1 – I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand.
2 – By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you.
3 – For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,
4 – that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,
5 – and that He appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve.
6 – After that, He appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep.
7 – Then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles, 8 – and last of all He appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.
14 – If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.
18 – Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost.
19 – If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men
20 – But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.
21 – For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a Man.
22 – For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.
This is the Word of the Lord, Thanks be to God.
When Daniel was about twelve years old, he did a science project for school in which he compared name-brand light bulbs to the knock-off store-brand bulbs. The idea was to find out if the name-brand bulbs, which of course tend to be pricier, are actually worth it in that they last longer than the cheaper brands. To help him with this project we purchased several clamp on lights and boxes of the various brands of bulbs. It wasn’t a cheap homework assignment! Once we hooked it all up, some lights were left on 24-7 until they stopped working. Others he turned on and off, on and off several times every half hour or so until they finally blew out. I know you’re on the edge of your seat to hear the results of his comparative study so here goes: Daniel found out that in spite of their fancy packaging, the bulbs all worked about the same. The knock-off brands were just as good, and sometimes even better than the name brands. So there you go! I’ve saved you some money today! You no longer have to cough up the big bucks when it comes to light bulbs!
I bring this up because with my sermon this morning I want to save you something much more valuable than money. I want us to spend our time together on this Easter Sunday doing a comparative study of the world’s top religious leaders to see which one is really worth our time, which one is worth devoting our lives to.
I realize there is a very good chance that everyone present this morning has already given their hearts and lives to Jesus. and if you have, you may think you don’t need this study because you already know how infinitely precious a relationship with Jesus really is.
If you’re thinking that then don’t leave, because I still believe our comparative study will be beneficial in that it may help you when it comes to leading someone else to make this decision- a co-worker or neighbor or even a family member. I truly believe this comparative study will help you to be better equipped and motivated verbalize your faith, the gospel we’ve been reviewing by looking at our stained-glass windows.
At the onset of this message I want to let you know that this material is not original with me. It’s based on research done by Bill Hybels and his staff at Willow Creek Community Church, and they have given permission for pastors like me to use it in this manner as long as I give him credit, which I have just done. I also want you to know that their work was done just last year which means the facts we’ll be reviewing are fresh and up-to-date. So let’s get started.
Identifying the top tier of the greatest religious leaders of all time is not really that hard. It’s pretty easy to see which four religious leaders rise to the top of the pile, and here they are: Confucius, Buddha, Mohammed, and Jesus. I want to thank Bill & Meredith Jones, and their two-year-old Sunday School class for letting me use their blocks this morning. If you’re wondering why I don’t mention a Hindu leader, well it’s because there’s no central personality in the Hindu faith, so these four are it.
I want to begin by doing a quick overview of these top four, and then we’re going to compare each of them according to five categories in a way that I think you’ll find quite interesting. And please understand, my purpose is not to be critical, but just to provide you with as fair and objective a comparison as possible. Let’s begin with Confucius. You probably haven’t heard about him much since your school days, but he was born in 551 B.C. and at one point he held influence over 300 million people, which is about the same size as the current population of the United States. I’m sure you will agree that is an impressive number of adherents! That number has dropped significantly since Confucius’ teachings were banned in China after the revolution there in 1949, but I think you still have to consider him in the top four.
Second is Buddha. Any of you know what his actual name was? Siddhartha Gautama. I think I would have changed my name, too! Actually the name “Buddha” just means “the enlightened one”, and he was born just a few years before Confucius in 563 B.C. At one time his influence spread to hundreds of millions of people mainly in northern India, parts of China, Japan, Korea, Indonesia. And, even today best estimates are that about 382 million people, follow the teachings of this individual.
Next is Mohammed. He was born approximately a thousand years after Buddha and Confucius in 570AD and is, of course, the founder of Islam. Even today Islam is a rapidly expanding religion. In fact, it has about 1.3 billion followers, which easily make it the second largest religion in the world.
