Lost and Found

Growing up, I had a pathological fear of getting lost. It didn’t matter if it was in a nearby cornfield that bordered our burgeoning suburbia, or on the busy highways connecting the vast metropolis in which I lived. For me, getting lost was a fate worse than death. While I wish I could pinpoint the origin of this fear, I cannot. Sure, I had the normal mishaps in which I was separated from my family—and I certainly remember numerous times in which I got lost driving. In the days before GPS, I relied not only on hand-written directions, but also on my ability to interpret them when encountering the street-level reality. The twists and turns in the roads often seemed to contradict the directions I had been given! Even today, living in a world in which we have GPS and Google Maps, I can still be turned in the wrong direction. New construction and detours move cars around the city streets in ever changing patterns that conspire to make even the most sophisticated GPS system sputter and fail.

When I feel I am lost, there is a deep terror that seizes me. Gripped by a feeling of panic, I am prevented from anything like clear thinking. I feel constricted within, my mind swimming with all of the worst possibilities that will befall me because I am lost. I can only focus in on my terror and I lose all sense of perspective with regards to finding my way. Perhaps the deepest anxiety that accompanies those instances of feeling lost is that I am all alone. I am not only separated from my bearings, but also from anyone who knows me, loves me, or cares about me. In these moments of panic, I feel I will wander alone and wonder how or if I will ever be found.

In the life of people of faith, there is also the fear of being lost. What if believing the wrong thing leads one off course? What if wrong choices lead down a path from which one might never return? What if doubt separates one from all guidance and direction? Many times, we
associate being lost with a deliberate turning away from faith by those who are rebellious, or who, like prodigal sons and daughters, desire escape to a far country away from the controlling gaze of those perceived to hinder freedom of movement in any way.

But what about those cases in which the directional equipment fails through no fault of those who seek their guidance? What about those unanticipated twists and turns in the road? What about the unexpected storm that arises and blows the ship far off course? There are certainly those times when disorientation, rather than rebellion obscures the path home.

Perhaps in these cases, ‘feeling’ lost is not the same thing as ‘being’ lost. The ancient Hebrew psalmist suggests that even while one might ‘feel’ lost, one is never lost to God. Where can I go from your presence? Where can I hide from your love? In the midst of his own disorienting experiences, the psalmist found comfort in the fact that even while
feeling lost and submerged in the remotest parts of the sea, even there your right hand will lay hold of me. When encompassed by utter darkness, the psalmist believes that the night is as bright as the day. The psalmist felt lost—disoriented by the forces that would obstruct the clear way. Yet, in the midst of these feelings, the psalmist affirms the abiding presence of God even in the most desolate places.

This image of the ever-abiding presence of God is extended in the ministry and teaching of Jesus. Jesus expands this image of the God who is especially near, not only to those who ‘feel’ lost, but for those deemed ‘lost’ by others. When the religious leaders of his day grumbled over the tax-gatherers and sinners coming near to listen to him teach, Jesus offered three images of a God who relentlessly seeks the lost in Luke’s gospel narrative.(1) The shepherd leaves the ninety-nine sheep in order to go after the one which is lost; the woman who has ten silver coins
turns her house upside down in order to find the one coin she has lost; and the father of the prodigal son is watching and waiting such that he sees his once wayward son while he is still a long way off. In fact, Jesus summarizes his ministry as one that seeks and saves that which was lost.(2)

This gives me great hope, both for the times when I feel lost, and as I wander alongside many others who have indeed lost their way home. Though some of the directions I’ve tried to follow are indiscernible, and even though I have been turned around and disoriented, I have always found the way home. But, more importantly, even when I feel I have lost my way, I am not lost to the God who pursues me. Like the servant Hagar affirmed when she was lost in the wilderness, you are the God who sees.

Margaret Manning is a member of the speaking and writing team at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Seattle, Washington.

