Religious Implications of Atheism - страница 26
Therefore, no man could have invented the teaching of Christ. It’s just that no one would want it. And no one would want to follow this without inspiration from above. God whom he loves, he reproves and disciplines (Rev. 3:19), promises his followers persecutions (John 16:33). Well, who will like it? Christian teaching surpasses any human logic and common sense. Krauss says that if a voice from heaven said something to a multitude of people, it would be convincing. However, nothing supernatural, no voice from heaven, is required to distinguish the divine from the human. People without external miracles perfectly feel and understand what is in accordance with their nature and what is higher than this nature. Nobody before Christ taught to love enemies, this is contrary to human common sense.
In any religion, its adepts who can prophesy, cast out demons and perform many miracles will certainly be considered religious leaders. But this is not the case in Christianity. By performing miracles in His name, Christ can say, “I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers” (Matt. 7:23).
All religions require worship and service to a certain deity. This is completely logical, and according to the religious idea, the Roman emperors, the Egyptian pharaohs, the Babylonian kings demanded to be worshiped as gods, they self-deified themselves. However, in Christianity, the opposite is true. The King of kings and Lord of lords (1 Tim. 6:15) wants love, not sacrifice, believes in man (in his potential for deification), becomes a friend to human (John 15:14) and “came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Matt. 20:28; Mark 10:45). Christ proclaims the anti-religious teaching that God and the supreme authority in general, and His disciples too, should be like servants, and “the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep” (John 10:11). Thus, Christianity is, in fact, in every point opposite to other religions.
While religion is a socio-cultural phenomenon, in Christianity God looks at the heart, addresses the depths of the personality of each person individually. Sometimes He asks provocative questions or even gives provocative commandments to see the response of a person’s soul. For example, when Christ said to Judas, “Do quickly what you are going to do” (John 13:27), he did not want to push Judas to betrayal, but on the contrary, he wanted his conscience to awaken in him. And when Jesus said to the twelve apostles, “Do you also wish to go away?” (John 6:67) he certainly did not push them away. Does God look wherever the heart of a human bows, for good or for evil?
In the Old Testament, many religious ordinances were given. For example, about the Sabbath or the fact that harlots should be stoned. But Christ did not condemn the harlot whom they wanted to stone (John 8:11) and often provocatively violated the Sabbath in front of Jewish religious leaders. They were indignant at him, and he was at them, saying, “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to kill?” (Mark 3:4) God, as it were, provokes people: will you fulfill a religious commandment if it will lead to evil, or will you break a religious commandment if it will lead to good? Perhaps, the Old Testament commandment to destroy seven nations in the land of Canaan was just as provocative: do you want to become executioners?