Finally there is Jesus of Nazareth. Does anyone remember what year He was born in? Best estimates right now indicate that about 2.1 billion people consider themselves to be followers of Jesus Christ. Nearly twice the number of Muslims.
So using the number of their followers to identify the top four is fairly easy, it’s just basic math. Even I can do it! The real challenge in a true comparative study is to try and see if any of the top four distinguishes himself from the others in some way, or if are they all about the same when it’s all said and done.
As I said, in his research Hybels and his staff compared these four men according to five categories. And again my purpose is to look objectively at what the evidence tells us.
(1) The first category we will look at is their teachings.
In his day, Confucius was always referred to as the “sagest of the sages,” which we would translate to mean, “scary smart.” But if you really dig into his teachings you’ll find that he didn’t author that much original material. By his own admission, he basically collected pearls of wisdom from other teachers and other originators of spiritual ideas. Then he edited them and eventually put them into a small book called the Analects. Another thing, Confucius spent very little time or energy trying to connect any his followers to a higher spiritual being. No, his main goal was to get people to walk in wisdom and to get along with one another a little better, which is not a bad thing in a world as screwed up as his was and ours still is. The circulation of Confucius’ teachings has been on a steady decline in recent decades. From its peak of 300 million adherents in its hey-day, there are only about six million today-plus-Confucius’ teachings have lost a lot of influence, especially in the last 50 or 60 years. So we’re going to give Confucius a teaching block of representative size.
Okay, what about the teaching of Buddha? Well, like Confucius, Buddha was far from original when it came to his belief system. Actually, Buddha borrowed very heavily from Hindu theology, including such beliefs as reincarnation and karma and meditation. Buddha is revered for putting together what’s known as the Four Noble Truths and what’s called the Eightfold Path, which has to do with the elimination of desire in a person’s life. The truth is many of us get into trouble because of our wayward desires and attachment to things, and Buddha made the point that if we could create a little distance from our desires and attachments to things, well, we could eventually live in a peaceful state called nirvana. (By the way I’ve noticed that a lot of times when I’m preaching I see people slip into a peaceful state of nirvana.) In any case Buddha’s writings and the teachings are still quite widely distributed. There’s a Buddhist “house of worship” right down the street at the end of Muncaster Mill Road, and popular stars like Richard Gere, Kate Bosworth, Orlando Bloom, and Tina Turner embrace Buddha’s teachings. Now, exact numbers are hard to come by, but in terms of the impact of Buddha’s teaching, to be objective I think we have to give him a block just a little bit bigger than we gave Confucius, because his teachings have had and still have quite a bit of impact on people.
Next comes Mohammed and his core teachings can be summarized in the following five statements:
- Allah is the one true God.
- Allah has many prophets including Moses and Jesus, but Mohammed is the last and the greatest by far.
- The Koran is the supreme religious book in the world.
- There are many intermediate beings between God and us, some good and some evil; and
- Every person’s deeds will be weighed someday to determine who did enough good deeds to deserve Paradise.
In other words, in Islam you earn your salvation, you earn Paradise through your works. If at the end of your life, the scales tip right, you’re good. But, if they tip wrong in terms of good deeds and bad deeds, it’s not good. As I said, the truths of Islam are recorded in the Koran, which is widely distributed and read in growing numbers of countries all over the world. It’s easy to see that Islam has had a much greater impact than the teachings of Confucius or Buddha, so from the teaching impact point, being as objective as possible, we should assign a larger block to Mohammed.
