Did Jesus Want a Religion Made After Him?

How should I respond to the books and TV specials that come out around Easter saying Jesus never wanted to have a religion founded after him? That's just one of the questions we'll be answering on today's edition of CORE Christianity. Hi, this is Bill Meyer, along with Pastor Adriel Sanchez, and this is the radio program where we answer your questions about the Bible and the Christian life every day. With your question at 833-THE-CORE. That's 1-833-843-2673.

You can also post your question on our Facebook or Instagram accounts, and you can email us with your question at questions at corechristianity.com. First up today, let's go to Dean from Millsboro, Delaware. Dean, welcome to the program. Hi, how are you doing? We're doing well, Dean. Thanks for taking my call.

Yeah. I've been a believer all my life, but I've always had a problem with knowing how to love God. I never met the guy, so I just find it hard to love God, basically.

So how would I go about doing that? Well, I think it starts, Dean, with recognizing what Christ has done for us and experiencing the forgiveness that he's given to us. There's this wonderful story in the Gospel of Luke, in Luke chapter 7, where a woman, she's described as a sinful woman, comes to Jesus and she's basically weeping at his feet, and the Lord receives her and forgives her. And he has this statement there in Luke chapter 7, verse 47, Therefore I tell you, her sins which are many are forgiven, for she loved much, but he who is forgiven little loves little. It's this idea of when we grasp the mercy of God to us in Christ, how much God has forgiven us, Dean, what it should produce in us is love. Now none of us perfectly love the Lord, but I think the more that we rest in and receive the goodness of God to us in the Gospel, in what Jesus has done for us, that's what it does, is it produces love in our hearts, love by the grace of the Holy Spirit.

And so we can love the God who we don't see because we know what he's done for us in his Son. Now throughout the Gospel of John, another thing that you also see is this relationship between love and obedience. Jesus said in John chapter 14, If you love me, you will keep my commandments.

And then throughout 1 John, 1 John was a letter that was written to a group of Christians. Throughout that book, Dean, John talks about how love looks like the way we treat one another. In particular, our Christian brothers and sisters, we can't say I love God if we hate each other. And so love is this real thing that God produces in our hearts through the grace of the Gospel and by the power of the Holy Spirit, and it should cause us to treat each other differently with charity, with love, and it should produce in us this love for God that's reflected in our obedience to his word. And again, like I said, none of us do that perfectly, but John says again in 1 John, We love because he first loved us. And so if you are struggling to love God, and as I said, all of us, we struggle to love God, none of us does that perfectly. What we go to is God's love, his love for us in Jesus.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son so that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. And it's as we apprehend that truth. We can be in church for our entire life and really not lay hold of that truth, not understand it, not grasp it. And so we pray that the Lord gives us that understanding so that we can truly love him by knowing his love for us. Thank you for your question, Dean, and may the Lord fill you with his love. You know, Adriel, I realize that a lot of Christians get caught up with depending on their feelings. And at times, you know, we're trying to maybe generate this feeling of loving God and we're saying, well, it doesn't feel like loving another person. How do you respond to that? Yeah, and that's part of the issue is I think in our culture today, we have this definition of love that's very much sort of rooted in feelings.

C.S. Lewis in his classic work, Mere Christianity, you know, he talked about how so many people think of love today like the cold. You know, it's just something you sort of catch and then it's there for a while, then it goes away. We don't see love as rooted in promise, action, those kinds of things. I mean, God's love for us was manifested in what he did for us in this covenant.

There's sort of contractual language that you see throughout the Bible, the new covenant that Jesus himself spoke of. And really that's reassuring when we grasp that the love of God for us is deeper than just a sort of emotional thing. And our love for one another through the gospel ought to be deeper than our feelings as well. Sometimes it's a decision that we make to say, I am going to love the Lord by following him, even though I don't necessarily feel like it all the time. Because we're still broken, we still experience the effects of indwelling sin. And so we go to the word and we rest in God's promise and we follow him even when we don't feel like it. Great counsel. This is Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez. Let's go to Raul calling from New York City. Raul, what's your question for Pastor Adriel?

