C-1 : The Great Vision of the Gospels

Rainbow Bar

" Where there is no VISION ,
the people PERISH."
{ Proverbs 29:18 }
The Wonderful World
According to Jesus

[ You won't fully appreciate Chapter C, if you have not read
Chapter A - "Why so many suffer so much" and
Chapter B - "The Vision of the Great Prophets of Old" ]
There is so much in the Bible that it is very easy to get lost in it. Even experts usually end up following some guide. Whether people are led to the most important and useful passages or not depends on the quality of those guides. Unfortunately many of them will lead you right past what is really important, and then make you think that something that isn't that important is the end of the world. I am offering my services here as such a guide. Be careful. Don't follow me or anyone else just because we pretend to know our way around the bible. The best way to avoid being taken in by false guides is to read the words of the best Christian there has ever been, bar none, Jesus of Nazareth. It sounds too simple to need saying, but read the Gospels over and over again for yourself, and see if you don't begin to recognize how far the preaching, writing AND EXAMPLE of many so-called religious authorities really is from that of Jesus.
More importantly, you will realize that many of the debates that rage among many religious people are a tremendous waste of time and resources. There is more than enough REALLY IMPORTANT and VERY UNAMBIGUOUS teaching in the Bible that we ought to attend to instead. There's nothing difficult about knowing what was paramount in Christ's mind, because he spelled it all out for us. in response to FIVE CRUCIAL QUESTIONS:

What was the purpose of Christ's life ? Jesus' answer = Luke 4:18.
Which is the most important command in the laws of Moses? nbsp; Jesus' answer = Matthew 22
What must one do to live forever in heaven? Jesus' answer = Luke 10.
What does God expect of us every day? Jesus' answer = Matthew 25.
What is the "price" that God requires us to pay for eternal life? Jesus' answer = Matthew 19,

CRUCIAL QUESTION # 1 :
What was the purpose of Christ's life ? Jesus came into the world with a vision which he described as "GOOD NEWS for the Poor " :
Christ's Mission {Luke 4:18}
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me;
he has appointed me
to preach Good News to the poor;
he has sent me to heal the brokenhearted
and to announce that the blind shall see,
that captives shall be released
and the downtrodden shall be freed
( i.e. liberated ) from their oppressors."

Did Jesus accomplish his mission during the next three years of his life? Of course not. But did Jesus ever plan to do all of this ALONE, and in his own lifetime? Or did Jesus' vision include a multitude of followers, who over the centuries and in every nation in the world would share that vision and work towards its realization in His Name? If Christ's followers would pay close attention to what JESUS explicitly identified as the most important parts of his own teaching, they would recognize that Jesus expects THEM to SHARE in his mission to preach Good News to the poor; . . . to heal the brokenhearted and to announce that the blind shall see, that captives shall be released and the downtrodden shall be liberated from their oppressors."
There is no need to WONDER about what is most important in Christ's teaching, because he was asked about that very matter, and answered as follows ( reiterated in Mark 12, 28--31, Luke 10, 25--28 (below), and John 13, 34--35 ) :

CRUCIAL QUESTION # 2 :
Which is the most important command in the laws of Moses?
{ Matthew 22:36-40 } "Sir, which is the most important command in the laws of Moses?" Jesus replied,
"This is the first and greatest commandment: 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind.'
The second most important is similar: 'Love your neighbor as much as you love yourself.'
All the other commandments and all the demands of the prophets stem from these two laws and are fulfilled if you obey them. Keep only these and you will find that you are obeying all the others."
How much simpler could Jesus have made his teaching: just two commandments? Yet, Jesus understood that not everybody would be able to figure out by themselves whom they must love and precisely what that love should move them to do.
And so, to illustrate whom we must love, i.e. whom we should consider our neighbors, he gave us the deceptively simple "parable of the good Samaritan" :