Next comes Jesus. And, again, sticking to our effort to be objective, the fact of the matter is that the teaching impact of Jesus Christ dwarfs the others in the top four. Even His critics were astounded at what He said. In John 7 it tells us of a time when temple guards were sent to arrest Him and when they were asked why they came back empty-handed they said, “No one ever spoke the way this Man does.” (John 7:46) And that respect for His teaching hasn’t changed even in 2000 years. In virtually every poll and every survey conducted inside and outside the Christian faith all around the world, when asked the question, “Who was the greatest teacher of all time?” Jesus of Nazareth appears on the top or in the top three almost every single time. Jesus is quoted more often; His stories and parables are repeated more frequently; and in sheer numbers of sales of Bibles and other books related to Jesus’ teaching, none of the others even come close. In fact, ninety-four percent of the world’s population has access to at least a portion of the Bible and even in a bad year, 60-70 million copies of the Bible are sold. It is the best-selling book every year.
The cover story on Time magazine last week admitted that the Bible “. is the most influential book of all time.” The story went on to talk about the fact that even secular educators say that we have to teach the Bible in public school because so much of our literature and culture is based on it. For example Shakespeare quotes the Bible 1300 times so you can’t understand his plays unless you understand the Bible. The plain fact is if we fail to teach the Bible, which of course tells why Jesus came plus tons of things that Jesus taught and did, we fail to truly educate our children. So I think it is a no-brainer to say that when it comes to the impact of the teachings of Jesus, in all fairness, He should get the biggest block. It’s just being objective.
(2) Our next category is a bit more controversial, because now I want us to compare these four men according to their morality.
What were their personal ethics like? How did these great religious leaders behave in private? And once again let’s begin with Confucius. Now, while he strongly encouraged virtuous living, Confucius never claimed, nor was it ever said of him, that he lived what you would call a morally spotless life. Understand-there’s no record of him being a bad guy. From what we do know, he seemed to be a decent, upright person but he didn’t claim perfection and no one ever attributed that to him. So we’ll just give him an average sized block to symbolize the fact that, as far as we know, Confucius was at least a pretty nice guy.
Buddha on the other hand was a very strong proponent of moral living. And from what historians tell us, he did his absolute best to live out the Eightfold Plan that he taught so energetically. So, to be fair, we’ll give him a little larger block than Confucius.
Now, we have a problem when it comes to Mohammed because he admitted to killing several people in various skirmishes that he and his followers got into. Plus, in direct violation of the teachings of the Koran, he exceeded the number of wives he was allowed to have. The limit at the time was four. Some would say that he received a special revelation one night that resulted in his getting a special dispensation to add to his collection of wives. Of course, no one else got that kind of deal, but he did-and this makes me wonder why he would not be held to a standard that his followers were held to. Furthermore, Mohammed often acknowledged his own waywardness, his own sinfulness, and he repeatedly asked Allah for forgiveness from it, and his followers and friends clearly saw his dark side on many occasions. So without going into any more detail than that, I would say that to be fair, to be objective, we have to give him a little thinner slice of the personal morality block.
Now, what about Jesus of Nazareth? How would you compare Him when it comes to morality? One of the truest tests of someone’s personal ethics is to give his detractors a free shot in which you let them describe all that’s wrong with that person. If your friends are asked to vouch for your attitudes and behaviors, they might cut you a little slack and leave out any comments about your shortcomings. But give your enemies an opportunity to assassinate your character or to bring up something bad you’ve done, they will usually take every opportunity to criticize you if given the chance!
In our search committee whenever we examine a candidate, we not only look at their references, we dig further because references are usually that candidate’s friends, and friends tend to always paint a picture that is a little bit rosier than reality. Jesus was so open and non-defensive about His character that as John 8:46 tells us, one time in a mob situation with people who were jealous of His growing popularity-enemies who were looking for ways to publicly discredit Him, Jesus asked this if anyone could accuse Him of a wrongdoing. He said, “Can any of you prove Me guilty of sin?”
By the way, I advise against your asking the same question of your family members in the car after the service. It could make for a long uncomfortable ride home!
But think about this for just a second. In the 33 years of Jesus’ earthly life there were no exaggerations, no jokes at someone else’s expense, no impatience, ingratitude, or arrogance. How do you live 33 years without piling up at least a small mountain of mistakes? Well, Jesus didn’t rack up even one. There’s nothing in recorded history, secular or otherwise, that would reveal anything about a dark side-because Jesus didn’t have one. As Hebrews 4:15 says, Jesus was, “… tempted in every way that we are, yet was without sin.”