(1) Luke 15
(2) Luke 19:10. Cf.
Matt. 18:11

The Really Real

Someone asked me recently to describe how I see God, what I envision, whom I perceive, and how I imagine God reacts when I think I’ve failed or succeeded. As I tried to put these mammoth ideas into words, I found it was helpful to speak aloud the attributes of God’s character. It was also helpful to see again the places where my own experiences of people or authorities have shaped the words I heard myself using, as well as the places where I might unjustly project upon God things that do not belong there. For instance, things that might seem incredibly real to me—my sense of failure or success, a sense of fear or offense—somehow seem, not unimportant, but less tall, less real, if I imagine really trying to describe them to the man who claimed to be God.

The Gospel of John recounts the story of a man confronted with the responsibility to grapple with his perception of Jesus and the looming worry on his mind. John 4:43-54 tells of a certain royal
official whose son was ill and hours away from death. This man had heard that Jesus had arrived in a town nearby, so with a desperate hope he left his son’s side and went to the place where Jesus was teaching. There, he hurriedly begged Jesus to come back with him to Capernaum and heal his son.

We are not told much about the official’s perspective of the rabbi from Nazareth. Had he heard that Jesus was a miracle worker? Was he certain that God was with him and not Beelzebub as others speculated? Or was it merely a last feeble attempt to change the outcome that seemed likely on his son’s deathbed? This man’s perception of Jesus likely existed hazily within his perception of the things he knew were real—and pressingly real at that moment. His son lay at home dying. As we can imagine, his sense of time and space was incredibly heightened. His son was sick, death moments around the corner. Hearing of Christ’s arrival, the official left quickly hoping there was still time. If Jesus agreed to return with him, they would have to move quickly.

At the very least, the official held the hope that Jesus was a powerful healer, a man who might well make a difference in the outcome of his son’s illness. Perhaps he had seen or heard what others were noting: “The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor” (Luke 7:22). Whatever his perception, the official believed there was something real enough about Jesus to possibly mend the peril of the moment.

Yet, as in many of the moments we face with tears or anger or excitement, factors other than God’s provision or Christ’s power often seem more real to us. For this desperate father, Jesus was more of a “last hope” in a race against death, than he was hope and life itself. Consumed by the weight of time, the man begged the face of eternity, “Sir, come down before my child dies!” The text is full of
anxious awareness that time is of the essence. Like countless others of his day and ours, within his perception of Christ, he had not fully come to terms with the profundity of Christ’s unique claims as they might affect this and every moment. He may have believed him to be real; did he believe him to be God? The greatest tragedy in our thinking about Christ is often that it stops far short from really considering the outrageous claims he has given us to consider.

Yet here, in a providential test of perception, Jesus responds to the anguished father’s desperation. But he simply says, “You may go. Your son will live” (4:50). In this defining moment, the man had to decide whether Christ was who he said he was or not. He had to decide what and who was more real. Could the hand of Jesus really touch his son across these cities? Could this word really mean something for his son from such a span? Were time and distance the greatest factors in his child’s life or was this rabbi one who could really overturn everything that loomed so real before him?

The gospel simply reports that the man “took Jesus at his word and departed” (4:50). At Christ’s word, the man’s perception of reality was sharpened. Jesus became more than a good man, more than a miracle worker; time and distance became lesser gods. Moving beyond fear and hurriedness, trusting beyond time and space, beyond his own eyes, the man took Jesus at his word, and went home to find his son well.

Jill Carattini is managing editor of A Slice of Infinity at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.

Reading Between the Lives

On any given week, three to five biographies make The New York Times best-seller list for non-fiction. Though historical biographies have changed with time, human interest in the genre is long-standing. The first known biographies were commissioned by ancient rulers to assure records of their accomplishments. The Old Testament writings, detailing the lives of patriarchs, prophets, and kings, are also some of the earliest biographies in existence. Throughout the Middle Ages, biographical histories were largely in the hands of monks; lives of martyrs and church fathers were recorded with the intention of edifying readers for years to come. Over time and with the invention of the printing press, biographies became increasingly influential and widely read, portraying a larger array of lives and their stories.

The popularity of the genre is understandable. As writer Thomas Carlyle once said, “Biography is the most universally pleasant and
profitable of all reading.” Such books are pleasant because in reading the accounts of men and women in history, we find ourselves living in many places; they are profitable because in doing so, we hear fragments of our own stories. The questions and thoughts we considered our own suddenly appear before us in the life of another. The afflictions we find wearying are given meaning in the story of one who overcame much or the life of one who found hope in the midst of loss. Perhaps we move toward biography because we seem to know that life is too short to learn only by our own experience.

