On Jesus Christ as the Perfect Sage, the Holy Fool, and the Absolute Truth

On Jesus Christ as the Perfect Sage, the Holy Fool, and the Absolute Truth.

“The birth of Jesus took place like this. His mother, Mary, was engaged to be married to Joseph. Before they came to the marriage bed, Joseph discovered she was pregnant. (It was by the Holy Spirit, but he didn’t know that). Joseph, chagrined but noble, determined to take care of things quietly so Mary would not be disgraced.  While he was trying to figure a way out, he had a dream. God’s angel spoke in the dream: ‘Joseph, son of David, don’t hesitate to get married. Mary’s pregnancy is Spirit-conceived. God’s Holy Spirit has made her pregnant. She will bring a son to birth, and when she does, you, Joseph, will name him Jesus – ‘God saves’ – because he will save his people from their sins.’ Then Joseph woke up. He did exactly what God’s angel commanded in the dream. He married Mary. But he did not consummate the marriage until she had the baby. He named the baby Jesus.”  (Matthew 1:18-25).

Yeshua is the Hebrew name for Jesus. It means Yahweh who saves, or the LORD to the rescue. Yeshua, or Y’shua, is a common form of the Hebrew name Yehoshua, which translates to Joshua. The name Jesus is actually an English version of the Greek version (Yay-soos) of the Hebrew Yeshua. And since Greek was the common international language used when spreading word about Yeshua, Jesus (Yay-soos) is the name most of the world ended up with. Yeshua is the name most commonly used by Hebrew-speaking Christians in Israel and followers of Messianic Judaism. The name Yeshua represents His Hebrew identity, and anyone who called Jesus by His Hebrew name while He was on earth would have called Him Yeshua.

On Christ as Wisdom. “To those called by God to salvation, both Jews and Gentiles, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God.” (1 Corinthians 1:24).

A Fool according to the World: A person who doesn’t appreciate the ways of the world; a gullible person who will trust in an unseen Person and believe in the reality of an unseen world; an ignorant person who doesn’t live for worldly success; people who are so heavenly minded they’re no earthly good; a person who refuses to accept the values of accumulation, personal achievement, self-advancement, wealth, prestige, power over others; a person who is dependent on God instead of being a “self-made person;” a person who is willing to live a hidden life of weakness, mercy and grace.

Sage = A person who has deep understanding and discernment; has the practical art of living skillfully; has moral and spiritual intelligence; has the ability to practice the truth in daily life; has astute insight; has shrewd street smarts; has the ability to apply relevant knowledge to thoughtful decision-making; is able to think ahead with foresight and anticipate the consequences of actions; is able to fully appreciate the difference between wise and foolish, right and wrong, beautiful and ugly, good and evil, true and false; is able to demonstrate a practical spirituality. Jesus has all these attributes of wisdom. The fact is, Jesus is all these attributes in the flesh.

Intangibles Made Tangible. Christ is in the business of making intangible things tangible. He became God incarnate, for instance, and we know full well God is a Spirit (John 4:24, 2 Cor 3:17). Jesus fleshed out the Spirit. He put tangible flesh on an intangible Spirit. He embodied Spirit and became man. In the same way, Christ is embodied wisdom. Christ is wisdom incarnate. He took tangible flesh and blood and infused that human body with an intangible attribute, an abstract virtue. Christ isn’t merely full of wisdom… “Jesus, in Whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” (Col 2:3). He is not merely a source of wisdom for us. He literally is Wisdom personified in real, concrete life. Christ is the Wisdom of God. He is God’s Wisdom made manifest. He makes God’s wisdom clearly seen, visible, experiential, obvious to the senses. In His earthly ministry, Christ didn’t just exhibit wisdom, He was Wisdom itself in personal form. He was a Personal version of an impersonal idea. When people interacted with Jesus, they were encountering a Person who was a walking and talking Wisdom from God. Was Jesus so divinely full of wisdom, so saturated with godly wisdom, that the spiritual result was that He was Wisdom itself? God wanted everyone to see what His wisdom looked like, so He sent us His Son Jesus.

Christian wisdom is not acquired through human effort, but through uniting ourselves with Wisdom, Jesus Christ; through acquiring the very mind of Christ; through union with Christ, the Wisdom of God. “It is by Him that you exist in Christ Jesus, who for us was made wisdom from God.” (1 Cor. 1:30). By gaining the mind of Christ, we are also acquiring the very mind of the Almighty God.

On Christ as the Wisdom of Creation. We do know that God and Wisdom created the world. From all eternity, Jesus was God’s wisdom, even before the Triune God created the world. That’s why Wisdom is a title of Christ, not merely a description of Christ.