Okay. Before Jesus Christ, how did people make it to heaven? And before Jesus Christ, how did anyone have their sins forgiven?

Hey, Raul, thank you for that question. And forgiveness, obviously, is this theme that's not just in the New Testament with Jesus. It's something we see all over the Bible from the very beginning. You think of the book of Genesis and Adam and Eve sinning against the Lord and the Lord forgiving them.

Actually, in the context, they're clothing them. They tried to cover themselves with these fig leaves and the Lord gave them these garments of skin, animal skin. There had to be a sacrifice. There was this atonement that was made, if you will, to cover their sins. And so forgiveness is something that we see throughout the Bible prior to the coming of Jesus.

And God is the one who gives forgiveness. Now, how in the Old Testament did people experience this? Well, first, we would want to say anyone who ever makes it to heaven or ever got to heaven even prior to the advent of Christ was saved by the grace of God and ultimately through Christ.

Well, how did that happen if Christ hadn't done his saving work on the cross yet? What we say is that there were these sort of images, these types and shadows. I use that phrase sometimes on this broadcast, really just referring to those Old Testament pictures that we see, the sacrificial system, the temple, the animal sacrifices that you saw, which were really all about atonement, forgiveness, making a way for people to dwell in the house of God and in the presence of God. And so through these types and shadows, the image of the scapegoat, if you will, on the Day of Atonement described in Leviticus chapter 17, the people had these vivid images, pictures of how their sins would be taken away, placed on this sacrificial animal. And so it was this very vivid picture, and ultimately we know that Jesus, John the Baptist says this in John chapter 1, is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, so that all those types and shadows pointed forward to Jesus. But prior to his coming, the people looked forward to Jesus and to his saving work through those images, through the temple, through the priesthood, through those sacrifices, and were truly forgiven.

One book, Raoul, that you can look at that I think unpacks us a little bit more if you want to go deeper into studying is the book of Hebrews. Throughout the book of Hebrews, it talks about the sort of role of the Old Testament system, the priesthood, the sacrifices, how ultimately they all pointed to Jesus. The blood of bulls and goats can never really truly take away sin. It's the blood of Christ.

And so anyone who's ever saved in the history of humanity, it's been by the grace of God and through Jesus Christ and by faith. And so there's your answer, brother. Thank you so much for giving us a call. You are listening to Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez, and if you have a question about the Bible or the Christian life, we would love to hear from you. Here's the phone number. You can call us for the next 15 minutes or so at 833-THE-CORE.

That's 1-833-843-2673. Let's go to Sharon in Cedarburg, Wisconsin. Sharon, what's your question for Pastor Adriel?

Well, this might sound a little odd. My daughter and I are Christians for a long time, and I got talking since tomorrow is the day that Christ was crucified. I said to my daughter, I wondered if that was Christ's cross, his cross, personal cross, or did they reuse them? How did that work in those days? Did somebody use it after him or before him, or was it his personal cross? Yeah, that's an interesting question, Sharon, because I know and we know that crucifixion was practiced by the Romans, that there were many people who were crucified. I mean, it was really this very heinous and shameful form of capital punishment that even people in that day had a problem with. There were philosophers who spoke out against crucifixion just because of the shame. It was not a pretty picture.

I mean, if you saw crosses erected on a hill, your stomach would turn. It was this just horrific image, and that's what our Lord endured for us. Now, were those crosses reused? I don't think so, but the reality is we're not told anything about that, certainly not in the Gospels. There's no sense that the cross of Christ was reused for something else or for another crucifixion, that kind of a thing.

We really don't know. The Bible doesn't speak to that specifically. It does focus on the shame of the cross, the pain of the cross, and really the purpose of the cross. The purpose of the cross was really Jesus bearing our curse. The apostle Paul in Galatians chapter 3, he brings this out. He says, verse 10, for all who rely on works of the law are under a curse, for it is written, cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law and do them. Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law because the righteous will live by faith, but the law is not a faith.

Rather, the one who does them shall live by them. And then get this, Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written, cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree. Why did Jesus go to the cross? It wasn't just the shame and the pain, that sort of a thing. It was this sense of curse, the curse that was due to us for our sins that Jesus was bearing.