Christianity embraces a similar thought. The most direct attempt in Scripture to define faith is done so by the writer of Hebrews. The eleventh chapter begins, “Now faith is being sure of what you hope for and certain of what you do not see.” To be honest, it is a definition that has always somewhat eluded me, and I was thankful to read I am not alone. John Wesley once observed of the same
words, “There appears to be a depth in them, which I am in no wise able to fathom.” Perhaps recognizing the weight and mystery of faith and the difficulty of defining it, the writer of Hebrews immediately moves from this definition to descriptions of men and women who have lived “sure of hope” and “certain of the unseen.” From Noah and Abraham, to Rahab and saints left unnamed, we find faith moving across the pages of history, the gift of God sparkling in the eyes of the faithful, the hope by which countless lives were guided. In this brief gathering of biographies, the writer seems to tell us that faith is understood functionally as much as philosophically, and that our own faith is more fully understood by looking at lives God has changed long before ours. For in between the lines that describe any faithful man or woman is the God who makes faith possible in the first place.

At the end of his compelling list, the writer of Hebrews thus concludes: “Therefore, since we are
surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” The lives of those who followed Christ before us urge other onward, strengthening hearts with stories of faith, stirring minds at the thought of God’s enduring influence, reminding us that God moves in our biographies and yet beyond them.

Jill Carattini is managing editor of A Slice of Infinity at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.

My Father’s World

“Why would a theologian have anything to contribute to any worthwhile discussion, on any subject whatsoever?”(1) So asks Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist and author of The God Delusion. He further articulates his disgust for theology in his 2006 article in The Free Inquiry magazine:

“What has theology ever said that is of the smallest use to anybody? When has theology ever said anything that is demonstrably true and is not obvious? I have listened to theologians, read them, debated against them. I have never heard any of them ever say anything of the smallest use, anything that was not either platitudinously obvious or downright false. If all the achievements of scientists were wiped out tomorrow, there would be no doctors but witch doctors, no transport faster than horses, no computers, no printed books, no agriculture beyond subsistence peasant farming. If all the achievements of theologians were wiped out tomorrow, would anyone notice the
smallest difference? Even the bad achievements of scientists, the bombs, and sonar-guided whaling vessels work! The achievements of theologians don’t do anything, don’t affect anything, don’t mean anything. What makes anyone think that ‘theology’ is a subject at all?”(2)

Dawkins scornfully dismisses not only theologians but the subject of theology, too. Francis Schaeffer similarly recalls in his book The God Who Is There meeting a successful young man when he was on a boat crossing the Mediterranean. “He was an atheist, and when he found out I was a pastor he anticipated an evening’s entertainment, so he started in.”(3) It seems not taking theologians seriously is hardly a new phenomenon. As a theologian, I might be tempted to respond to these provocations with the words of the Psalmist: The fool has said in his heart that there is no God. Nevertheless, skeptical commentators like Dawkins might also make me ask other questions. For instance, from where did people get the
idea that theology is meaningless and also detached from other subjects? Do others think the same about theologians? Did the theological community contribute in any way to this impression? Are religious leaders guilty of indulging in spiritual talk divorced from reality?

When the apostle Paul visited Athens “his spirit was provoked” as he observed the city full of idols. Nevertheless, when he addressed the Areogagus gathering he commended them for being a religious people. Having spent time understanding their religious and philosophical beliefs he begins his message by finding a bridge in their idolatry with “The unknown god.” He knew that bridges could not be build without starting at their end of the shore. And he knew their ideas and interests well enough to be able to quote pagan poets and prophets.

The Christian is always encouraged to take stewardship of this world of commerce, science, literature, philosophy, and every other field seriously. Where
Christianity is lived well, the charge that theologians can engage only in the pursuit of theology devoid of contemporary issues should sound false to the ears of this generation. For all truth is God’s truth. As hymn writer Maltbie Babcock wrote more than a century ago:

This is my Father’s world,
and to my listening ears
all nature sings, and round me rings
the music of the spheres.
This is my Father’s world:
I rest me in the thought
of rocks and trees, of skies and seas;
his hand the wonders wrought.

