 In our culture, many different Jesuses are presented to us. Hippie, Jesus, Fire, and Brimstone, Jesus, Activist, Jesus, British, Jesus, and Progressive Jesus. The sad truth is that many people cling to a version of Jesus that is not reflected in the Bible, but rather is created in their own imagination. Today, I want to debunk three common lies that people believe about who Jesus was, in hopes that it will give you a greater love and passion for who Jesus truly is. I figure instead of pulling these misunderstandings about Jesus from thin air, let's respond to a couple of folks who have different understandings of who Jesus is. Hey guys, what's up? It's Isaac David, and this is The Daily Disciple, where I help you find Jesus and follow him daily. If you're new to the channel, subscribe because I'm putting out new content every single day. That is only possible because of the support of people on Patreon. It is our goal to get to 300 patrons by the end of the year, and through your support, we get closer and closer every single day. If you want to sign up, head to the link in my biopatrion.com slash daily underscore disciple. Now onto the video. You should just be trying to model yourself after Jesus. And what did Jesus do? He literally loved and accepted and hung out with every single person, literally every single person down to the person who was being crucified right next to him, who was an awful sinner in the world's eyes. He even told him, hey, you're going to be in heaven with me. From my experience, one of the biggest misconceptions people have about Jesus is that he was purely about love. That was pretty much his only thing, love and acceptance. Was Jesus about love? Absolutely. God demonstrated his love for us that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. We were welcomed into God's family despite our sins, flaws and mistakes. Through his grace, we are totally accepted. But don't get it twisted. Jesus was not just about love and acceptance. It's important not to minimize the other aspects of Jesus' character. Jesus was certainly about love and acceptance, but he was also about repentance and truth. Jesus did not approve of every kind of behavior. That's not what he was trying to signify by hanging out with tax collectors and prostitutes. In fact, he called those who were living contrary to his commands to repentance. Repentance is not a word we like very much these days, but it is so important if we're going to understand Jesus' true character. Jesus called the Pharisees to repentance as well. Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside, but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. Let's look at John 8 verse 4. This is a little bit longer of a passage, but it highlights more of Jesus' character. They said to him, Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say? This, they said to test him that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her. And once more, he bent down on the ground. But when they heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the older ones. And Jesus was left alone with a woman standing before him. Jesus stood up and said to her, Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you? She said, No one, Lord. And Jesus said, Neither do I condemn you. Go and from now on, sin no more. We often get caught up in this dramatic scene. It's quite a show. All these Pharisees and religious elite are gathered around this woman. And Jesus comes in and he says, if you have not sinned, then you can cast the first stone and everyone walks away. But Jesus doesn't leave it at that. He says that I don't condemn you, but then he calls the woman to repentance. Repentance is this idea of turning, right? It's turning away from what you once knew to newness of life. It's a turning of the mind, but I like to think of it physically as well. You were going in one direction, following one thing. But now you're turning into a new direction to face Christ to go in that direction. Jesus' love isn't just warm and fuzzy. It is grounded in truth. While some people may try to minimize or even erase certain aspects of Jesus' character, when we do that, when we take away his holiness, his judgment, his truth, his wrath, we're actually making an idol. Hi, my name is Bailey. I am a pastor in the United Methodist Church. And the thing that I have in common with Jesus is that we are both queer. Try and fight me. Okay, I'm not going to fight this lady. She seems, you know, nice enough. And I'm not going to try to convince you that it's a popular idea that Jesus was queer because I don't think many people believe that. But the broader version of this at the very least was that Jesus was a progressive Christian. He was a non-discriminatory, unproblematic fellow. He dismissed old laws and old ways of seeing things. He wanted people to be liberated from the laws and not have any shame. So let's take a look at the scriptures to see if Jesus really did wipe away the old laws. Do not think that I've come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. You know, people in Jesus' day were wondering if he came to wipe out all the old laws and they were wondering if they could just live however they wanted now. Jesus clarified that he didn't come to abolish the law but he came to fulfill the law perfectly, something that we could never do. He demonstrated that in