Add to that, the fact that Jesus was the standard setter throughout all of history when it comes to compassion, justice, and encouragement of the oppressed. He was unparalleled in His concern for the poor and His care for widows and orphans. Plus, He was downright mind-boggling in the way He accepted people who had wondered far away from the faith. No one had ever seen anyone with the capacity for love like Jesus demonstrated. And people remarked about it all the time.
So, once again, you’ve got to figure out what this means comparatively-and to help you with that, since the season just opened, let’s use a baseball analogy. In major league baseball, a player could make probably $20 million a year these days if he could get a hit four out of 10 times at the plate throughout the course of the season. Think about that. He could strike out, foul out, hit into double plays six out of every 10 times at bat; but if he gets a hit the other four times, he’d make it to the Hall of Fame, no question. Now, imagine if a player went beyond that and achieved baseball perfection. Imagine a player who gets a hit every single time up to bat for a whole season. He bats 1000 the whole season and the next season and the next season throughout his entire career. And then add to that the fact that he never commits a throwing error or a fielding error, never gets thrown out at second base, never gets picked off third base, all without the use of steroids! The world wouldn’t even know how to respond to such baseball perfection. The guy would fill every stadium for every game.
Now let me state what should be obvious at this point. moral perfection is a lot tougher to achieve than baseball perfection! But according to the secular and the theological records of Jesus’ life, He achieved it. And friends, that doesn’t make him just a little bit different than Mohammed and Buddha and Confucius. It puts him in an entirely different league. It’s the difference between a 250 hitter and a 1000 hitter and I think we have to acknowledge that by giving Him at least double blockage in this comparative stack we are building.
(3) Let’s move on to another category-the power to do miracles.
How many of these top-tier spiritual leaders do you think possessed the power to defy natural law and to employ supernatural power? How many? What about Confucius? Well, the records show he never claimed to have that kind of power, and no one ever attributed it to him. He didn’t claim to have done any miracles, and no one ever said he did, and the same goes for Buddha. What about Mohammed? Even the Koran is clear about the fact that Mohammed had no miracle-working power. He didn’t claim to perform any miracles and did none. So, no blocks for those three.
Now let’s talk about Jesus. Well, even secular historians reference the fact that Jesus had supernatural power. He did a wide array of supernatural activities or miracles in very public places. And these were real miracles. I mean, Jesus didn’t just “heal” bad backs and knock people over or cure house pets, like some of the charades we see on television today. No, one time Jesus fed thousands of people from a single lunch box, and everybody watched Him do it. After He commanded a storm to cease on the Sea of Galilee His followers said, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey Him!” (Mark 4:41) Jesus cured lepers, He gave sight to the blind, He had the lame get up and walk. He even raised the dead back to life, including a man who’d been dead and buried four days. By the way, it’s really hard to fake that! People in His day knew it wasn’t faked! Jesus’ ability to perform miracles astounded them, as well it should have because let’s face it, the ability to do miracles isn’t a subtle difference than the ability not to do them. It puts Jesus in an entirely different category than the others in the top-tier leadership, so I think we have to give Him appropriate blockage for that.
OK, quickly let’s look at two more categories.
(4) What about the ability to prophesy?
I’m referring to the supernatural power to have special insight into people’s lives, into their past, sometimes into their future, or the ability to predict events in society that would occur months or even years down the road. Did any of the four have that particular ability? If you very carefully read the record of Confucius and Buddha, you’ll find there is no trace of this. They didn’t claim it, nor was it ever said of them that they possessed this power.
Now, to be objective we have to say that it was said of Mohammed that a couple of times he made some predictions about how his troops were going to do in a particular battle, but that’s about it. According to Hybels there was nothing all that impressive in the record when it comes to Mohammed’s ability to prophesy.