CRUCIAL QUESTION # 3 :
What must one do to live forever in heaven?
Christ's FIRST Answer to CRUCIAL QUESTION # 3 : In Luke's Gospel, Jesus may be answering the same question posed to him above, but the wording is a little different here, and the so-called "Parable of the Good Samaritan" becomes Jesus' way of spelling out whom he wants us to consider our neighbors, i.e. NOT those who live closest to us or who are most closely related to us, but THOSE WHO ARE MOST IN NEED OF OUR HELP.
{ Luke 10:25-37 } One day an expert on Moses' laws came to test Jesus' orthodoxy by asking him this question: "Teacher, what does a man need to do to live forever in heaven?" Jesus replied, "What does Moses' law say about it?" "It says," he replied, " that you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind. And you must love your neighbor just as much as you love yourself. " "Right!", Jesus told him. "Do this and you shall live!"
But, wanting to justify himself, the man asked, "Which neighbors must I love?" And Jesus replied with an illustration:
"A Jew going on a trip from Jerusalem to Jericho was attacked by bandits. They stripped him of his clothes and money, and beat him up and left him lying half dead beside the road. By chance a priest came along; and when he saw the man lying there, he crossed to the other side of the road and passed him by. A temple--assistant walked over and looked at him lying there, but then went on.
But a despised Samaritan (a non-believer) came along, and when he saw him, he felt deep pity. Kneeling beside him the Samaritan soothed his wounds with medicine and bandaged them. Then he put the man on his donkey and walked along beside him till they came to an inn, where he nursed him through the night. The next day he handed the innkeeper two silver coins and told him to take care of the man. "If his bill runs higher than that," he said, " I'll pay the difference the next time I am here."
"Now which of these three," Jesus asked, " would you say was a neighbor to the bandit's victim?" The man replied, "The one who showed him some pity." Then Jesus said, "Yes, now go and do the same."
There is no doubt that Christ's "Parable of the Good Samaritan" is one of his all time favorite sermons. But how many clergymen who use it in their preaching point out that, INSTEAD of following the example of the clergy and other "churchy" people, Jesus went out of his way to direct his followers to"Go and do like" the infidel, because HE was the one and only one who CARED that a fellow man was in pain, and in need of help ?
For centuries, while millions -- if not billions -- of people have been systematically victimized, not by bandits, but by highly respected companies and "entrepreneurs", whole churches have been virtually oblivious to those crimes and still are. And they have not just crossed over to the other side of the street, but have often moved their church buildings to other communities, so as not to even see the troubles of troubled communities. Are crimes against innocent victims any less tragic because they are happening all day, every day, on a massive scale, and if they are only seen through the eyes of reporters and/or television cameras? Faces of the Needy Many "churchmen" tell poor victims of such oppression -- if they talk to them at all -- that the "Good News" which Jesus was sent by the Spirit of the Lord to deliver to them was some spiritual "pie in the sky when you die". Their version of Christ's teaching is that the poor should bear their cross in this life and look forward to deliverance "in the next life." That would have been a great line for the priest in Jesus' parable to deliver to the victim of the bandits, before he crossed to the other side of the road. But that is hardly what Jesus had in mind when he said he had been sent "to heal the brokenhearted and to announce that the blind shall see, that captives shall be released, and the downtrodden shall be freed from their oppressors".
How far from that vision of liberating love and activism have the clergy moved! How many of them now have become more and more like the upper class people to whom they like to minister, living more and more like them, and moving further and further away from those whom Jesus came to liberate. Indeed, instead of fighting WITH the poor against their oppressors, they have often turned religion into an "opiate of the people", i.e. something to keep the disadvantaged from feeling their pain badly enough to rebel against their oppressors. Christians can easily dismiss Karl Marx's indictment as the rantings of an enemy. But no atheistic critic has had harsher things to say about the failures of religious leaders than has Jesus himself:
{Matthew 7: 15-29 } "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits (i.e. by their actions) . . . "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven."
"On that day many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not preach in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many deeds of power in your name?" Then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers.' "Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell--and great was its fall !"
Now when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes did". . .
These days many clergy are still "preaching and casting out demons ", still claiming, without justification, to speak and to act in Christ's name. But this web site invokes the authority of Christ's own words to demand that those who want to use the name of Christ and/or the Bible, EARN THAT RIGHT BY BEING TRUE TO WHAT JESUS AND THE BIBLE ACTUALLY TAUGHT. And simply sprinkling one's own pet theories with quotes from the Scriptures is not enough to make one a genuine spokesman for Jesus or the Bible. As Shakespeare said so well, " Even the Devil can quote the Scripture for his own purposes." Neither is it enough to be enamored of certain parts of Jesus' teaching, while ignoring other indispensable parts of that teaching, and therefore failing to enlighten one's followers about that essential teaching.

Christ's SECOND Answer to CRUCIAL QUESTION # 3 :
While many people today think they are perfectly good Christians, if they love the kinds of people who love them, Jesus shocked his listeners when he unveiled a very different portrait of what constitutes good Christrians :
{ Luke 6: 31-35 } Do to others as you would have them do to you. If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. If you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again. But love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High.
And in
{Matthew 10:34-37 } Jesus said: "Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and one's foes will be members of one's own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
Jesus even made the point that his teaching applied to his own immediate family, in { Matthew 12:47-49 } Someone told him, "Look, your mother and your brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you." But to the one who had told him this, Jesus replied, "Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?" And pointing to his disciples, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother."

