Jesus Is More Than Jesus

Browsing through a hymnal this morning it became clear to me that we have, especially through our hymns, made Jesus our God.  I know, I know, we have the doctrine of the Trinity (Three in One) and the idea that Jesus was God’s Son, sent to “save us from our sins” by dying on a cross, as a substitute, as a sacrifice—like unto the slaughter of the unblemished lamb in Old Testament times—to atone for our sin.  This has become the focus of faith for many Christians—“Christ died for me” and that is why He came.  In having this focus, we make Jesus less than the Jesus of the New Testament.

Now I am convinced that Jesus is more than Jesus.  With the early Christians I see Him as the Logos, the Word of God, God’s expression, the incarnation of God.  But if Jesus only came to die in order to save my puny soul and yours, we have narrowed down, minimized, and perhaps even missed, the tremendous import and meaning of his coming.  The New Testament says Jesus is more than Jesus:  He reveals the Spirit of the Living God in whom we too live and move and have our being, and that Spirit can work in us just as in Jesus.  Now that is good news—gospel!

Jesus is more than Jesus.  He is not simply a teacher and a personal ideal, he is not just the sacrificed Lamb, Jesus is the pioneer of a new age on earth for all mankind.  The New Testament proclaims this good news.  Jesus is more than Jesus.  He is more than a teacher, more than an example: “he opened the gates of a new age, changed B.C. to A.D., introduced into history a new force, let loose in the world a new dynamic that can, and does, and will, change human life and transform human relationships” (Fosdick).

If Jesus were only a teacher, telling us what we ought to do, if he were only an individual ideal, telling us to be like himself, what would that do?  Jesus is more than that.  He is “the pioneer,” says the New Testament, of the world’s salvation (not just the salvation of my soul or yours).  Jesus is the Messiah of a new humanity.  He inaugurated a new age (he pioneered it) and we are living in it.  The old order is passing away, and the new order is coming into being. Jesus is more than the Jesus we have focused on.  And that gives me hope!