The Significance of Jesus

Jesus is the central figure of human history. He has been written about, in all catagories of literature, more than any other individual by a mile. More songs, more histories, more poems, more periodicals, more annals, more prose, have spoken of Him in either positive or negative tones.

We still, to this day, measure time by the influence of this One Solitary Life. Since His birth we see the yearly significance of his influence in a Latin abbreviation, attached to the end of any given year, that declares His soveriegn hold over time. Now every year is anno Domini, in the year of our Lord. So why does Jesus hold sway over time and history?

The answer lies in the question itself. Jesus holds sway over time and history because he also stands above time and history. His God-in-flesh uniqueness allows him to be the one who is both in and over these realities.

This is what makes the Cross so central in this One Unique Life. John quotes Jesus as saying: And I, when I am lifted up from this earth, will draw all people to myself (John 12:32 - ESV). Jesus was referring to the Cross by which he would be suspended between heaven and earth and die for the sins of the world. It was the Cross that became the magnetic draw of humanity. Why? One reason is that Jesus who was both from heaven and earth united both the God of heaven with the Humanity of earth. The Cross acted as the nexus point between the darkness of our fallen world with the transcedent light of Paradise; between the evil in the human heart with the righteousness of a sinless Savior; between the age that is with the age to come.

In Jesus, the divine and human forged an unbreakable bond by which the Creator would re-unite Himself with His creation. In Jesus, God would lift humanity from its bondage to death and decay and lift us into the glorious freedom of the adopted sons and daughters of Heaven.

The Cross captures the heart of humanity like nothing else because it solves the fundamental rupture between ourselves and our Originator. Sin disconnects us; it disenfranchises us from God's original plan. God's plan for us was to enjoy His life; to live life without limits. Sin, instead brings death and limits radically the life we were intended to enjoy. Sin and death rob us of the awareness of this plan; it limits our understanding of the scope and majesty of our divine destiny. An ancient sage declared it this way: He...has planted eternity in men's hearts and minds [a divinely implanted sense of a purpose working through the ages which nothing under the sun but God alone can satisfy], yet so men cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end (Ecclesiastes 3:11)

The signficance of Jesus is that He satifies the longing of the human heart. Jesus brings into clear view what was once clouded and opague because of our sin. We write about Him and mark our calenders by Him because who He is and what He has done captivates our minds and hearts at the deepest level and we can't get enough of Him!