A non-violent, non-angry take on why Jesus had to die

[sleepthroughthestatic]

I'm slowly working through my thoughts on this topic. Any feedback or criticism would be appreciated, from all walks of faith (or lack thereof).

Why Did Jesus Have To Die?

Jesus came to reveal to the world exactly what God is like.
John 17:25-26: "Father, I showed the world what you are like". Jesus is the "exact imprint of God's nature" (Heb 1:3).

What this means is that Jesus revealed through his life, death, and resurrection EXACTLY what God is like, has always been like, and always will be like--for His moral character is unchanging (James 1:17).

What changes EVERYTHING is our perception of who God is, and how God relates to us. If we have a bad idea of God, it is going to bear bad fruit. Judging from the Old Testament, we had a lot of bad ideas about who God is, and it bore a lot of bad fruit (such as the Canaanite massacres). Jesus was the messenger that needed to clear up these depictions of God (Mal 3:1-4).

The cross is a message that reveals that God is unconditional love, and we relate to God by participating in and embodying His love. From this, all of our salvation flows. Nothing metaphysical needed to happen.

1. Jesus died for our sins.

Jesus did not die for our sins in the sense that God was holding them against us, and so blood was necessary to appease God. Jesus died for our sins because We THOUGHT God holds our sins against us (see Deut 28), and Jesus revealed with absolute clarity that this is NOT the case and never has been the case!

We see Jesus being mocked, tortured, and killed by His worst enemies, and Jesus still says "Father, forgive them". Humanity at it's absolute worst, killing God incarnate, was freely forgiven without any merit on their behalf. If God forgives that, then we can know with absolute clarity there is nothing that God has not already forgiven.

So we see that Jesus defeated our self-condemnation, and our picture of a God that holds sin against us and demands retribution! Jesus did indeed die for our sins!

2. Jesus defeated the Bible and religion.

Jesus broke Sabbath (John 5:18). Scripture says Sabbath breakers are guilty and must be put to death (Exodus 31:14-15). Yet we also know Jesus was actually innocent (Luke 23:41) We see that Jesus was simultaneously GUILTY in the eyes of Scripture, but INNOCENT in the eyes of God.

Jesus' death was proof that religion divorced from reason and empathy can actually kill the innocent son of God. The Pharisees were genuinely following Scripture in their murder of Jesus. We do the same thing today, using Scripture to kill God's purposes.

3. Jesus' death has set humanity on a trajectory that will eventually lead to our salvation

The more people who embody God's love revealed on the cross, and pursue this showing of love with the abandon that Jesus did, the less we will continue to self-destruct as a species. If one day "the whole earth will have knowledge of God" (Hab 2:14), and the knowledge of God is love as shown on the cross, then we will stop killing each other through warfare and hurting ourselves through our ignorance and wickedness. This may actually fulfill the evolutionary process, and we will be a much fitter species that has the capacity to survive (otherwise we may actually completely destroy ourselves with warfare).

5. Jesus defeated our hopelessness in the midst of suffering

We see a God that is not alien to our suffering, and actively enters into it on our behalf. God is with us in our darkest times, and through the resurrection, we have the hope that God will ultimately defeat out suffering.

4. Jesus defeated the Problem of Evil.

In addition to entering into suffering, we also see in Jesus' ministry that Jesus always treated evil as the work of Satan, not of God. He ALWAYS did everything in his ability to combat the evil. Therefore, we can be confident that God is always doing everything within His ability to defeat the work of Satan, and never sits back and idly allows it. Which means God never causes or allows evil, which means God is not omnipotent (at least in the way we usually define the word).

5. Jesus defeated other bad theology

The Bible frequently depicts those who do good as being rewarded by God, and those who do evil as being punished--no exceptions (Deut 28). The Old Testament wrestles with this idea, and occasionally protests it (several Psalms, Job, Ecclesiastes). You can imagine how toxic this belief was, as anyone who was the victim of suffering not only was enduring their suffering, but everyone around them thought they were justly being punished by God because they did something evil! Jesus blew up this toxic idea, by showing that following God can make you die the death of a criminal.

5. Jesus defeated death

Jesus revealed that we need not fear death in our pursuit of making heaven on earth, because as revealed by the resurrection, death is temporary. This is very empowering for activism. This also defeated our anxiety about death, which can be unhealthy.

6. Jesus defeated violence.

We see that God would rather die on the behalf of others, than to kill. And we are called to do the same.

7. Jesus defeated the irrational slaughter of animals and religious rituals to appease God

I don't think God enjoyed watching a bunch of animals get killed because we thought we needed to shed blood to appease to Him (Psalm 50:13-14). Beyond that though, was the deeper problem of us thinking we needed to do the "right things" to be in God's presence. This was a barrier that blocked us from experiencing God in the relational way God desires.
And that's all I've got for now. I'll keep thinking. Feel free to add!

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 20 by William]




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In God we trust... yeah, I mean the god of the Bible[/center]

Trusting GOD is a far better option.

That sounds real nice.
____________

Question:

• 
  
  Where oh where did you get your IDEAS about God?
  
  

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[Divine Insight]

I'm slowly working through my thoughts on this topic. Any feedback or criticism would be appreciated, from all walks of faith (or lack thereof).

Trying to make a decent God out of Jesus in spite of the horrible God of the Old Testament can never be made to work. The problem is that Jesus is nothing if not the demigod Son of Yahweh. Jesus has no authority to speak on matter of divine knowledge if he's not the only begotten Son of Yahweh, or if he's not God himself.

The problem with Jesus in Christianity is that Jesus has been "nailed' to the God of the Old Testament even more firmly than he was nailed to the cross.