“From eternity past, I (Lady Wisdom) was established, well before the world began. Yahweh possessed me before earth got its start. When He staked out earth’s foundation and set in place its pillars, I was right there with him, anointed from the beginning, making sure everything fit. Day after day I was there at His side as His master craftsman, joyfully applauding His efforts. He was filled with delight in me as I playfully rejoiced before Him, enjoying His company. I laughed and played, delighted with the created world of things and creatures, so happy with what He had made, joyfully celebrating the human family and finding my delight in the children of men.” (Proverbs 8:23, 29-31).

Through the Son. It is important to remember that early Christian tradition maintains that Wisdom in the Hebrew Bible is messianic, an anticipation of the person of Christ. (St. Justin, 150 AD). Ever since the early Church Fathers, when one reads about Wisdom personified in Jewish Scriptures, Christian believers can simply understand Christ as Wisdom. That’s the Christian tradition. Secondly, it is very clear that Christ was a co-creator of the world. He participated in creation with the Triune God. As the Orthodox Church puts it, “The Father made the world through the Son in the Spirit.” St. Paul put it this way, “For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible… All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things exist.” (Col 1:16-17). And St. John declared it to be true in the famous first chapter of his gospel, “Through Him all things came into being, not one thing came into being except through Him.”” (John 1:3).

Anticipation. In the poetic version of creation as seen in Proverbs 8 above, we see the vital role of wisdom, or as it reads, “Lady Wisdom.“ This was a poetic device in the Hebrew Bible that anticipated the attribute of wisdom being completed in the form of an actual Person. Wisdom as poetically seen as a person was completed in the New Testament in the real Person, Jesus Christ. What was an attribute of God in the Old Testament came to be accepted as a picture of God Himself, Jesus the Son of God, in the New Testament, early church and to the  present day. “Christ, who is the Wisdom of God.” (1 Corinthians 1:24). In Proverbs 8, Wisdom was an intricate part of creation, and Christians have believed ever since that Wisdom was in fact the Person of Christ participating in the creation of the world. “In Him were created all things in heaven and earth. All things were created through Him and for Him.” (Colossians 1:11).

Created in Joy. When we happily consider how the Godhead rejoiced over creation, and how Christ Himself delighted in the creation of mankind, we can easily see how human life is precious and sacred in His sight. We were created joyfully by God in His image. One can appreciate that God delights in our existence, that He rejoices over every person created, then and now. We can easily imagine, and should be encouraged by, the Lord’s promise to us… “The Lord your God will take delight in you with gladness. With His love, He will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with the singing of joyful songs.” (Zeph. 3:17).

On Jesus as a Holy Fool.   The Father was clear about His request of the Son. I want you to save the world we so carefully created, He said. I want you to be in the flesh, on the earth, God to the rescue. Did the Father send the Son on a fool’s errand? Maybe, if you mean holy fool. In His heavenly wisdom, He played the earthly fool many times over… He was accurately accused of associating with the unclean, the sexually immoral, with gluttons and wino’s. At times He was considered out of His mind, or filled with the devil, or of being unbiblical, going out of His way to touch the untouchable and minister to the religious outcasts, such as lepers, prostitutes and other public sinners, demoniacs, Samaritans, Gentiles, women, and even dead bodies! The religious leaders often accused Him of being a glutton and drunkard, a sure case of guilt by association. The Word being unbiblical? Foolishly, it seemed, Jesus invested His life and mission in a handful of inexperienced disciples, a handful of zealots, fishermen, a hated tax collector, and a betraying thief, a group of misfits who nonetheless rose to the occasion and boldly provided leadership to the new church. Foolishly, Jesus volunteered to surrender to the unjust authorities, and he followed that up by submitting to torturous death at their hands. Throughout His life, Jesus presented Himself as the long-expected Messiah, the Great I AM in the flesh, the fulfillment of Scripture, the eternal Son of the God of Israel. Foolish. So, in terms of everyone’s perception of him, did Jesus ever appear foolish? Yes, very much so. But He was never shy about being a fool for the Father. Jesus was the ultimate holy fool as he bore witness to the truth.

One of a Kind. Jesus was a seemingly inconsistent, unpredictable bundle of extreme qualities. He would ignore His mother, berate the religious, forgive the adulterous, befriend the compromised rip-off artist, kiss His betrayer, stare down a storm, call His most faithful apprentice a name from hell, weep at a death, tend bar at a wedding reception, whip the tar out of unwelcome moneychangers, hug the children, have scary duels with demonic spirits, and welcome the lepers and lunatics. Even Jesus’ own family considered him a little crazy at one point.

Beyond Definition. Jesus Christ, Y’shua Messiah… a misunderstood fool by most onlookers as He juggled grace and truth. He was easy to describe, and impossible to define. Some of His descriptive names were Rose of Sharon, Lion of Judah, Lamb of God, Morning Star, Stone of Stumbling, Root of David, Lilly of the Valley, Great Shepherd, Suffering Servant, Cornerstone, Man of Sorrows, Alpha and Omega, Bread of Life, Living Water, Bridegroom, Captain, Rabbi. Jesus seemed partial to Son of Man, a sort of Mr. Everyman, a Mr. One of Y’all. Somehow even that expansive list of titles still doesn’t quite capture Him. Maybe He Himself is the Word we’re looking for, and we’re wasting our time trying to limit Him to a definition.

