Liar, Lord, Lunatic (or None of the Above)??

Usually when someone says they don’t think Jesus is God, Christians get all shocked and upset.

“But but but … “ they sputter, “He SAID He was! So He was either a liar, a lunatic or the Lord! Deal with it!” and stomp off in a huff.

Now being a Narnian fan, I like a good C.S. Lewis quote as much as anyone else. But you know, with all due respect to Clive, that “Liar lord lunatic” thing really irritates the heck out of me.

Here's the quote:

I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: “I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.” That is the one thing we must not say. A man who said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell.

OK, Clive, nicely said. But there IS another possibility:

4. HE WAS WRONG!

Yeah, I know, hard to fathom, right? But stick with me:

What if Jesus (who I think really existed and was really a good and sincere person) just THOUGHT He was the Messiah?

What if (like most Jews at that time) He didn’t think of the Messiah as “God in the flesh” but as the Deliverer of his people?

What if (like most of his followers at the time) he just got convinced that all the signs of the times were right and he was the one?

And then after he died, his followers (who I suspect were not only grief-stricken, but guilt-ridden at their failure to protect this wonderful man from a horrible death) managed to convince themselves that they’d actually seen him, alive and well.

And I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt: maybe they really thought they had seen him. After all, there are people who insist that Michael Jackson faked his own death and appeared at his own funeral. Grieving people see ghosts and have extremely vivid dreams which convince them their loved ones are alive and well. Why wouldn’t the same thing have happened to the disciples?

Of course, this is all assuming that the stories in the New Testament are historically accurate and not just all made up.

All I’m saying is that even assuming that, it’s reasonable to conclude that Jesus wasn’t Liar, Lord or Lunatic – just a nice mixed-up Jewish guy.