Christianity – Boring, untrue and irrelevant?
I could introduce you to a number of people, friends of mine who would tell you that if you spend any amount of time examining Christianity, you are wasting your time. They would tell you that Christianity is boring, untrue and irrelevant.
Is Christianity Boring?
People who think Christianity is boring are people who have had some previous brush or contact with Christianity. An experience of school or a wedding or Christening that meant sitting in uncomfortable seats listening for what seemed like hours to the Bible being read and the commented on at length, music that is designed to put you to sleep and people who seem like the most uninteresting on earth.
The problem is – it cannot be denied that much of the way the church portrays itself is like that. And it puts people off from hearing the real message.
It is as though people have been inoculated against the real Christian message by being given a dead version – that is dull, dusty, but enough like the real thing that the body learns to reject the real thing. But the real Christian message is anything but dull, dusty and dead.
Christianity is about the message of Jesus.
Listen to what people have said about Jesus!
- Florence Nightingale
“People talk about imitating Christ, and imitate Him in the little trifling formal things, such as washing the feet, saying His prayer, and so on; but if anyone attempts the real imitation of Him, there are no bounds to the outcry with which the presumption of that person is condemned.”
- Martin Luther King Jr. - American civil rights leader
"Jesus Christ was an extremist for love, truth and goodness."
- Larry King - Television interviewer and presenter
“I would like to ask Him if He was indeed virgin born, because the answer to that question would define history.”
- Mikhail Gorbachev - Soviet Leader
"Jesus was the first socialist, the first to seek a better life for mankind."
- Albert Einstein
“I am a Jew, but I am enthralled by the luminous figure of the Nazarene. Jesus is too colossal for the pen of phrasemongers, however artful”. He further added: “No man can read the gospels without feeling the actual presence of Jesus. His personality pulsates in every word. No myth is filled with such life … Theseus and other heroes of his type lack the authentic vitality of Jesus”.
- Sholem Asch - Jewish author
"Jesus Christ is to me the outstanding personality of all time, all history, both as Son of God and as Son of Man. Everything he ever said or did has value for us today and that is something you can say of no other man, dead or alive. There is no easy middle ground to stroll upon. You either accept Jesus or reject him."
People speaking of Jesus use the terms outcry, extremist, define history, the first socialist, a man with authentic vitality, a luminous figure - all far from boring!
The thing is, people who can say that Christianity is boring have not met Jesus – and I use the term met deliberately because once you have encountered the living Jesus that the Bible speaks of, who died and rose again, you are never the same.
To so many, the question - “What am I here for? Or “Why do I exist?” is answered not with an answer but is covered over with a pile of entertainment and pleasure that prevents us having to answer the question. Pleasure, money, family, relationships - all prevent us from facing up to the question.
But Jesus said this -
"I am the way, the truth and the life".1
He claims to be the way to the meaning of life, he claims to be the answer to the question - "Why do I exist?" Far from boring!
Is Christianity Untrue?
The heart of Christianity is under attack. And it is currently under attack not because people consider it to be boring, but because people are attacking its integrity – it’s truthfulness.
This attack seems to be coming from two fronts that overlap - the scientific community and the media.
Richard Dawkins, award winning writer and professor at Oxford University recently brought out a book entitiled “The God Delusion”
“ Although Jesus probably existed, reputable biblical scholars do not in general regard the New Testament (and obviously not the Old Testament) as a reliable record of what actually happened in history, and I shall not consider the Bible further as evidence for any kind of deity. ” 2
Just a few months ago James Cameron, the director of Titanic was reported to be making a documentary about the Bone Ossuary discovered in Jerusalem that purports to have the bones of the Holy Family in it.
Marshall Thompson who writes for the associated press comments “…the very fact that Jesus had an ossuary would contradict the Christian belief that he was raised resurrected and ascended to heaven.”
The question that is being raised is Christianity really true?
You may be hear because you have been dragged along by a friend or family member. You are a sceptic. Great. The Alpha course is not for religious people – it is for anyone, no matter what the objections, or arguments. The Alpha Course is a great opportunity to ask your questions and try and get some answers. I think asking questions is so important.
But just a warning – history is littered with people who have started arguing, intent on disproving the truthfulness of Christianity, but have ended up themselves convinced. And if I’m honest – that is what I’m doing this for. I am so thoroughly convinced of the evidence that I believe it stands up and is the truth.