CRUCIAL QUESTION # 5 :
What does God expect of us every day? To spell out what loving those neighbors entails, Jesus explained what God expects in OUR day, by having his listeners fast-forward themselves to judgement day (when God will make us face the consequences of what we do today):
{Matthew 25:31-46 } "When I, the Messiah, shall come in glory, and all the angels with me, then I shall sit upon my throne of glory. And all the nations shall be gathered before me. And I will separate the people as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats, and place the sheep at my right hand, and the goats at my left.
Last Judgement Then I, the King, shall say to those at my right, "Come, blessed of my Father, into the Kingdom prepared for you from the founding of the world. For I was hungry and you fed me; I was thirsty and you gave me water; I was a stranger and you invited me into your homes; naked and you clothed me; sick and in prison, and you visited me."
Then these righteous ones will reply, "Sir, when did we ever see you hungry and feed you? Or thirsty and give you anything to drink? Or a stranger, and help you? Or naked, and clothe you? When did we ever see you sick or in prison, and visit you?" And I, the King, will tell them, "When you did it to these my brothers you were doing it to me!"
Then I will turn to those on my left and say, "Away with you, you cursed ones, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his demons. For I was hungry and you wouldn't feed me; thirsty, and you wouldn't give me anything to drink; a stranger, and you refused me hospitality; naked and you wouldn't clothe me; sick, and in prison, and you didn't visit me."
Then they will reply, "Lord, when did we ever see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and not help you?" And I will answer, "When you refused to help the least of these my brothers, you were refusing to help me." And they shall go away into eternal punishment; but the righteous into everlasting life."

CRUCIAL QUESTION # 6 :
What is the "price" that God requires us to pay for eternal life?
All kinds of Christians THINK they know Jesus' teaching. But how many think of the necessity of loving one's neighbors more than one's possessions as the centerpiece of that teaching?
{ Matthew 19: 16-25 } Then someone came to him and said, "Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?" And he said to him, "Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments." He said to him, "Which ones?" And Jesus said, "You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; Honor your father and mother; also, You shall love your neighbor as yourself." The young man said to him, "I have kept all these; what do I still lack?" Jesus said to him, "If you wish to be perfect, go, sell your possessions, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me." When the young man heard this word, he went away grieving, for he had many possessions. Then Jesus said to his disciples, "Truly I tell you, it will be hard for a rich person to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God." When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astounded and said, "Then who can be saved?"
Recognizing the perniciousness of wealth isn't the hard part, it's avoiding its temptation that is difficult. As Paul wrote so well to Timothy, { 6: 9-10 } "Those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil."
The love of money is so great that it is difficult to find preachers, in prosperous white communities at least, who preach anything like what Jesus preached about money and/or wealth.
As the world has become more and more developed, millions upon millions of people are becoming more and more miserable, while a handful of others keep getting richer and richer. According to New York University economist Edward Wolf, "The financial wealth of the top 1% of Americans now exceeds the combined net worth of the bottom 95%. Bill Gates' wealth alone exceeds the net worth of the bottom 45% (of American). The personal assets of Microsoft co-founders Paul Allen and Bill Gates, plus Berkshire Hathaway's Warren Buffet exceed the combined gross domestic products of the world's 41 poorest countries, with their 550 million citizens."
Is the negligence of the clergy any less reprehensible when, instead of a single clergyman ignoring the suffering of a single victim, whole churches ignore the suffering of vast segments of human kind? Try reading the parable of the "Good Samaritan" as "the parable of church leaders who miss the boat," and see what a difference it makes, especially if you view it with a world perspective.
Clergymen are meant to play an important role in the promotion of religion. But, in the words of Jesus, "From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required." (Luke 12:48) As a clergyman myself, I am afraid than many of us are guilty of something far more serious than not stopping to help individual victims of injustice. We are guilty of having twisted the teaching of the Bible, so as to enable others or even ourselves to hoard monstrously outlandish portions of this world's bounty on the one hand, and power on the other, and in the process, to ignore and forget the millions of our brothers and sisters , who are suffering untold misery, neglect, abuse and oppression at the hands of others. And in doing so, we are not only disobeying the second Great Commandment (to love our neighbor), but thereby proving that loving and pleasing God (the first Great Commandment) is not as important to us as accumulating wealth.

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