That's what the New Testament focuses on, and that's, I think, where we should focus as well as many Christians celebrate what we refer to sometimes as Good Friday tomorrow, focusing on the cross of Jesus, where he bore the curse that we deserved for our sins. Thank you for your question, Sharon. Thanks so much, Sharon, for calling in. We appreciate you.

Let's go to Jerry in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Jerry, what's your question for Pastor Adriel? Yes, what did Jesus name or refer himself to as when he says the man of God, the Son of Man?

Yeah, thank you so much for that question. A really interesting title, right, that you hear used throughout the New Testament, where Jesus refers to himself as the Son of Man. And it actually has this very rich Old Testament background back in the book of Daniel. Daniel, chapter seven.

Daniel has this vision, and he says in chapter seven, verse 13, I saw the night visions and behold, with the clouds of heaven, there came one like a son of man. And he came to the Ancient of Days and he was presented before him and to him was given dominion and glory and a people that all peoples, nations and languages should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away and his kingdom, one that shall not be destroyed. And so when Jesus refers to himself as the Son of Man, he's echoing Daniel, chapter seven, verses 13 and following. He is the one who has this kingdom given to him, this eternal kingdom that will never perish or pass away. And all peoples, nations and languages will serve him. Now, it's so fascinating about that word there, serve, is it's used throughout the book of Daniel to refer to the service or the worship that's given to God or a deity. You see, the Son of Man is this divine figure. Jesus is God. And so when he refers to himself as the Son of Man, I mean, it really was quite the claim, especially for people who knew the Old Testament and who knew the book of Daniel.

It's this glorious thing. And that's why sometimes when Jesus would call himself the Son of Man, the religious leaders would get upset. I mean, how could he say this? You're talking about the Daniel seven Son of Man? Well, yes, Jesus is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, who all nations are called to serve and worship. And he calls you and me to serve him. He's the Son of Man.

Thanks for that question. You're listening to Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez. The book of Revelation is often very confusing to Christians. Well, we have an excellent resource that will help you understand and study that final book of the Bible.

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You can also call us at 833-843-2673 for help getting that or any one of our offers. Right now, let's go to a voicemail we received here at CoreChristianity from Tom. Around this time of year, there's always things on TV, TV specials and hear about books saying things like Jesus never really wanted to find a religion. And he would be surprised today if people were worshipping him and there were churches and denominations, all this other stuff. And there's some other kind of historical figure other than the Bible says he is and that, you know, Jesus had a wife and all these ideas normally come around this time year. So how should we respond to those types of things? How should we maybe respond to people who seem to assume that that's the real story?

Thanks. Yeah, there are a lot of strange things that people say around this time of the year about our Lord. And you got to be careful.

You have to be discerning. Not everything you see on the History Channel or National Geographic or whatever is accurate. Frankly, a lot of it is misleading. Now, this claim that Jesus did not intend to create a religion or this sort of system of belief with the rituals and doctrine, it's actually a claim that was made by several critical scholars in the past. This idea that Jesus was just a sort of apocalyptic preacher who wanted to come and establish this kingdom and things didn't go so well for him. He was crucified. He died and then people took basically his his message and then they turned it into a religion. But Jesus in and of himself, I mean, they would teach that he had failed. He didn't establish this kingdom that he said he was going to establish. And it really is this this sort of tragic view of Jesus.

And it's it's a false view. It's not a biblical view. The fact of the matter is, is Jesus absolutely intended to establish his kingdom and he did through the preaching of the gospel and the establishment of the church. I mean, you just think about what Jesus told the disciples after his resurrection when he sent them out. He said to them, Matthew Chapter 28, verse 18, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. What a wonderful promise that is, isn't it, that Jesus is with us even to the end of the age right now, he's with us by the grace of the Holy Spirit.

Take comfort in that, brothers and sisters. But let me just say one thing that Jesus makes absolutely clear here is that he's establishing his church, his kingdom. He told Peter that very thing. I'm going to build my church and the gates of hell are not going to prevail against it. And ever since Jesus ascended into heaven, he's been building his church, advancing his kingdom through preaching, teaching, baptism, the Lord's Supper.