This is my Father’s world,
the birds their carols raise,
the morning light, the lily white,
declare their maker’s praise.
This is my Father’s world:
he shines in all that’s fair;
in the rustling grass I hear him pass;
he speaks to me everywhere.

This is my Father’s world.
O let me ne’er forget
that though the wrong seems oft so strong,
God is the ruler yet.
This is my Father’s world:
why should my heart be sad?
The Lord is King; let
the heavens ring!
God reigns; let the earth be glad!

Cyril Georgeson is a member of the speaking team with Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Delhi, India.

(1) Richard Dawkins as quoted in “What’s so heavenly about the God particle?” Newsweek, January 2, 2012.
(2) Richard Dawkins, “The Emptiness of Theology,” Free Inquiry magazine, Volume 18, Number 2.
(3) Francis Shaeffer, The God Who Is There in The Francis A. Schaeffer Trilogy (Wheaton: Crossway, 1990), 68.

The Invitation to Three

When a book titled Life Together landed on my desk as a college student, the subtitle promising “a discussion of Christian fellowship,” to say the least I was skeptical. Wary of Christian culture and preferring to remain on the fringes, I saw fellowship primarily as a means of enclosing oneself in self-affirming circles. I was weary of feel-good religion; I was also bothered by the charade of unity carried on in pluralistic crowds. But the book was given to me, and the giver was insistent that its author, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, was someone who would turn skepticism and self-affirmation on their heads.

Life Together was written in the thick of a mounting Nazi regime during Bonhoeffer’s unique experience with 25 vicars in an underground seminary. It took me only a few pages to realize that he was speaking with weighted words on a topic I had long judged as fluff. Almost immediately I was uncomfortably aware of the skepticism that kept me on the
outskirts of community, clutching an impaired image of the Christianity I professed. “Christianity,” Bonhoeffer announced in the first few pages, “means community through Jesus Christ, and in Jesus Christ.”(1) The two are inseparable.

In the community of believers, the Christian is said to be encouraged and admonished, uplifted and stretched (a few of the reasons I suspect many try to avoid it). As the priests called out to the crowds in the book of Nehemiah, the Christian is called to attention, called to remember in community the one who unites us: “Stand up and praise the LORD your God, who is from everlasting to everlasting,” said Nehemiah. In community, the Christian is repeatedly shown that Christ has called us to die to ourselves and live in him—together. An invitation to be three.

Bonhoeffer thus reminds the cynical not to overlook the opportunity of Christian fellowship. “It is not simply to be taken for granted that the Christian has the privilege of
living among other Christians. Jesus Christ lived in the midst of his enemies. At the end all his disciples deserted him. On the cross he was utterly alone.”(2) Being in the presence of other believers is indeed a hopeful gift. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus repeatedly cried out to his disciples that they stay awake and keep watch with him. While in prison, the apostle Paul called for Timothy, his “true child in the faith,” to come and visit.

Christian fellowship is vital—though not as an end in itself, but in and of the God we profess. Thus we must not avoid being a part of a believing community, but neither should we believe that gathering is the extent of the call. Christ’s call to the disciples was a call to community even as it was a call to a common vision to reach the world with the reality of God’s love. Before going to the cross, he asked the Father that “they might be one even as we are one… so that the world may know that you sent me” (John 17:11).
Surrounded by a world of belief, the collective praise of the Son is a compelling testimony of God’s presence to a world the Father longs to reach.

Consequently, even as Bonhoeffer himself recognized the privilege of living with fellow Christians, he chose to live in the midst of enemies as well. Given the opportunity to move outside of Nazi Germany, he declined.

God’s people remain scattered throughout the nations, but held together in Jesus Christ. This is part and parcel of the invitation of Christ. Even as God places people around us that we can learn from and grow with, the reach of a believing community goes beyond physical presence. Hearing a song written by Fernando Ortega recently, “Take heart, my friend, the Lord is able,” I was stirred by words God knew I needed to hear, and moved to worship with the songwriter himself. “Where two or three are gathered in my name,” Jesus told them, “there I am among them.” United to Christ, we are invited to be members
of a community beyond our imagination because of the one in our midst. And thus we can be encouraged by the believer beside us or a person we have not met, and heartened at the God who knows us both. A thousand voices tuned to the same instrument are automatically in tune with each other. And so we take heart; Christ is among us as we sing.