C. S. Lewis –
“ Christianity is a statement which – if false, is of no importance, and, if true, of infinite importance. The one thing it cannot be is moderately important. ”
If this is true then we can ask any question of it, and there will be an answer. Now I am not claiming to know all the answers – no – we are all human and limited, but for Christianity to be true there must be an answer. Having faith in Jesus is not about taking a blind leap and hoping for the best. It is about weighing up the evidence and asking whether I can say that beyond reasonable doubt this is true. We don’t want to leave our brains at the door – far from it. We need to weigh the evidence.
Anne Rice – “I have covered an enormous amount of sceptical criticism, violent arguments, and I have read voraciously in the primary sources of Philo and Josephus which I deeply enjoy……I expected to discover that their arguments would be frighteningly strong, and that Christianity was, at heart, a kind of fraud. I’d have to end up compartmentalizing my mind with faith in one part of it, and truth in another….what gradually came clear to me was that many of the sceptical arguments – arguments that insisted most of the gospels were suspect, for instance, or written too late to be eyewitness accounts – lacked coherence. They were not elegant. Arguments about Jesus himself were full of conjecture. Some books were no more than assumptions piled upon assumptions. Absurd conclusions were reached on the basis of little or no data at all.
In sum…that whole picture which had floated in the liberal circles I had frequented as an atheist for 30 years – that case was not made ." 3
So we will consider what the Bible has to say about Jesus – and can we really trust what the Bible has to say to us? But we will also consider evidence from independent historians who are not Christians. And we will find plenty of good evidence for us to say that Christianity is indeed true!
But there is more to truth than facts. Jesus once said this
“I am the way, the truth and the life ” John 14:6
Truth is something to be understood – but it is something to be known and experienced too.
Suppose before I met my wife I had read a book about her. Having read this book I thought to myself, – ‘Wow – she sounds like a fantastic woman. That is the person I want to marry’. There would be a big difference in my state of mind then – intellectually convinced that she was a wonderful person – and my state of mind now have experienced being married to her for 6 years. I can now say she is a wonderful person.
Knowing the truth about her is different from knowing her.
Jesus says I am the truth. Knowing the truth about him is important – but it is not knowing him. The message of Christianity is about a relationship with the truth – knowing Jesus which is life changing and changes the way we view the world around us.
Is Christianity irrelevant?
A few moments ago we read Jesus words
“I am the way the truth and the life!”
Not only does he claim to be the truth, he claims to be life too.
We humans are amazing. We are an intricate connection of minerals, elements and compounds that make up cells which house the building blocks of life. Each cell holds more information than is contained in the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica. Just look at a single organ - the skin as seen in the dove adverts – it is breathtaking in it’s brilliance.
But we are more than our physical make-up. We have a consciousness that marks us out from all of the rest of animal kind. In fact the Bible tells us we are made in God’s image – with a soul.
There is something noble about us human beings.
But we are also fallen – we are born with a propensity to do evil that leads to lives that are often less than noble
Bernard Levin, the Times journalist and columnist said this a few years ago.
“ Countries like ours are full of people who have all the material comforts they desire, together with such non-material blessings as a happy family, and yet lead lives of quiet, and at times noisy, desperation, understanding nothing but the fact that there is a hole inside them and that, however much food and drink they pour into it, however many motor cars and television sets they stuff it with, however many well-balanced children and loyal friends they parade around it… it aches”
And into this vacuum Jesus says “I am the way, the truth and the life!”
C.S.Lewis again said
“For the first time I examined myself with a seriously practical purpose. And then I found what appalled me; a zoo of lusts, a bedlam of ambitions, a nursery of fears, a harem of fondled hatreds…”
Christianity is relevant because Jesus comes to offer forgiveness, and the way to living life to the full.
Christianity is about Christ. Alpha is an opportunity to have a long, hard look at Christ and I’m sure we will find he is anything but boring, he is the truth and supremely relevant to our current lives and our eternal futures.
So I want to invite you to join us in this journey – I promise you won’t regret it, or your money back.
1 John 14:6
2 The God Delusion, by Richard Dawkins. pg 97
3 Christ the Lord, by Anne Rice. pg 312-314