I mean, you can't miss it. Jesus intended to establish his church, his kingdom here on earth. And one day that's going to be fully realized when the Lord comes back, consummated, if you will.

We sometimes use that word, just the finalization of the kingdom. Another thing I'll say that we can point to, to establish the fact that Jesus really did intend to start a religion, is not just what you see there in Matthew 28, but also what you see two chapters earlier in Matthew 26, when Jesus instituted the Lord's Supper. You know, he told his disciples, he has this meal, this religious meal with them, but then he also tells them, you know, take, eat, this is my body given for you. This cup is the new covenant in my blood, shed for the forgiveness of sins. Do this in remembrance of me. In other words, he's establishing this ritual, this religious ritual, if you will, that focuses on the gospel and on his shed blood, his work for us, that he intends for his followers to do after he leaves.

It doesn't get any clearer than that. He's giving them essentially these things to follow, these rules we might say, these wonderful rituals. We can call it a ritual.

We sometimes refer to it as a sacrament or an ordinance, but it focuses on Jesus and what he's accomplished for us. And so when people say, oh, Jesus was just this apocalyptic preacher who didn't intend to start a religion or have people believe all these things, that's just so not true. And we see it over and over again in the gospels. Jesus, not only did he intend to start a religion, as it were, really to be the fulfillment of the promise given to the patriarchs in the Old Testament, he did. He established his kingdom. That kingdom is still here on earth right now, and it's advancing every day through the proclamation of the gospel. And if you believe in Jesus, you're a part of that kingdom. Praise the Lord. Amen. This is Core Christianity with Pastor Adriel Sanchez. Let's go to Sal from Oklahoma City. Sal, what's your question for Pastor Adriel? Hello, Pastor.

This is Val. My question is with regard to the animals that God gives us to take on as pets, dogs, cats, etc. I don't understand the short length of time we have them and then they pass. You know, we love them so much, they become part of the family, and why such a short time does Jesus say anything about this? And is there a heaven for these pets that become such loved ones?

Yeah. Hey, well, thank you for that question, brother. Sounds like you've had maybe some rough experiences with pets. And the reality is they are truly a gift given to us from God. I mean, you think of the created world that the Lord has given to us, all of these wonderful blessings that God has given to us, and animals, too.

And as you said, they sort of become a part of the family, and so when they die, it's this really sad thing. Now, the question, do they go to heaven? Is there a heaven for animals?

There's a difference of opinion on this in particular. So, one, we know that in the new creation, it's going to be perfect. Are our pets that we had here on earth going to be there with us?

We're not told anywhere in the Bible whether or not they will or they won't be. I do get the sense that in the new creation, there are going to be animals there who are going to be a part of it, and that the whole creation, including the animals in one sense, are going to be praising the Lord. All creation worshiping God in perfect harmony. But we don't know exactly whether or not our specific pets, the dog that I had or the cat that I had, whether they're going to be in the new creation there with me. One thing that I think we should know is there is something unique about humanity, different from the animals. We're made in the image of God, and so there has to be a balance here where we recognize the value of and the blessing of these animals, this created world that the Lord has given to us, but we also recognize what's distinct about humans.

As moral agents who make decisions and trust and believe in Jesus Christ for the salvation of our souls. But I think, brother, that you can be comforted by the fact that God made the world good, that sin entered the world through death, and that one day God is going to restore everything, the whole created order. It's not just that God is saving my soul and that the body in this creation is going to just burn and be done away with. No, God is going to restore everything, brother. And what that looks like, we're not entirely sure, but I'll tell you one thing.

It's going to be better than we could ever imagine. And so you can trust the Lord with that. You can trust the Lord with that promise that He's given to us in His word and take comfort there, brother. You know, Adriel, I was just thinking about that passage about the lion laying down with the lamb. We don't know about the labradoodle. That hasn't been answered for us. That's right, Bill, and I know you have a wonderful dog that you love very much. But again, just the hope that we have, the restoration of all things through the work of Jesus Christ, what a great promise we receive from the Lord. The truth of God's word together.