From C. S. Lewis to the Synoptic Jesus

Over at Eerdword I have a post up introducing folks to my new book, A Man Attested by God. Here’s how it kicks off:

“A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. . . . You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God.”

These famous words by C. S. Lewis beautifully encapsulate the Christianity of my childhood. They underscore how central Jesus’s divinity has been to the church’s confession of faith for the past sixteen hundred years. And they provide a trenchant lens for coming to terms with Jesus as he is depicted in the Gospel of John.

But they also provide a set of blinders that have the power to keep us from ever coming fully to terms with Jesus as he is portrayed in the Synoptic Gospels.

In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Jesus says very few things that explicitly claim lordship for himself, and none at all that assert preexistence or divinity. John is full of such references, but the Synoptic Gospels seem to be telling a different story…

You can read the rest here.

Also, here’s the video of an interview I did about the book that I think captures my vision and my passion both. Take a look, and then saunter on over to your favorite bookseller and grab a copy!