This One Thing Makes Christianity Different From Every Other Religion

Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz and this is Ascension Presents. So, just a quick little intro. We're going to do things differently for the next couple videos. Because it's the month of September, Ascension was like, Father, you've started recording the Catechism in the Air. That's a little bit, you know, a little extra work. Also, students are back on campus, which is a bit of extra work. They said, how about this? How about we just are good citizens? You know what good citizens do? They reduce, they reuse, they recycle. So, we're not going to reduce, but let's reuse. Let's reuse and recycle some stuff that they said, how about you had made these videos in the past for us that people haven't really seen yet, or many people haven't seen yet. So, how about we put them out there? The first one today is, I'm so indebted to C.S. Lewis for this video. I'm so grateful for his argument in mere Christianity about, is Jesus who he says he is? Because one of the things people say about Jesus is that, well, I don't really believe he was God, but he was a good person. I don't believe he was God, but he was a holy prophet. C.S. Lewis says that's the one thing you can't say about Jesus. So, here's this video we made a few years back, and I hope that it convicts your mind and your heart the same way that this argument convicted my mind and my heart. It led me to a place where I could say, no, Jesus is who he says he is. So, back in college, I took a class called World Religions. Actually, I took a number of these classes. It was really good because it's good to study what people have believed throughout history, what people believe throughout the world. And it's great to study the differences and know some of the similarities. One of the things I found, though, is that virtually all of these classes that I took, you get a textbook and each chapter in the book would be divided up according to a different religion. So, chapter one would be Buddhism, then Confucianism, then Christianity, then Islam, Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Daoism, whatever it is. And you'd go through the book and you'd study the different points of the different religions and look at their merits and look at their faults. The problem was that when you studied Christianity, they didn't appreciate the fact that Christianity is uniquely different than all other world religions. Here's what I mean. All world religions were founded by someone who either claimed to have insight into God or they claimed to have a revelation from God. But Christianity was founded by someone, Jesus Christ, who didn't claim to have insight into God or revelation from God. Jesus actually claimed to be God. And so when we study world religions, especially when we're looking for like what's true, like what actually is unique, what is the one that I can believe in? When it comes to Christianity, we don't have to just jump to like the minute details. We don't have to jump to the articles of the creed. All we have to do is answer this one question. Is Jesus who he says he is? Because he claims to be God and if he's not, then all of Christianity is false. But if he is, then all of Christianity is going to be true. Now, I'll talk to people all the time who will say things like, well, I believe Jesus was a holy person. He was a prophet, but I don't believe that Jesus was God. C.S. Lewis, who is an author and who's talked about this a lot, he'd say that's the one thing about Jesus that you can't say. You can't say that he was a holy person, but not God. Why? Because he actually claimed to be God. And if he wasn't God, then that means he was not a good person. He was either a liar. He wasn't God and he knew he wasn't God. Or he was a lunatic. He wasn't God, but he didn't know he wasn't God. Or he actually is who he says he is. He is the Lord. That's called the trilemma. Jesus is either a liar, he's a lunatic, or he is the Lord. So let's look at this. First, maybe Jesus is a liar. Maybe he was lying. Now, interesting. If you ever study the personality profile of someone who's a compulsive liar or even someone who does, like, basically lies for a living, someone who is a professional liar, and if you're going to pull off the lie that says you are the creator of the universe, that means you are incredibly committed to this lie. When you look at that personality profile, that psychological profile of someone who lies like that, they have certain traits. They are incredibly narcissistic. They're incredibly self-involved. They lack a certain compassion. They lack creativity. But when we study the life of Jesus, you see the exact opposite. You see someone who is incredibly creative. You see someone who is incredibly self-giving, someone who's completely compassionate and not self-involved. So Jesus, at least, doesn't fit the profile of a liar. So maybe he's a lunatic. Maybe he wasn't God, but he didn't know he wasn't God. Now, this is, I think, fascinating because our degree of sanity, like all of us, our degree of sanity matches up with our degree of being conformed to reality or in touch with reality. Here's what I mean. If I were to say, I'm a priest, then my degree of sanity conforms to reality, right? So I am a priest. But if I were to say something like, I am the best priest in the world, then I would be slightly, actually largely, disconnected from reality. And if you were talking with me for any amount of time, you'd quickly catch on to the fact, OK, this priest is not connected to reality. But what if I were even further disconnected and I said, I'm the Pope and I really believe that I was the Holy Father? But shh, don't tell anyone. Pretty quickly, you'd realize that I was not connected to reality. But if I was even further disconnected and I said, I am Marie Antoinette and you can have cake, very, very quickly, you would catch on, OK, this guy is not connected to reality. And if I was so far gone, so far disconnected from reality that I really believed that I was a butterfly and I really am a butterfly and you should have known, you should have been there when I was in that cocoon. It was just, it was crazy. Really tight quarters. You would quickly catch on, this guy's not connected to reality. Now Jesus, he's unique because he doesn't just claim to be the greatest prophet of all time. He doesn't just claim to be Elijah come back from the dead. Jesus actually claims to be God, the maker of everything in the universe. And if he was disconnected from reality that way, if he wasn't really God, people all around him would very, very quickly catch on to the fact