So trying to salvage Christianity by making Jesus out to be a decent God in spite of the horrible God of Old Testament can never work. Although this is certainly a tactic used by many "Christians" who have come to realize that the OT cannot be true as written.

Also you suggest that Jesus came to show us what God is really like. But that would require once again that the God of the Old Testament was totally inept and incompetent in not being able to show what he's truly like from the start.

So this approach to "saving Christianity" or "saving Jesus" truly is a futile approach.

I understand what you are attempting to do, and even why you are attempting to do this. Every Christian wants to "save Jesus" as having some sort of legitimacy and authority to speak about divine and supernatural topics. But it truly is futile.

Jesus cannot be the demigod (or only begotten Son) of Yahweh. That's just not a sustainable theology. Nor could Jesus have been Yahweh incarnate either.

But the path you are going down is a very well-trodden path to be sure. Thousands of Christians are currently going down that path trying to make out that Jesus represents what God is "truly like" whilst the OT obviously had it all wrong.

But that's simply not supportable. The God of the OT would need to be totally inept in order for that scenario to be the true.

As an previous Christian I too tried very hard to make that scenario work. But in the end it truly can't be justified. Yahweh would need to be a totally inept bumbling fool in order for Jesus to need to come and show what Yahweh was "Truly Like".

That would imply that Yahweh had no clue how to show his true nature from the get go. So this simply cannot be made to work.

[William]

It does actually work if one understands the concept of a planetary consciousness which is evolving into GOD-head and is all of the above and more.

From an ignorantly arrogant human perspective, sure, a sometimes bumbling inept GOD can be attached to the character of the OT idea of GOD but in order to do so, one has to cherry-pick anyway.

There are two options for the individual.

1: Evolve with the GOD.
2: Support anything that attacks any idea of the GOD evolving.

It is true that Christendom took Jesus and tried to merge him with an older, less evolved concept of the GOD which had proved to be corruptible through the actions of human beings.

That in itself does not signify therefore that the GOD is corruptible.

Jesus clearly enough had a message which was basically saying mistakes were made and needed to be rectified and the arrogant have taken this to signify failure.

Jesus too warned that any message from GOD can be corrupted by humans in order to serve the interests of the arrogant.

Christians are indeed deceived by the message of Christendom. They would do well to walk the path of an evolving GOD.

They would also do well to rebuke any message which insists that Jesus, GOD etc are to be spurned as evildoers and ridiculed as irrelevant myths. Such messages of arrogance and ignorance are sourced with the Filthy Little Liar, and are for the purpose of deception, under the guise of being enlightened and, even in some cases, claiming even to having 'divine' insight, and from that proclaiming such as "one cannot be a GOD if one cannot make folk obey GOD of their own volition," amoung other claims of that nature.

We are all GOD in the making, and those who spurn that through either separating GOD from human beings and enthroning that idea as a false idol to worship, or willfully employing proclamations against all ideas of GOD. These are effectively on the same team, because both are acts of arrogance and ignorance and run contrary to the ture nature of this GOD.

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 23 by William]




[center]

Another truly true humble perspective of the truth from the one and only true truth provider[/center]

It does actually work if one understands the concept of a planetary consciousness which is evolving into GOD-head and is all of the above and more.

Planets can think now?

From an ignorantly arrogant human perspective, sure, a sometimes bumbling inept GOD can be attached to the character of the OT idea of GOD but in order to do so, one has to cherry-pick anyway.

We are truly blessed to have people in here who aren't ignorant nor arrogant and who truly know the true truth of the truth like that.

Jesus too warned that any message from GOD can be corrupted by humans in order to serve the interests of the arrogant.

Were so lucky that there are humble people in the world who tell us how things REALLY are.


Thank you, and God bless

[American Deist]

[Replying to post 1 by sleepthroughthestatic]

Jesus died because Pilate ordered his execution as a rabble rouser within the Roman province of Judea. Jesus was made an example out of for all those that were considering rebellion.

[Divine Insight]

It does actually work if one understands the concept of a planetary consciousness which is evolving into GOD-head and is all of the above and more.

But that's not the Biblical story. The Biblical story is not about a bumbling inept God who is evolving alongside humans.

So it doesn't work in the context of the Biblical God.

[Blastcat]

[Replying to post 25 by American Deist]

Jesus died because Pilate ordered his execution as a rabble rouser within the Roman province of Judea. Jesus was made an example out of for all those that were considering rebellion.

I love it when people explain a mystery that nobody else knows.
I would love it a bit MORE if they could support their hypothesis with some evidence.
We don't want to mistake opinions for facts.

Could you cite your source?

[William]

It does actually work if one understands the concept of a planetary consciousness which is evolving into GOD-head and is all of the above and more.

But that's not the Biblical story. The Biblical story is not about a bumbling inept God who is evolving alongside humans.

Not so that it is that noticeable.

Q: If you were the planet entity and wished to have human consciousness become aware of you, how would you go about it, knowing the limitations you would obviously have in accomplishing this task?

So it doesn't work in the context of the Biblical God.

Sure it does. The definition of the god would have to shift a degree or two, but it is very likely all that we would be doing in that case, is shifting it back to where it originally was positioned before human beings figured out there was a way of controlling this god indirectly through controlling the peoples beliefs about this god.

[Blastcat]

It does actually work if one understands the concept of a planetary consciousness which is evolving into GOD-head and is all of the above and more.

But that's not the Biblical story. The Biblical story is not about a bumbling inept God who is evolving alongside humans.

So it doesn't work in the context of the Biblical God.

That's debatable.
Sorry, I disagree.

I take the god of the Bible as a bumbling idiot who intends EVIL and who seems to be surprised about events.

Free will defense.. ya gotta love it