The most incredible man
It’s not often that my entire post is made up of a quote, but I really wanted to post this. The author is Joe Crews. You may or may not have heard of him. He was a good Christian man, a prolific writer, and the founder of Amazing Facts. Here’s what he wrote about our Lord Jesus Christ:
“I invite you to consider with me a Man — the most incredible Man who ever lived. The facts of His life are enough to arrest the attention of anyone to give it careful consideration.
This incredible Man was born without a human father; in a nameless, lower-class family during a housing shortage; under a set of emergency circumstances that made a cowshed His place of birth. This Man grew up on the dirt floor of a tiny, over-crowded home, in an obscure village in Palestine. And young people, He never rode a bike, nor swam in a pool, nor watched TV, nor talked into a telephone, nor listened to a radio! But when this unique person became thirty years of age, He spent just three years in carving out a destiny that will never be forgotten and around which millions have clustered. He had no formal education. He wrote no books. He received no worldly honors. He held no office. He owned no home and frankly stated that even though the “foxes have their holes and the birds of the air have their nests, the Son of Man hath not where to lay His head.”
He never accepted a penny for His services. He espoused the underdog to the disgust of the ruling class. He never traveled more than two hundred miles from the place of His birth. He dared to expose wickedness in the face of terrific Roman ruthlessness, Jewish hatred, and the incendiary political situation of Palestine that was destined to crush Him. He was executed as a criminal after helping and healing and blessing countless thousands of people as no organization of His day could possibly do. They gambled for the only piece of property He owned, a seamless outer garment. Neither He nor His family owned a cemetery plot, or a grave, and so His closest friends borrowed a cave in which to lay His body.
In the ensuing years millions upon millions have come to worship Him, and many have laid down their lives for Him because of Who He was. This Man loved as no man has ever loved. As we look at His unique character, it is so vast that it is like the starry heavens. When you gaze you look deeper and deeper, and it becomes more wonderful all the time. We stand and admire. We look. We esteem, and we are startled as was the Centurion, who was responsible for His crucifixion, when he exclaimed, “Truly this was the Son of God.”
We turn to Matthew 21:10, and we see there that Jerusalem did not know its Lord, but when Jesus came riding into the city on a colt, the people turned out by the multitudes and said, “Who is this?”
“Who is this?” Many today are asking the same question. “Who is this Man, this incredible Man, the Lord Jesus Christ?” In reality, this is not just a man. This is an incredible God who because of love left heaven and came to this earth and inherited the degradation and terror that sin had wrought for 4,000 years and took upon Himself a body and died on the cross for our sins.
This Man has changed the world by His ability to change the human heart. Because of this, Jesus has the ability to change the world. An unknown author wrote these interesting words: “I am far within the mark when I say that all the armies that ever marched and all the navies that ever sailed and all the parliaments that ever sat and all the kings that ever reigned, put together have not affected life on earth as powerfully as this one solitary life, the life of Jesus Christ.
Jesus changed the world because He can change human life beyond recognition. There are many religions in the world. There are the cults of the Orient with all of their pathways to some “Nirvana.” There are the African voodoo worshipers. There are spiritist revelations, and the psychologic cults for those who are more sophisticated. Take your pick. But no religion in the world has claimed to do what this incredible Man has! This incomparable Christ does today, exactly what He did in April of A.D. 29. He takes a man and cleanses him of his guilt and sin. He transforms his life. He puts within that life His Spirit so that a man becomes a “new creation.” And then, He gives him a sense of self-worth and guarantees a hope of resurrection and eternal life. What religion in the world claims to do this?
In John 9 there was a man healed by Jesus who was blind from birth. The Pharisees got hold of this story and seized the man. They interrogated him and asked him all sorts of questions about Jesus. He became so shaken by it that, finally, he said, “I don’t know anything about this man; but one thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see.” Isn’t this enough, dear friends? Any Christian will say the same thing. Thank God for the wonderful revelation in Jesus Christ.
If Christ were a mere man, this would pose no problem. We could dispense with Him as the psychologist often does. Philosophize Him away if you wish. Do what you will with this historical person if He is not divine. If He is a great teacher, destroy His books; but if He is more than a great teacher, look out!
If Jesus is what He said He was, then, my friend, be careful! If Jesus did come from heaven, you are treading on sacred ground. Your entire destiny is wrapped up with who Jesus really was. If Jesus is divine, then there rests in the hands of every human being an entire destiny that rises or falls on our relationship to this incredible Man. It is the world’s grandest opportunity if you accept it. It is a most fearful responsibility.”
