The 'Jesus Test'

Here's an exercise to do sometime - open up your Bible in the New Testament letters and just scan through the columns noticing any mention of the words 'Jesus', 'Christ', 'Jesus Christ' or 'Christ Jesus'.

It very quickly strikes you just how saturated the New Testament is with references to Jesus. Obvious point? Doh! Well of course, but it's amazing how often we can miss the obvious. You can hardly throw a brick in Paul's letters without hitting the name of Jesus - it is peppered throughout his letters, e.g. 'in Christ Jesus', our Lord Jesus Christ', 'purposed in Christ', 'mystery in Christ', 'fulness of Christ', 'with Christ', 'as Christ', 'of Christ', 'about Christ', 'to Christ', 'know Christ' - and that's just some of the mentions within about 4 pages.

The NT writers addresss a whole range of issues but they do so in a way that connects everything to Jesus. The name of Jesus is weaved through the text of the NT - He is the reason, the example, the authority, the hope, the source, the answer, the end, the beginning, the point etc - of everything that Christians are instucted about in the NT.

So when evangelical organisations produce publicity DVDs or send out appeals for support that contain no references to Jesus Christ it is not just unfortunate but actually sub-Christian. I mean, the notion that Paul would have disconnected Jesus from an exhortation to Christians, whether in giving to the poor or just living uprightly, is simply unimaginable. John Chapman makes the point that a sermon that could be preached by a Rabbi or an Iman is not a Christian Sermon - the challenge for many Christian organisations is do they want to be 'Christian' or just a 'successful' organisation? There is a creeping pressure to keep Jesus locked in the back office while Christians go out to show the world what great caring people they are - we must resist it.

In our secular - 'we don't want any of your faith stuff here' - society we will need to resist the temptation to become 'Jesus-lite'. Because if we take Jesus out of our ministry rationale or just minimise His profile - we are moving far away from NT Christianity and robbing ourselves of the one thing that will actually make our ministries powerful, meaningful and effective.