Jill Carattini managing editor of A Slice of Infinity at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.

(1) Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together (New York: Harper and Row, 1954), 24. (2) Ibid., 17.

The Prosperity Drug

The catchy beat was disarming. Driving down the highway with my hands tapping out the rhythm on my steering wheel, I thought this was just another clever pop tune with bubblegum lyrics. Then the words to the chorus caught my attention:

“I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore
I don’t know how I’m meant to feel anymore
When we think it will all become clear
I’m being taken over by The Fear.”(1)

This song sung by the young British pop star, Lily Allen, was not just another slickly produced tune without substanc. Allen sings of the destructive impact of materialism:

“I want to be rich and I want lots of money
I want loads of clothes and loads of diamonds
I heard people die while they are trying to find them

Life’s about film stars and less about mothers
It’s all about fast cars and passing each other
But it doesn’t matter because I’m packing plastic
and that’s what makes my life so fantastic

And I am a weapon
of massive consumption
and it’s not my fault it’s how I’m programmed to function
I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore
I don’t know how I’m meant to feel anymore
Cause I’m being taken over by fear.”

Among other things, the song laments the vacuity of mindless consumption and its pervasiveness in our society. Consumption, as Allen points out, can be like any other form of addiction, providing an initial high that hooks us, but never again delivers what it promises. Instead, it leads us down the path toward diminishing returns and never ultimately calms our fear.

Over 200 years before Ms. Allen stepped onto the pop music scene in the United Kingdom, John Wesley articulated the dangers of materialism. “I fear, wherever riches have increased,” he wrote, “the essence of religion has decreased in the same proportion. Therefore, I do not see how it is possible, in the nature of things, for any revival of religion to continue long….[A]s riches increase, so
will pride, anger and love of the world in all its branches.”(2) Even as thousands and thousands were joining his ranks, he spoke prophetically about the inevitable decline and dissolution of this revival as a result of the increase of wealth arising from Christian diligence and frugality.

Indeed, it is well known to students of human societies that an increase in prosperity often brings with it a precipitous decline in religious involvement. After all, why would anyone need God when there is Master Card and Visa? The declining numbers in churches in the Western World seem to affirm that Wesley’s fears were warranted. Christian leaders speculate that if current trends continue in England, for example, Methodists will cease to exist in that country in thirty years.(3) Of course, long before Wesley uttered his fears, Jesus warned his disciples: “No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one, and love the other, or else he will hold to one, and despise the
other. You cannot serve God and riches” (Luke 16:13). Jesus warns of the idolatry that so easily entraps us, luring us away from faithful allegiance.

We might be tempted to disregard any such warning in times of economic “slow down.” How can people be tempted to serve “the master” of money, after all, when there is so much less of it? Yet even in its absence, we can find our hearts soothed more by money than by God and behold the signs of a dangerous dependence. When our hearts find salvation and security in having more and more material gain—whether we actually hold it or not—we are reminded of “the deceitfulness of riches” and the narcotic effects of material success.

Thus clearly, the abolition of wealth or production is not the answer to materialism! Rather, the answer Jesus suggests lies in the proper use of wealth in our world: as a blessing for others and not just for our own use. Jesus instructed disciples to “sell your possessions and give to charity; make
yourselves purses which do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven….For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Luke 12:33-34).

John Wesley understood this, too, and in the spirit of Jesus reiterates the same idea: “We ought not to forbid people to be diligent and frugal: we must exhort all Christians, to gain all they can, and to save all they can… What way then (I ask again) can we take that our money may not sink us to the nethermost hell? There is one way, and there is no other under heaven. If those who gain all they can, and save all they can, will likewise give all they can, then the more they gain, the more they will grow in grace, and the more treasure they will lay up in heaven.”(4)

In difficult economic times, this is far from unnecessary counsel. It may be, in fact, the very idea that finally breaks the chains of addiction and reveals a far better treasure.