But Jesus-Jesus displayed prophetic power in ways that the world had never seen. He could read the hearts and motivations of human beings. He even knew things about perfect strangers! One time He was talking to a woman at a well, and she made the point that she was single. Jesus then commended her for being technically accurate as to her single marital status, and then He gently and sort of playfully informed her that He knew all about her previous five marriages and divorces and her current live-in lover. Then He went on and had a wonderful grace-giving conversation with this poor woman. At the end of that conversation, she said, “You must be a prophet.” (John 4:19) There is no way you could have known that about me and my past. And you didn’t cream me with it. You just let me know that You know what’s going on. And then You extended grace to me. You’re a prophet of another kind; there’s something supernatural about You! And then her whole life changed and the lives of many people in her village because of her interaction with the prophetic side of Jesus.
As I told you last week, Jesus prophesied His own death in stark detail. He foretold His burial and resurrection, and when that was going to happen. He also predicted the fall of Jerusalem, which blew everybody’s mind at the time, but came absolutely true four decades later. The list could go on and on about this prophecy thing, so it isn’t just a minor difference between Jesus and the other top-tier leaders. It’s a huge difference that needs to be acknowledged as well.
(5) And then there’s one final category, the ability to rise from the dead.
Now, if you read history at all, thousands of people throughout the historical record have claimed to be the Messiah at one time or another or in one way or another. Plus, there have been tons of gurus and cult leaders and generally strange people who have made huge claims about their supernatural identity. Some have managed to attract quite a following. But their following didn’t last because at some point they all ran into one sticky, little problem that pulled the curtain back on all of their claims: they died. And what’s worse is the fact that they stayed dead! History shows that time and time and time again, death has called the bluff of religious leaders. Death negatively colors their teachings. It happened to Confucius and Buddha and Mohammed. Each of these guys is in his tomb. You can visit their graves to this day and the signs on the doors say, “occupied.”
Of course, you can visit the tomb outside Jerusalem where Jesus’ body lay for just three day after His crucifixion. Millions of people have visited His tomb, as have I. But they visit this tomb for a totally different reason: not to honor a dead guy, but to stand in awe and wonder at the fact that His tomb is NOT occupied. No, unlike these other three men, Jesus Christ said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in Me will never die.” (John 11:25-26) And, Jesus proved this statement by bursting forth from His tomb three days after His death. Then He showed Himself in public places, one time to a group of over 500 people. He showed Himself to family members and friends. He spoke and He ate and drank with them. He taught them and fellowshipped with them for fifty days. And after that He ascended to His father. Well, people, that sets Him apart from every other religious leader who ever lived on this planet or who ever will. This fact is why churches all over the world are packed today, packed with people who do not grieve like those who have no real hope.
And if you have any real doubts about the evidence for Jesus’ resurrection, go to the bookstore or go to the Internet, for that matter, and start your research. The amount of evidence will astonish you because Jesus’ resurrection is very well documented. I remember watching a documentary on the life of Jesus done by Peter Jennings and even He admitted that something amazing, something world-changing happened on that first Easter morning. Now, how many blocks do you give a guy for a resurrection? I mean, it’s got to be worth a couple, don’t you think? And it does distinguish Jesus from all of the other leaders doesn’t it?!
Okay, what does all this mean? What can we take from our pile of blocks? Here are two quick things.
(1) First off, you can look at these piles and conclude that if you are a Christian, you are following the right leader!
I’m a Christian and I don’t know about you, but I’m glad I followed this Guy! And I hope that if you’re a fellow believer our little comparative study helps you to realize that your trust in Jesus is well-placed, because the facts are on your side. The One you follow is literally head and shoulders above all others.
