One Man's story

Have you ever stopped to think of what a miracle it is that we even know of Christ today? Looking at Christ through strictly human eyes, and removing faith in Him as our Lord…He was a man that lived thirty some odd years, preached for three years, and was killed as though he were a criminal.

How many men have lived in this world throughout all of time, even men claiming to be Christ or a god, and we have little or no record of them. How many men taught for way more years than Christ did and yet their teachings have disappeared? How many men died for their crimes and little or no record was kept of their deaths?

And yet here we are 2000 plus years after the death of Christ and His ministry continues. The things He taught are still being taught today. His death has been recorded and replayed countless times.

The story of His life, of His very existence and influence, on all of creation has been recorded and preserved despite the fact that it has been outlawed, burned, and hunted down as if it were some sort of evil plot to destroy the world.

The history of the Scriptures and of the Church is fascinating. There is no earthly reason that a book that has been banned in so many places, that has been purged from so many lands, that has been hunted and destroyed throughout so many years, should have survived to this day and become the most popular Book of all time. There is no reason why one man, a man that today we would label as mentally unstable…after all who goes around claiming to be the Son of God…should have His story recorded and preserved over so many years. There is no earthly reason why so many people should have had such faith in a single Man that they gave their very lives rather than deny Him. After all…how many men throughout history have claimed to be god?

There have been men that have led groups of people as their pastor and leader…and they led them straight to their deaths. Some have even told those that follow them to kill themselves. And the people that followed them did just that. Others have led those that follow them in such a way as to lead them into a situation where authorities wind up using deadly force on their compounds.

And these tragic stories of people that followed their leader to their deaths…stories of the leaders themselves…garner only small memories in our written records. Their stories have not gone on to become all-time best sellers. They have not lined the shelves of just about every bookstore ever opened. They do not live in the homes of thousands of people. They are not translated into hundreds of languages.

By the world’s standards what made Christ someone that we should remember throughout all of time any more than anyone else that claimed to be a god?

And yet His word has been preserved even when it was illegal, even when a single copy had to be handwritten over many months or years. It was preserved when men burned every copy of it they could find. It was preserved when it was tied to believer’s necks as they were burned at the stake. It was preserved when men had to flee to foreign lands in order to copy it down.

And through our Lord’s word many have been saved. The preservation of the Scriptures defies all reasonable explanations. By all rights it should have perished long before now.

By all rights Christ should have been preserved at best as some small mention of a man that claimed to be the Son of God and was put to death. Much the way we might see a small mention of something in a back page, or even a front page, of a newspaper. There today. Gone tomorrow.

If we followed that newspaper article a bit further we might dig up a bit of information at the courthouse. Might find a few more articles. But really…why would one want to. He was a man that claimed to be God and therefore can be written off as not worthy of our time.

But this man’s story wasn’t written off, left to disappear as the scrolls disintegrated and turned to dust. His story, instead, was painstakingly written down, was preserved and shared. It could almost be said that it was written in blood for all the blood that was shed for it.

And today we have the Scriptures to teach of us our Lord and to lead the way as we follow Him. Because one Man’s story, a story that should have disappeared many years ago, was preserved for us so that we might know that one Man today.