that he isn't who he says he is. And yet when you read the story, what you get is he actually is living. He is walking. He is talking. He's acting like he's connected to reality. So Jesus isn't a liar. And he isn't a lunatic. That leaves only one option left. He actually is who he says he is, that he's the Lord. Now that doesn't prove that he is. We need, in order for us to believe in Jesus, we need to have him prove it. So that's what he does. I mean, honestly, if someone walked into the room where you are right now and said, hello everyone, I am God, you wouldn't just say, okay. And back in the day, they didn't either. Sometimes we think that because they lived so long ago, they were simple, like they didn't know how to do stuff. They didn't know how to like program their TiVo. They didn't know how to use iPods. Therefore, they were just dumb. And if someone came on the scene and just claimed to be God, they would just completely believe him. But they didn't. In fact, when Jesus came on the scene and claimed to be God, they did what we do. They asked him to do what we would ask him to do. And what is that? They asked him to prove it. So that's what Jesus does. His whole life, in the last three years of his ministry, is him proving that he is who he says he is. In fact, the second chapter of Mark's gospel, there's this scene, you've probably heard of it, where there's a one paralyzed man and his four friends are carrying him on a stretcher to Jesus. But there's so many people in the house where Jesus is, they couldn't get through the door. So they go up on the roof and they do some remodeling, right? And they make a skylight and they lower the guy down in front of Jesus. And it says, Jesus looked at their faith, looked at the man, and he said, your sins are forgiven. And at that moment, everyone's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Who but God can forgive sins? And Jesus is like, I know, right? This guy. But he says to prove to you that I am who I say I am. He says to the man, rise, pick up your mat and walk. Jesus claimed to be God and then he proves that he is who he says he is. In fact, that's why in St. John's gospel, when he talked about miracles, he doesn't use the word miracles. He uses the term signs and wonders. What do signs do? Signs always point to something else. All of Jesus's miracles, all of his signs and wonders, those signs all point to the fact that Jesus is who he says he is and the greatest miracle of Jesus's life is actually at his death. Because when he is crucified and when he is dead, what he ultimately does to prove that he is who he says he is, that he is the Lord of life, he's the one who can conquer death, he's the one who made everything, he rises from the dead. And this is remarkable because this sign, this wonder, is so wondrous that it absolutely takes all of the disciples and all the apostles by surprise. I mean, think about this. Throughout Jesus's life, doesn't he say that, here's what's going to happen. We're going to Jerusalem. They're going to arrest me. They're going to torture me. They're going to kill me. I'm going to die. But don't worry because after three days, I'm going to rise from the dead. Have you ever noticed that when it actually happens, all the apostles are like, what's going on? They're all freaking out. In fact, we know Jesus dies on a Friday. They lay him in the tomb. Three days later, on Sunday morning, it says these women are going to the tomb, not because they say, oh, it's Sunday, he's alive again, because they're going to the tomb because they're like, we need to anoint his body for burial. They expect him to be dead. He's dead. They expected him to stay dead. And when they get to the tomb and the stones roll back, they're not like, oh yeah, that's right. They're like, what's going on? And they look in the tomb and the body's gone. They're not like, oh yeah, that's right. They're like, what's going on? In fact, they all leave, but Mary Magdalene stays behind in that garden, outside the tomb, and she's weeping, not for joy because he's alive. She's weeping because she thinks someone stole his body. So much so that when she sees Jesus, she thinks he's a gardener. She says, if you've taken his body, take me to where you put him because I'll rebury him, basically. And this is Jesus she's talking to. I love the moment because Jesus basically looks at Mary. He says one word. He says her name. Like, Mary, like, hello. And Mary realizes this is Jesus. He is who he says he is. So she runs. Mary runs in joy to the other apostles and tells them, Jesus rose from the dead. I saw him alive. And you think the apostles would be like, oh my gosh, that's, was that today? We totally forgot. We spaced that. But they say, nope, nope, nope. Not, not, doesn't happen. Only two of the apostles, think about of the remaining 11, only two of the apostles run to the tomb to even check out her story, Peter and John. And when they get there, you'd think that they would say, oh yeah, but they're like, what's going on? In fact, an angel has to come to them and say, remember what he said. Just imagine this, like rubbing his temples, like he said he would have to die and rise from the dead. That's today. They return home amazed and bewildered. Later on that day, that same Sunday, the apostles are all together with the disciples and the doors are locked and Jesus appears to them. He says, this is my body, my flesh, my whole self risen from the dead. And they're amazed. Remember there was one apostle though, who wasn't there? Thomas. I always picture Thomas, like he was out in an errand, something getting groceries. And he like does the secret knock and they let him in. They're like, Thomas, we saw Jesus. He's alive again. And he'd be like, oh man, I always miss out on everything. But Thomas, he doesn't say that. He doesn't say, oh, that's right. He says, nope, nope. I'm not going to believe this. Remember what Thomas even actually goes so far as to say, unless I put my fingers in the nail marks and my hand in his side, I will not believe. So what happens one week later, the next Sunday, they're all together in one place and St. John makes the point of saying that this time Thomas was with them. And Jesus appears in the locked room. Imagine Thomas's face looking at Jesus. Oh no. But Jesus looks at Thomas and he says, Tommy, put her there. Thomas falls to his knees and he says five words, my Lord and my God. Because Jesus has just proven that he's not a liar. He's not a lunatic. He is the Lord. Jesus is who he says he is. He is God. And if Jesus is who he says he is, then that means you are who he says you are. So who is it that Jesus says you are?