Some time ago I heart a man ask a radio audience, “Is your Christ God?” My first reaction was one of surprise and curiosity, but the more I thought of it the more relevant the question appeared. The Christ of the Bible and the Christ of personal experience must be the same.
The Christ portrayed in Scriptures has certain attributes ascribed to his person and his work. Here we find historical record and divine revelation combined: we are told who he was and what he did, and we are also told truths about him that could come only through a revelation from God.
The affirmation has been made that we can reject the scriptural record about Christ and at the same time accept Christ. But the question instantly occurs, “What Christ?”
If we reject the Christ of the Bible, then we accept someone who is the product of human rationalization, deduction, and imagination. There is nothing wrong in using all our God-given faculties in thinking of Christ. However, if we do this while rejecting revealed truth concerning him, the person we conjure up may not be the real Christ at all.
But someone will argue: We accept the Christ of our own personal experience as led by the Holy Spirit. Good enough; but if the Christ of experience differs from the Christ of the Scriptures, the question is whether we have been led by the Holy Spirit or by our own imagination.
Unregenerate man readily goes off at tangents. The non-Christian religions of the world and the cults surrounding us are products of man-directed rather than Spirit-directed thinking.
The importance of holding the true conception of Christ cannot be overestimated. A Christ of the imagination—one different from the real Christ—can do inestimable harm. The pilot, whether on the sea or in the air, makes certain that the compass he follows is worthy of confidence. How much more important when eternal destinies are at stake!
To the question, “Is not the Christ believed in by all men essentially the same?” the answer is an emphatic No.
The Christ of the Bible is the eternal Son of God, who entered into this world through a virgin, who manifested himself and declared himself to be the Son of God, and who showed himself both sinless and sovereign over all creation.
The Christ of the Bible, deliberately and by design, gave himself as a ransom for sinners, and died on the cross and shed his blood so that those who believed in him could be delivered from the guilt and penalty of sin.
This same Christ arose from the dead with a physical body that was seen and could be touched. His body bore the evidences of the crucifixion. He talked to and ate with his disciples and showed himself alive on a number of occasions. He then ascended into heaven as they watched him go.
The Christ of the Bible will come again some day in great glory and power. His coming will bring to an end this age in which we live.
The Christ of the Bible was the Son of God. He was also the Son of man. He is portrayed to us in terms of supernatural pre-existence, supernatural advent into the world, supernatural characteristics and power while in the world, and a death with supernatural effect on those who believe. His resurrection was a supernatural event that brought with it supernatural power and hope for Christians. His ascension into heaven was supernatural in manner, and his promised coming will involve supernatural happenings.
On the other hand—and how vital the difference—the Christ of human reason is a man divested of his divine attributes, one from whom the supernatural is stripped. He is a man who came closer than any other man to attaining perfection, one to whom we look as an example to follow and a pattern to live by.
There are those who ascribe to him some degree of deity, vigorously affirming their faith in the divine Christ, but reject what they assume to be the manmade records in the Scripture; these, they claim, are merely the writings of ignorant and enthusiastic disciples. What Christ do they then worship? Is he not a Christ who is the product of a discipleship even more ignorant? For the Christ they embrace is also a Christ of man’s own imagination and not the Christ of the Bible.
Why this determined attempt to present another Christ? Is it not basically a rejection of the authority and integrity of the Scriptures, and a denial of the supernatural? We are told by some that advanced scholarship can no longer agree to the biblical record. This is untrue, for there are others of equal scholarship who bow their hearts, minds, and wills to the Christ of the Bible, accept him in all his supernatural manifestations, and attribute to him the glory and honor and power accorded him in the biblical record.
These are some attributes of the Christ of the Bible:
He is the Creator of the universe. “All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made” (John 1:3).
He was pre-existent. “And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was” (John 17:5).
He was the Son of God. “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (Mark 1:1).
He was virgin born. “Fear not, Mary.… Behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb.… The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God” (Luke 1:30–35).
He performed many miracles to prove his deity. “Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs, which God did by him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves know” (Acts 2:22).
He died on the Cross as an atonement for our sins. “In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace” (Eph. 1:7).
He arose from the dead. Jesus said: “Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have” (Luke 24:39).
He ascended up to heaven and is coming again. “Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11).
Finally, the Christ of the Bible is the only Saviour, our sure hope of eternal life. “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).
God in his infinite love and mercy has provided for us through his Son cleansing and forgiveness for sin and power to live for him through his indwelling Holy Spirit.
The Christ of the Bible is our one hope. It is sheer folly to trust in any other.
