Is there a difference between Jesus of Nazareth and Jesus Christ? I think there is..and knowing the difference could make a difference in your spiritual life. It did for me.
The difference is huge.
Understanding the difference between the two and following the former will transform your life by the power of the latter.
Let me explain this by using an analogy.
How many of you heard of Joseph Ratzinger? Do you know who he is?...How many of you heard of Pope Benedict XVI? You heard of him, you have seen him on TV. You know who he is..the pope before Francis..the only pope who resigned.
Joseph Ratzinger and Pope Benedict are the same person. But then again, they are not. They are hugely different especially in their roles. Very few people know him as Joseph Ratzinger, but the whole world knows him as pope Benedict.
Ratzinger is this diminutive cardinal from Germany who was the head of the Congregation of Faith in Rome for many years. He used to live in an apartment in the Vatican complex. During my visit to Rome in 1984, I saw him walking from his apartment to his office in the Vatican square. A tiny man with gray hair walking, holding on to a little bag.
But on April 19, 2005 everything changed. He was elected pope by his fellow cardinals. Immediately he was whisked away to a special room and his black cassock and red hat were removed and he was dressed in white and a white hat was placed on his head and a special papal ring was placed on his finger. His name changed from Joseph Ratzinger to Pope Benedict the XVI. He was called His Holiness.
He sat on a special white chair. Other cardinals walked up to him, knelt in front of him and kissed his ring and pledged obedience to him. Then he came out to the window, flanked by cardinals, and greeted the crowd and blessed them as pope. He was elevated to the role of being the head of 1.2 billion Catholics world wide.
He was the same person, yet his role and position and persona had changed dramatically.
Joseph Ratzinger was transformed into Pope Benedict.
What happened in the case of Jesus of Nazareth is somewhat similar. Jesus was transformed into Jesus Christ. The carpenter from Nazareth became the savior of the world. The carpenter from Nazareth is Jesus the man, the savior of the world is, Jesus the Christ.
As humans, we need to get to know the human Jesus. God became man to show mankind what God is like and make mankind a “godly people.” (Mt: 5:48)
When Jesus says to us: “Follow me” he is asking us to follow him into his full humanity which grew into divinity. He is telling us that, if we follow him, we can get rid of our human problems, deal with our human struggles and grow into our inborn divinity and live much happier and peaceful lives.
Most Christians haven't paid attention to the humanity of Jesus. They only know him as the savior of world. And that is the problem. Let me tell you a story:
A baptist minister was once baptizing his flock on the river bank. A drunkard walked into the scene and preacher asked if he wanted to be baptized. He said yes, and he was taken into the water and the preacher asked: “Do you believe in Jesus Christ?
Guy: Who is that?
Preacher: Your Lord and savior.
Guy: You mean the guy who died on the cross?
Preacher: Yes
Guy: “He is OK, I believe in him” and the preacher baptized him in the name of father and of the son and of the holy spirit.
When I was in India, I stayed with my brother's family. His grandson Kevin is going to receive his first communion in March. It is a big celebration. He is already in a special catechism class preparing for holy communion. So I asked this little kid, what is it about. What happens at first communion? “I am going to receive Jesus for the first time” he said.“Who is Jesus?” “Jesus is God” and who is God? “God is Jesus?” He gave me this circular answers.
Unfortunately, most adults are also only capable of giving such circular answers. For most adult Christians, their religious knowledge has not progressed much from their religious education days as children.
For the past 17 centuries, the Church has been focusing on Jesus as son of God or Jesus the Christ. The first 3 centuries were different. It is in the fourth century, when emperor Constantine became a Christian, that Christianity became a religion. Until then, it was considered a way of life. A life based on the way of Jesus of Nazareth.
Constantine convened the bishops of the Church in a place called Nicea for a Council and the creed of the church was formulated during that council. This is the section abut Jesus.
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven:
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.
I was taught that creed when I was about 8 years old. It was mandatory learning prior to receiving first communion.