Margaret Manning is a member of the speaking and writing
team at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Seattle, Washington.

(1) Lily Allen, “The Fear” from It’s Not Me, It’s You, Regal Records, United Kingdom, January 26, 2009.
(2) Cited in an article by Philip Yancey, “Traveling with Wesley” Christianity Today, November 2007, vol. 51, No. 11. (3) Ibid.
(4) Cited from The Works of the Rev. John Wesley, vol. XV (London: Thomas Cordeux, 1786).

Dreaming of Water

Every so often I am too tired to yield to pangs of thirst, and get myself a glass of water before going to sleep for the night. And it is often on these nights that I have the most frustrating dreams (and unsettled sleep). Whether I’m driving through the countryside or solving crimes in Washington, D.C., the events in my dreams carry on as usual. But amidst moving scenes and thickening plots, I am continually stopping to gulp down glass after glass of water. I have even stopped dream conversations in mid-sentence to tell the person I am talking to that I just can’t seem to get enough water. Upon waking the frustrated lesson is palpable. I couldn’t dream my thirst away because my body knew it was real.

Apparently such dreams and the dreamers they frustrate are not uncommon. Centuries before me, the prophet Isaiah described them perfectly. “Just as when a hungry person dreams of eating and wakes up still hungry, or a thirsty person dreams of drinking
and wakes up faint, still thirsty, so shall the multitude of all the nations be that fight against Mount Zion.”(1) The passage is one of several prophecies God gave Isaiah concerning the nation of Israel. Isaiah was describing the attitude of their invaders, who believed they were tasting victory, but would wake to disappointment. It was a promise to the people of God: those who lick their lips at the thought of their demise will ultimately be frustrated. Certainly there have been, and will continue to be, similar occasions when the world has prematurely celebrated the unraveling of belief and believer. Yet “the trees of the LORD are well watered,” praised the psalmist.

Even so, though frustrated-thirst was promised of God’s enemies, in the same chapter of Isaiah, God laments over the dry and empty faith of Israel itself. “[T]hese people draw near with their mouths and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me, and their worship of me is a human
commandment learned by rote.”(2) They were dreaming of well-running springs and manmade reservoirs, putting the kind of water to their lips that would only leave them thirsty. Isaiah describes a people surrounded by the living waters of the kingdom but preoccupied with make-believe mansions and their pools.

Today the frustrated dreamer the prophet describes is closer to home than ancient Israel. Dryness of faith and heart is a struggle as unsettling as unquenchable thirst. Spirituality is popular, religion is dismissed, and faith is often obscured or synthetic. At times it is like my dream; we can’t seem to get enough water because we are drinking from artificial wells. Other times dryness comes without explanation. We stand before living water unable to drink and be satisfied, seeing that the well is deep but having nothing left to draw with.

As a Christian longing to know and to be known by God, dryness of faith does not elude me. An old song written by musician
Keith Green has often captured my prayer in the midst of thirst and drought. “My eyes are dry, my faith is old. My heart is hard; my prayers are cold. And I know how I ought to be—alive to You and dead to me. Oh what can be done for an old heart like mine? Soften it up with oil and wine. The oil is You, Your spirit of love. Please wash me anew in the wine of your blood.” Men and women throughout Scripture found similar respite for maddening thirst as they cried out to God within the very pangs of that thirstiness: Our thirst, too, is something we can give to God. Though the land is weary, our hearts faint for the one who promises to reach weariness with sustenance and hunger with an actual meal for bodies that know the difference. “Whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty forever” (John 4:14). To the dry and emptied faith of Israel God provided a spring. And for generations long thereafter, the water of life remains a gift for the thirsty.

Jill Carattini is managing editor of A Slice of Infinity at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.

(1) Isaiah 29:8.
(2) Isaiah 29:13.

Reward in Full

“The most important thing to be said about awards,” an anonymous voice once uttered, “is that Mozart never got one.” The statement draws into sharp distinction the often-troublesome quality about recognition: sometimes the most deserving candidates for praise are overlooked. (And the victim we notice most often is usually ourselves!)

