Having entered but a few years into a new millenium, what do we have in our hands? On the one hand we stand amazed at what has happened in just the last 100 years of the last millenium. My father wrote a book – his memoirs – called I Remember When. In it he tells of the absolute fascination with the advent of the motor car, the aeroplane and radio when a lad. Then came other things such as Television, and , naturally, he wrote it on a computer!
Some of the most amazing advances have been in the area of communication. Earliest forms consisted of runners (from which we get the Marathon race) and then things like the Pony Express. Smoke signals have been used and flags, flashing mirrors and lights and then Morse code and the Telegraph (it has come and gone for you can’t send one anymore – The best Man at the wedding reads out the emails and text messages now).
When Alexander Bell invented the telephone in 1876, Henry David Thoreau was approached by a friend who enthusiastically told him of the invention: “Just think, a man in New York can pick up this instrument and talk immediately with someone in Texas!” Thoreau replied, “What if the man in New York doesn’t have anything to say to the man in Texas?”
His reply was designed to identify the difference between image and substance. A meaningless comment has no more significance if carried over great distances to millions of people by marvelous technology than if spoken in private between two friends. With all that is communicated, how much of it is worth saying? (Reminds me of my mother telling me “What is not worth saying is sung” when I would listen to the latest pop song)
Everett Parker said The cardinal sin of mass communication is not that television, radio, movies, magazines, and newspapers are devoted primarily to provide escape entertainment and the means for dumb relaxation. The unforgivable sin is that the most powerful force in modern life is directed to the sale of commodities and to the fostering of a philosophy of atheistic hedonism, based on the acquiring of commodities. Malcolm Muggeridge wrote, No view of life, as I am well aware, could be more diametrically opposed to the prevailing one today (that is, the view of Christ) especially as purveyed in our mass-communication media, dedicated as they are to the counterproposition that we can live by bread alone, and the more the better.
Everything is so transient. In the mad quest for ratings, popularity or notoriety we have so much of what I call The Athenian Disease (cf Acts17:21). What is new quickly becomes old, we tire of it, and we want something new to titilate our senses and make us feel up-to-date, modern, and sophisticated. Pressure for newness is on – old time comedians would travel from venue to venue with a routine that would last them a year: now an 1/2 hour T.V. special will consume that year’s material and they’re in need of new gags. People send me jokes by e-mail and they can circle the globe in a matter of minutes. But as they say, who cares where we’re going as long as we get there fast, and who cares what we hear as long as it is new.
But what’s fair dinkum? What’s real? What’s of substance when we don’t want to be entertained but want to deal with the real issues of life and eternity? Does anybody have a message? It’s no wonder a generation of children are growing up with no idea of eternal realities when their life revolves around T.V. soaps. There’s a lot of Pilate’s cynicism as a result – “What is truth?”. With our cyberspace and virtual reality, truth is what you make it. Justice Holmes said Truth is the majority vote of that nation that could lick all the others. So truth is transient – whatever suits you and suits the day. This is the age of pluralism where every doctrine of every religious is given equal value. So passing fads are held up as truth for today. Who has a word?
In contrast to these shifting sands Jesus Christ contrasts His words with the most permanent thing we know – not ourselves, our homes, our great projects like the pyramids – rather He contrasts them with the material universe (Matt. 24:35 Heaven and earth shall pass away but my words shall never pass away). The day will come when this universe will pass away (2 Pet. 3) and everything material will dissolve. The nature of Moses’ law is seen in Luke 16:17 – it is easier for heaven and earth to pass than one tittle of the law to fail. Yet the law thundered at Sinai did pass away – it wasn’t easy – it had to be nailed to a cross along with the Son of God. But Jesus says His words will never pass away.
How many teachers have desired immortality for their words only to have time take them away? Who’s hot for Plato now? Who hangs on Socrates’ every word now? Others achieved more than they dreamed – Shakespeare never dreamed he would command the attention he still commands today. But Jesus, the Galilean peasant, doesn’t just aspire – He foretells. This is either madness or truth! He speaks this in the context of the destruction of their beloved city and the world. How could His words which hung in the air but for a moment have immortality when the great stones of Jerusalem and the material elements of the universe were destined to pass? What characteristics do the words of Christ have to enable us to understand this confident position?
First we must note the authority with which He speaks (Matt.7:29). So many teachers have suffered from timidity, and in many cases, deservedly so. Socrates went about Athens asking people questions with a view to get them to enquire. It was all very well – as far as it went. But, at his best, Socrates was an apostle of some sublime uncertainties – he raised questions he couldn’t answer – he made it his business to not administer intellectual truth, but to get people to question. It’s fine to question but where are the answers?!
The scribes of Israel wanted to bring their countrymen to look at the law in the light of traditional interpretations of which they were the guardians and exponents. They found themselves confronted with the difficulties which present themselves to any teacher who has taken upon himself the task of trying to convince the human mind of doctrines he believes is true. It was not enough to say, “This is right; that is wrong”.
Jesus was different. He taught as men were able to bear, but he was indifferent to the inward opposition which His words created. He awes rather than satisfies the reason. He doesn’t reason, as a rule, but declares the truth and allows it to make its way into the soul. For example in John 3:3-5 He declares to Nicodemus the need to be born again. Nicodemus baulks and stumbles over this but Jesus affirms more strongly “except a man be born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven”. In John 6:51-54 Jesus declares Himself to be living bread from heaven, which, if a man digests, shall live forever. They question this and are offended by it but He reaffirms “Except you eat the flesh of the son of man and drink His blood you have no life in you”.
The prophets of old would say “Thus saith the Lord” – distinguishing between themselves and the real Author of their message. But Jesus! “Verily verily I say unto you”: “Believe in me”: “come unto me”: “follow me”: “keep my commandments” – and He didn’t say “I know the way to the truth and the life” but rather “I am the way, the truth and the life”. He speaks as one who has an ancient right to a welcome in the soul of man – that He alone possesses the key to its wants and to its mysteries. So it must be, because life is earnest and Hell is as everlasting and horrible as Heaven is eternal and wonderful.
When a man is strong and in good spirits he likes to toy with speculations – he likes to play Devil’s advocate. But when he is sick, and suffering, and has another state of existence looming, he desires truth – truth which dares to assert itself as truth – truth that can be held up beside the open grave. To talk at the bedside of a dying man as if you are doubtful about everything, and afraid of offending the sensibilities of skeptics, would be impossible. “Speak to me of certainties – I have enough doubts of my own” would be words of the dying. A religion may have – does have – a literary side, but, strictly speaking, literature is one thing, and religion is another and infinitely higher and more sacred thing than literature. It was because our Lord’s words go straight to the heart and soul of man that He shows Himself to be the Master of the absolute religion.