So according to the creed this is the bottom line:
Jesus is this big guy. He is the son of God. He has very little in common with me. He is divine and I am human; He is God, and I am a poor sinner. He has easy access to God, and I don't. If I pray to him he will tell God the father about my request and my prayers may be answered, or may be not, if it is not “God's will.” Since he died on the cross to save me, I need to thank him and praise him.
He rose again on the third day. He ascended into heaven which presupposes that heaven is somewhere up there. He is sitting now at the right hand of the father, which means that God has two hands...but then again, we say God is Spirit...
And of course, he is going to come again at the end of the world on golden chariots...and he will take a select group of people with him to heaven and the rest will be sent to hell for eternity.
Believing all that and repeating it is never going to change your life. It won't have any impact on your daily lives when you have to deal with the challenges and struggles of life.
When he was born, Jesus was not Jesus Christ, he was just Jesus. In the birth announcement, the angel told Mary that she “was to give him the name Jesus (Lk:1:31). He didn't say his name shall be “Jesus Christ.” In fact, according to the gospel of Mathew (1:23) his name is “Emmanuel” which means, “God with us.” So, what did we do? We took the “God with us” and made him into a “God for us,” put him on a pedestal and began worshiping him, rather than following him.
Listen to these words of the creed again: “He was born of the virgin Mary” and look at the next phrase: “He was crucified under Pontius Pilate and died and was buried.”
What happened to his 33 years of life, his teachings, his message? What happened in between his birth and his death? Who was he? What were his values? How did he live? How did he deal with life situations? How did he deal with people around him? What did he teach?
Let me give you a nugget from the gospel of Luke: (Read Luke: 6:27-36)
It is my opinion that that majority of Christians don't know Jesus the man who lived..or what he really taught or don't want to know what he taught, because, it is too hard to follow those teachings...and that is why the world is the way it is, even though half of the world is “Christian”...they are members of the religions of Christianity..not necessarily followers of the way of Jesus...big difference.
Story about worshiping and following.
This is the story of two patients on one of our hospice teams. Jane and Lisa were in their 70s. They were diagnosed with cancer. They lived together in a house in Tamarac. Being traditional Catholics, they wanted to receive the “Sacrament of the Sick” (Last Rites) before they died. So the team chaplain, who is a Protestant minister, contacted the local Catholic parish.
The priest agreed to come to the house and give the women Last Rites. The chaplain showed up at the house few minutes before the priest arrived. Both of them walked into patients' bedroom. The priest spoke to the women for a few minutes and excused himself from the room along with the chaplain.
And the priest told the chaplain that he could not give the sacrament to the women..because, they were gay... and living in sin. And the priest left.
Jane and Lisa have been in a committed relationship for more than 50 years. I personally don't believe that being gay is sinful. But for arguments sake, let us say it is.
Had this priest known the human Jesus who let the prostitute wipe his feet with her hair,
the Jesus who did not condemn the woman caught in adultery,
the Jesus who visited the house of Zacheus, the tax collector.
the Jesus who touched and healed the leper, the Jesus who forgave the thief on the side of his cross,
the Jesus who said, “Woe to you hypocrites! You shut the kingdom of heaven in people's faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to ( Mt: 23:13)
the Jesus who said: “Do not judge”,
the Jesus who said: “I desire mercy, not sacrifice, for I have come not to call the righteous but sinners” (Mt. (.13)
would have been extremely loving and compassionate to Lisa and Jane and would have given them the sacrament and comforted them in their dying days.
This priest was praising Jesus and worshiping him as the son of God in the church, but had forgotten who Jesus of Nazareth was.
I want you to get to know Jesus. I want you to shape your lives based on his teachings. I want you to see the world thru his eyes. I want you treat the people around you as he would have treated them. I would rather you follow him rather than worship him.
Jesus the man who grew up to become Jesus the Christ. Here is a human being, who was born in a family, raised by parents, and did carpentry work who became the anointed one.
In other words, the humanity of Jesus was transformed into divinity. That is my attraction to Jesus. That gives me hope that my humanity has the potential to grow into divinity when I follow in his way.
The seed of divinity is ingrained in your humanity. When you become conscious of that truth and bring forth that divinity from within...you are on your way to become Jesus-like..
… and the whole purpose of the enterprise called “Church” should be exactly that...