By the age of six, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was an accomplished performer and a promising composer. In his lifetime he was commissioned to compose an opera, made a member of an honorary knightly order by the Pope, and was given membership by the Accademia Filarmonica despite their policy requiring candidates to be 20 years old. But he was not rewarded with the pomp and circumstance we might imagine for someone of his rare giftedness. He was not given a lifetime achievement award or presented with anything remotely comparable to a Grammy. Close to destitute at the time of his death, Mozart was given a third-class funeral.

Throughout the gospels Jesus can be heard reminding disciples, crowds, and Pharisees that the most important thing to remember about the things we do is that there is almost always a motive for recognition behind it. “When you give to the needy,” he told them, “do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets.”(1) Significantly, he makes the same comment regarding prayer, and also about fasting.

In each example Jesus offers, he doesn’t tell us that the human hope for recognition is wrong. On the contrary, he explains that within our hope, we can seek to be honored by humanity or seek something more lasting. Regarding those who make certain their actions are known and admired by the right people, Jesus explains that they have essentially received their reward in full. But if when giving to the needy, being the bigger person, putting another before yourself, he notes, you “do not let your left hand know what your right
hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret, then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”(2) Where the motive is the honor of God and not personal recognition or gain, we store up something that can neither be destroyed nor stolen, something far more weighty than notoriety, wealth, or praise.

And yet, as the thought of an award-less Mozart reminds us, labor unnoticed, hard work unappreciated, and fruit unseen are sometimes disturbing realities. The promising rewards of the wisdom of Jesus seem to promise an uncomfortably delayed response.

Here, the weariness that might come from not seeing the fruit of our laboring, the results of our fervent prayer, or our life’s greatest efforts is a reality we must wrestle with—and not alone. The prophet Isaiah once lamented, “I have labored to no purpose; I have spent my strength in vain and for nothing. Yet what is due me is in the LORD’s hand, and my reward is with my God.” Isaiah was further
comforted by God’s response to this recognition of reward in the hands of a greater giver: “Yes, kings shall see and arise; princes, and they shall prostrate themselves; because of the LORD, who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you.”(3)

In Isaiah’s efforts to serve God and people, though he struggled with a nation that did not honor him, he was reminded that God was the one delving out the better gifts. Though it seemed his efforts were in vain, there was yet a purpose, whether he would see it in the time and fashion he hoped for or not. Fruit would come; a different hope would unexpectedly surface; and God would be glorified in his decision to labor for heaven. So it is with those who choose to follow after lesser titles for the sake of a greater bestower. Thus as another laborer warns, “Watch out that you do not lose what you have worked for, but that you may be rewarded fully.”(4) Perhaps the most important thing to be said about awards is that we are
looking to things unseen—great and unsearchable gifts from one who knows you better than any Grammy can attest.

Jill Carattini is managing editor of A Slice of Infinity at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.

(1) Matthew 6:2.
(2) Matthew 6:2-4.
(3) Isaiah 49:4, 7.
(4) 2 John 1:8.

Who Was He?

It would be hard to underestimate the significance of Jesus. No other person has had a greater historical impact. Even those who aren’t Christians acknowledge this: Muslims revere Jesus as a prophet. Hindus consider him a holy teacher. Even many atheists are very willing to say they admire Jesus; for example, Christopher Hitchens once said he respects “the virtue of his teachings.”

Yet a common skeptical remark you hear is that we can’t really know anything about who Jesus actually was. He was probably a great guy, but the early Christians invented so many stories about him that we have no way of separating what’s true in the Bible from what’s false. Most skeptics don’t realize, however, that academic historians take Jesus very seriously. We’re talking historians, not theologians; not least, because we have so many historical sources for Jesus. Many people don’t realize the New Testament is a collection of books, for example, and represents multiple
sources about Jesus. Many are very early—for example, Paul’s letters date to the 40s and 50s AD and some of the material he quotes is dated even earlier, to within months of Jesus’s death.

Literary studies of the gospels have also shown that their authors were intentionally setting out to write biography—not fiction or hagiography. Where we can test them against archaeology or other historians of the period, they’re shown to be reliable. Thus, historians take Jesus seriously. No credentialed academic historian in a university ancient history department would suggest that Jesus never existed, for instance. Throw out Jesus and you would have to throw out a wealth of other historical figures for whom less evidence exists, such as Julius Caesar.

