Christmas question: Is Jesus a revolutionary?

What your Christian friends believe makes your world.

Consider…

The United States is the most powerful nation on the planet. For most of you reading this, it’s your home country. And Christians are an extremely large demographic group influencing culture and politics.

Perhaps you never thought about that before.

Maybe you think about it regularly and it scares you.

For Christmas, we sat down with Dave Brisbin, a pastor with a unique yet relatable life journey, to discuss, “Who is Jesus?”

Why should you tune in to this episode?

Being a Christian is mostly about how you view Jesus. That’s practically the theme of the Gospel of John.

Let me be blunt: American Jesus is used to make a ton of trouble.

Progressive Christians might think they agree with that statement. But I should warn them: Before you get on the bandwagon and cheer, remaking Jesus in your image is also trouble.

Everywhere – work, home, community, and society – the tyranny of laws and rules (backed by violence) is used to keep an artificial peace or tackle a social problem. The overwhelming majority of Americans think they can reform these inherently authoritarian (anti-human) structures. And both tribes claim Jesus is on their side.

Our show involves replacing that bureaucratic way of thinking with a peacemaking, relational approach.

Indeed, as we discuss with Dave Brisbin, in this interview…

Grace is an anarchic idea. It’s showered on everyone, equally, and that means it doesn’t reward status. It’s unjust and upends castes.

The very notion of grace is scandalous. At present, even religious Christians tend to literally stand in the way of this anarchic idea. They must.

They want certainty. They want formulas. They want metrics. They want security. They want rules. They want to know the score of their virtue rank.

They need “western Jesus” to preserve their scheme.

Part of the “good news” of Christmas is that Jesus is NOT the guy marketed by Western philosophy and religion. Jesus was born a Hebrew. He used Hebrew methods of teaching to address the local concerns of Jews. What are the human (anthropological) implications of that fact?

And whether you believe in Jesus or not, if you want a Zero Aggression society, then you must recognize that the question of who Jesus was and what his life means is not just a Christmas story. It’s an issue that matters to all of us.

Our take? Dave Brisbin’s take? Might the real Jesus be the revolutionary we need?