his sinless life. Further evidence that Jesus didn't come to abolish the law was that he, in fact, brought the law into a new context when he gave the sermon on the Mount. You have heard it said, You shall not commit adultery. But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Jesus by no means was this guy that was just trying to wipe out the old laws saying you can live however you want. He was actually fleshing out the laws that they had been given. He's saying, look, you've heard this law a long time ago, right? We all know this, but this is actually the implications because I care about your heart, not just the physical act but where your heart's at in all of this. You know, people may claim that Jesus was the first progressive Christian but when we actually look at progressive Christianity they try to abolish the law but true biblical Christianity sees Jesus as the fulfillment of the law. That doesn't mean that we now have license to do the things that God hates. However, Christ has lifted the burden of needing to keep the law perfectly. Now we pursue holiness out of our love for God. Pastor Vicki, did Jesus die for our sins? That is a line that the church has used for hundreds of years that does not really make sense to me. Jesus died because Jesus challenged the status quo and the leaders of the church at the time and the leaders of the Roman Empire were not happy with his challenges to love one another, to treat all fairly and to welcome the most marginalized in the community. That is why Jesus died. He was killed by those who feared him. There are a lot of troubling aspects of this clip and I could go in depth and I have actually on this specific clip in other videos but I want to talk about this misconception that Jesus was simply a social revolutionary. People create an idol of the Savior they think they need and in our current culture many people believe that our primary problem is that social structures are failing us. Many believe that the most pressing issue of our day is that we need to rectify injustices brought towards marginalized groups. If this is your belief system then seeing Jesus as the ultimate social revolutionary makes perfect sense. After all, if Jesus can't solve what we think is the primary problem of our world then who can? Though Jesus was concerned with those being marginalized in his day and that's evident through his interactions with the sick, the weak, the ostracized of society. But I contend that Jesus' primary purpose and mission in coming to this earth was something greater than social change. Jesus' message was that of inner transformation where the kingdom of God is built in us then through us. He came to fulfill the law. He lived the sinless life that we could not live to die on the cross, the death we deserve to die for our sins against God. You see, Jesus was concerned with getting to the heart of our problems. All the issues within society and our social structures were simply outflows of a wicked and broken heart. We don't like to talk about sin. It's much easier to push the blame onto government entities or societal norms or the church itself. But our first reaction needs to be to look on the inside because that's what Jesus was trying to get at. And when you take a good hard look, I don't know about you guys but I see brokenness. I see sin. I see selfishness. I see pride. We have all fallen short and we've all rebelled against God. Jesus came to save people, to save us from our sin, to bring us from spiritual death into spiritual life. In some ways, the plan of God is understandable. But in others, it's incomprehensible. Why would God come to save a people that would spit in his face, that would rebel against him? You already have the answer. It's one of the most famous verses in the whole Bible, John 3.16. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever shall believe in him shall not perish but have eternal life. Jesus was so much more than a social revolutionary. Yes, he cared for the marginalized and oppressed. But first and foremost, he was the savior of the world who sought to bring us from spiritual death into spiritual life. Our goal should be to see God as he truly is to the best of our ability. How we see Jesus affects the way we see ourselves. When we have a distorted view of Jesus, we have a distorted view of ourselves. And it leads many people into either progressive Christianity or legalistic Christianity. Progressive Christianity seeks to abolish the law and thus relieve ourselves of the shame and guilt we feel. Legalistic Christianity seeks to stew in that guilt and shame in order to manipulate and motivate themselves to be better Christians. Biblical Christianity invites us into rest and acceptance that is only available through Jesus and his sacrifice by his grace on our behalf. Friends, that is truly good news. Thank you so much for watching this video. It is such a blessing to be able to shoot these videos and write these scripts and just research. And my heart is filled as I'm writing and as I'm making them. So I hope yours is as well. If you want to subscribe, I would love that and see you on a daily basis because I'm putting out new videos all the time. Thanks again to everyone on Patreon. You keep this ministry, keep going and growing. So thank you. You are a blessing to my life. I will see you guys next time. God bless.