In recent decades, there has been a renewed interest in the study of the “historical Jesus,” by which we mean what we can say about Jesus using the methods and tools of the historian. There are a wide number of facts upon which
historians agree. To list just a few, it is generally agreed that Jesus was raised in Nazareth. That he was baptized by John. That he had twelve disciples. That he had a reputation as a healer and miracle worker. That he taught in parables and stories. That he clashed with the religious authorities of his day. That he spent time with social outcasts. That he had an extremely high view of his own identity and his relationship to God. That at the end of his ministry he rode into Jerusalem, was hailed by many as the Messiah, performed some kind of prophetic action in the Temple for which he was arrested, tried, and executed. It’s simply not the case, in other words, that Jesus’s life was invented decades after his death by well meaning Christians. And that means we are forced to take the life of Jesus very seriously—at the very least, we need to read the gospels as we would other ancient literature and weigh them accordingly.

And that brings us face to face with Jesus himself:
a Jesus who made astonishing claims about himself. C S Lewis once famously said that Jesus left us only three options. Either he was mad—utterly insane. Or he was bad—a cynical liar. Or else Jesus was who he claimed to be. Whilst this threefold choice may slightly over simplify things, the broad thrust is right. Jesus forces all of us to answer the same question he asked Peter in the Gospels: “Who do you say I am?” One thing is certain: Jesus has left a powerful footprint on history, too great to ignore. “Who do you say that I am?” The answer each of us gives to that question matters profoundly.

Andy Bannister is a member of the speaking team at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Toronto, Canada.

Why Is There a Church?

The emergence of the Church, the emergence of followers even after Christ’s death, despite intense opposition and even brutal persecution, is an enigma. Or, in the words of professor C.F.D. Moule of Cambridge University, it “rips a great hole in history, a hole of the size and shape of the Resurrection.” The book of Acts offers the first glimpses of that great hole.

In it, we find a high priest filled with rage. Jesus was no longer among them, but the disciples continued to fill Jerusalem with his teaching. The high priest had strictly charged the apostles not to teach of Jesus, yet they continued preaching to the crowds and healing the sick, and multitudes were professing belief in Christ. So the high priest had them all arrested, and setting them before the council, he questioned them harshly. Peter answered exactly as he preached: “We must obey God rather than men. The God of our fathers raised Jesus… exalting him at his right hand as Leader
and Savior, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. And we are witnesses to these things and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him.”(1)

At his words, the council was enraged, and some wanted to kill them. But a Pharisee named Gamaliel, a teacher of the law held in honor by all the people, stood up to speak, first instructing that the apostles be led out of the room. And he said to them, “Men of Israel, take care what you are about to do with these men.”

Gamaliel’s words introduce a logic often overlooked; he reminded them that this had happened before. He reminded them to look at history. “Before these days, Theudas rose up,” he countered, “claiming to be somebody, and about four hundred men even joined him. But he was killed, and all who followed him were dispersed and came to nothing.” And after Theudas, Gamaliel warned, there were similar stories. “So in the present case I tell you, keep away from these men and let them
alone, for if this plan or this undertaking is of man, it will fail;but if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them. You might even be found opposing God!”(2)

Though the growth of the Church alone is not enough to conclude the veracity of Christ’s resurrection, it is evidence that would be irresponsible to ignore. The apostles were aware that the message of the Cross is foolishness. They made choices to continue preaching despite the orders of the high priest and the often-severe persecution they faced. They changed social and religious practices that had been followed for centuries. They refused to give in; they would not be overthrown.

The birth and rapid rise of Christ’s followers after the offensive death of their leader fails to make sense outside of the explanation the Church itself offers: they were witnesses of these altogether unfathomable events. The message they were teaching was true. Christ was raised and death was stopped, while the
disciples looked on. They were witnesses of God’s power, and they went to their deaths proclaiming it, choosing to obey God rather than man.

Christ left in history a hole the size and shape of the Resurrection. With what explanation will you attempt to fill it?

Jill Carattini is managing editor of A Slice of Infinity at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.

(1) Acts 5:29-32.
(2) Acts 5:38, 39.