Advent Week 3

Advent Week 3:
How Do We Know Jesus Came?

Who was Jesus, and why did he come to earth? Before we can tackle these questions, we need to confirm that he even existed. So, how can we know that Jesus actually walked on earth? The good news is there is plenty of evidence to point to the fact that Jesus came to earth!

Have you ever had someone say, “I just know Jesus is real because I know”? Unfortunately, in many cases, this is how the Christian faith has been characterized. It’s defined as a faith based on feeling, opinion, or experience. 

And Scripture does say believing in Christ takes faith. (Eph 2:8)

But, in Scripture, the word “faith” is talked about in a different way than we tend to think of faith. In Scripture, the word “faith” is not an opinionated, blind faith based on personal experience - it is a belief based on facts. (Mangum 2014, “belief”) As the author of Hebrews puts it, “faith” is based on “reality” and “proof”...

Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen. Heb 11:1 CSB

So, what does that mean for us? We have not seen Christ with our own eyes, but we can use tools to test if our faith is based on reality and facts. (It’s similar to looking at facts to make a conclusion that George Washington was the first president of the United States.)

This is important because Chrisitantianity is not asking us to believe in something by taking a blind leap of faith or making conclusions based on subjective evidence. 

So, let’s look at the 4 historical books in Scripture that are primary accounts of Jesus’ existence and life.

The four Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John) were written by 4 of Jesus' disciples. These men walked and talked with Jesus. And since these accounts were written down soon after they occurred, other eyewitnesses of Jesus were still alive and could verify the stories. (Turek 2019)

There are many various theories to look at the reliability of the Gospels, but I wanted to focus on one that I’ve heard used a lot actually to argue against the reliability of the writers. But it ends up being proof the gospel accounts are accurate!

The 4 Gospels contain repeated material since they are accounts of the same time period of Jesus’ life. Scripture recounts a specific teaching or miracle of Jesus, but the majority of the time has a few different details or emphasis. It would be like if 4 people were told to visit the Grand Canyon and describe what they saw. They would all say similar things, but since they might be standing at different angles, different heights, etc., they would describe details in various order or even leave out certain things that another saw. 

This is similar to the 4 gospels. The slight variance makes the accounts more accurate as they are being told by observers from different angles and with unique personalities. If they were exact replicas, we would think they had memorized the same account of one person’s story and were just regurgitating it. (Like memorizing movie quotes!)

There were non-Christian sources from that time that included accounts of Jesus as well. A Jewish & a Roman historian who lived at the time of Jesus included records of Jesus in their writings. (“Did Jesus really exist? Is there any historical evidence of Jesus Christ?” 2022)

And, can I be honest with you all? Currently, the question of if Jesus actually existed isn’t really up for debate. Most non-Christian scholars agree Jesus existed. On a quick internet search, you can find an article that notes, “The majority of modern scholars of antiquity agree that Jesus existed historically, that he was baptized by John the Baptist and crucified by order of Roman prefect Pontius Pilate.” (Cranach, n.d.)

So, if Jesus did come and walk on earth, what do we do with that information? Why does it even matter? 

It’s as if John (the writer of the Gospel of John & Jesus’ disciple) knew we would have this question, so he said this:

Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God and that by believing you may have life in his name. Jn 20:30–31 CSB

John’s emphasis in his gospel is on details about the miracles Jesus did. These miracles prove Jesus is the Savior of the world. The miracles also prove Jesus was the Messiah who the Old Testament prophesied would come, that he was the Son of God who was able to forgive sin (Matt 9:5-6) and, therefore, was God.

John wrote his gospel so we could have enough evidence to have faith (or believe) that Jesus came. But not only that, he wrote his gospel inviting us to test the Scriptures to see if there is enough evidence that Jesus really was who he said he was.