As you know, part of my job is to read. I read all the time so I always try to have one book I’m reading that is not for sermon prep, but simply for my own personal enjoyment. The last book I read in that category is Cornelius Ryan’s The Last Battle. It’s a non-fiction book that tells about the final days of Berlin at the end of WWII. Well, the book drives home the point that for years the majority of the German people believed Adolph Hitler’s lies and followed his leadership unquestioningly, but one thing that book shows without a doubt is that in the end history showed they were following the wrong leader. All but the most fanatical Nazi’s realized this as the bombs fell and the Russian tanks plowed through the streets of their beautiful city, and their way of life in Berlin literally began to come down all around them. It was the saddest book I have ever read. I felt so bad for those people that I hurried to finish. It was just too painful to read.
Now, don’t get me wrong-I rejoiced to see Hitler get “his” but I grieved over the hundreds of thousands of civilians in that city who paid a high price for following the wrong guy. Well, friend, if nothing else, these blocks should encourage you-because one thing this objective study we have done shows, is that our faith is well placed. As Christians we are following the right Guy! And, I think our study shows one other thing,
(2) It shows that as Christian witnesses we are sharing the right message!
Because when we share our faith with others, we are pointing other people to the right leader. We shouldn’t shrink back or cower in a social setting when someone learns that we’re a Christ-follower. Why would we follow anyone else? Jesus was and is in a class by Himself! So, when you get a chance, gracefully, respectfully, and confidently stand up for Him because people need to hear about Jesus! Say a word for Him when He gives you the opportunity. Point people to Him. Fire people up to investigate His claims because friends, Jesus Christ is the hope of the world, Jesus is he only One Who satisfies our hunger for a relationship with our Creator, the only One Who enables us to experience truly abundant purpose-filled life and most importantly, He’s the only One Who prepares us to face this enemy all people fear: death.
This week I read a little story about a famous painting that once hung in an art gallery in Europe. It’s a depiction of Faust playing chess with the devil. And in the painting, the devil has Faust checkmated and is claiming his soul in victory. Over the years people looked at this painting and felt a certain identification with it. They would go away and feel like the artist had captured their own hopeless situation when it comes to death. Well one day a great chess master came. And he stood there looking at the painting studying the game board for a long time. Finally he disturbed everyone in the gallery by stepping back and shouting at the top of his voice, “It’s a lie! The painting is wrong! The knight and the king have another move!”
Now, I’m not much of a chess player, but I understand what it means to be checkmated. And many of us feel this way about death. We feel that death is the last move and we can’t win. But the empty tomb of our Lord says, “That’s a lie! You do have another move!” And if we take that move, if we take the step of faith and put our faith in Jesus, the only One Who conquered death for us, then we can proclaim with the Apostle Paul, “Where oh death is your victory? Where oh death is your sting?”
Closing
Now, if you are here this morning and you are not a Christian. You came to church because it’s Easter and you felt that was the right thing to do. If that describes you, then I agree, coming to church today was the right thing to do! I compliment you on your decision. Welcome! And since you are here, let me ask you a question: Who are you following in life? Who are you living for? Who are you depending on? Who are you looking to for guidance and strength? Who’s going to forgive your sin? Who’s going to enable you to deal with this thing called death that comes for us all eventually? Who’s that going to be? Today I invite you to look at these blocks and conclude that the answer to these questions is going to be Jesus, the Christ Who lived a sinless life, died on the cross for your sin, and rose from the dead on the third day. Come forward in a moment as we sing and we’ll talk and pray together. I’d love to tell you about my Lord and Savior. I’d love to introduce you to Him today!
And if you’re already a Christian, then I can think of no better thing to do on Easter than to recommit yourself to sharing His gospel with a lost world. Remember, you and I follow an incomparable Savior, so make a commitment and say, “Jesus, if You give me the opportunity, I will take it. I will tell people about You.”
If you need a church home, come and join us. For the fields are ripe unto harvest and we need more laborers. Come as God leads.
Benediction
Let the Peace Of Christ rule in your hearts
since as members of one body you were called to peace.
Let the Word Of Christ dwell in you richly
and whatever you do, in word or in deed
Do it all in the Name Of Christ giving thanks to God the Father through Him.