His Own Man. When Jesus was tender, He seemed to almost wilt. When He was angry, there was a scary flash of fire in His eyes. And He often aroused those same extremes in others. In fact, He started His ministry by igniting His hometown with flammable speech straight from the Word; He continued it by answering serious questions with bewildering stories which often bordered on the comic; and close to the end, He irked His accusers with unflappable silence. Throughout His life, His version of sainthood was never sanctimonious. His holiness was never holier-than-thou. His God-talk was free of trite cliches and empty platitudes.

Manger Messiah, Dead God. In the earliest days of His earthly life, Jesus was a Savior fetus in a teenager’s womb. Then soon He was a God who wet diapers, a Co-Creator needing to be burped, the Lord of the universe nursing at His mother’s breast. A few years later, He was the defeated heavenly King with seared flesh and punctured scalp, passively facing mockery and torture. It’s a toss-up as to which of those two mysteries, the Manger Messiah or the Dead God, are the most incomprehensible and scandalous. One thing for sure, in both cases, this Man Jesus bore witness to the truth and seemed to be a helpless fool in the process. Fortunately, His last juggling act in the court of the Father, juggling life and death to the Father’s pleasure, was a resounding success. And better yet, the holy juggler is promising an encore for the Ages that we will die to see. Finally, the holiest of holy fools will be understood for who he is, the Truth and Wisdom of God.

On Jesus as the Absolute Truth. “This I why I was born, and for this I have come into the world, to bear witness to the Truth. Everyone who is a friend of the Truth, who belongs to the Truth, listens to my voice.’ And Pilate said to Jesus, ‘What is truth?” (John 18:37-38).

TRUTH: (Hebrew, “emet;” Greek, “aletheia”) Truth is the only absolute in the world. If everything else in the world falls apart, only Truth will remain standing. The building blocks of all creation; the framework upon which we build our faith; the true Reality that has established the world’s reality; that which can never be truly altered or changed; that which is universally trustworthy as facts of life; the foundation of what is truly real in our experience; the plumblines from which to measure our lives; that which is common knowledge in God’s mind; that which lines up with God’s perspectives; established facts from God as opposed to a person’s changeable opinions or preferences; that which is solid and certain as opposed to a lie, deceit, an illusion or superstition; the tangible fundamentals issued forth from the intangible mind of God. Truth is always true even when discounted or disbelieved. Since the Almighty God is the ultimate source of all truth, then it follows that the Father God is Truth, the Lord Jesus is Truth, and the Holy Spirit is Truth.

Mission Statement of Jesus. What led up to Pilate’s famous question as he stood toe-to-toe with Jesus? What prompted Pilate’s question was the Son of God giving His life purpose in one sentence: to “bear witness to the truth.” Jesus took on flesh in order to reveal the indisputable fact of God’s existence in the world. Jesus testified to the truth by revealing Himself, the Author of truth. Jesus came into the world to show us that truth actually exists. He became incarnate to show the world what God’s living Truth looks like in real life.

“I AM the Truth!” (John 14:6). The Father was clear about His request of the Son. I want you to bear witness to the truth, He instructed. I want you to save the world we so carefully created, He said. I want you to be truth in the flesh on the earth, God to the rescue representing the truth of my love. Did the Father send the Son on a fool’s errand? Maybe, if you mean that Jesus was a fool for truth.

Humble Beginnings. His momma was an unwed teenager, she was made pregnant by the Holy Spirit, and early on his life was in mortal danger. His foster father was a kindly, courageous old widower who protected his wife and son through thick and thin. Truth in the flesh was raised in a backwater village off the beaten track. Nonetheless, his presence on earth had been expected by many for thousands of years and his birth ws announced by a sky full of singing angels.

The Minister of Truth Begins. At thirty years of age, Jesus couldn’t even consider bearing witness to the truth without first receiving his Father’s blessing at baptism. Immediately afterward He was driven off into the wilderness to confront and defeat the Enemy, the devil himself. Needing to choose His apprentices in spreading the good news of Truth Incarnate, Jesus spent the night in prayer with his Father, and selected an unlikely ragtag group that included young fishermen, a Zealot who wanted to violently overthrow Rome, and a tax collector who made his living by dishonestly collaborating with Rome. They were all no doubt raised in the synagogue schools and knew their Scripture well. Except for the traitorous Judas, they all proved they were worthy trainees in matters of the Kingdom of God by participating in his ministry, remaining with Jesus during his entire three-year ministry, and becoming stalwart, faithful leaders of the gospel of Jesus after he ascended back to heaven.

There we have it… Jesus Christ was and continues to be God’s Wisdom in the flesh, the world’s Co-Creator delighted with what He has so wisely made, the holiest of holy fools, and the Absolute Truth with skin on.