Jesus Our Contemporary

On American Idol one of the comments the judges make to the contestants has to do with whether their performance was judged to be “contemporary.” A contestant can see a good song and have a great voice, but sometimes the performance, even when done by a 17 year old, will come across as old fashioned and dated. Simon will say “it wasn’t contemporary,” and therefore didn’t connect with the audience. A performer who is not contemporary won’t win, won’t get on the radio, won’t be “relevant.”

This same critique is often applied to religion in general and Christianity in particular. It’s old-fashioned. It’s not relevant to life today. It doesn’t connect with people. . . I’m not even going to try to dispute that. What I will say, what I’m fairly confident of, is that in contrast, Jesus is very relevant today. Jesus is our contemporary. Through the Holy Spirit Jesus is speaking to us, in our lives, today. He is speaking and acting with us on how live really is and is experienced.

“It is in this contemporary world where we must meet him and know him if we are to meet and know him at all,” Dallas Willard writes.

As I mentioned last week, Jesus is already here. He already belongs to humanity. In spite of our stumbling, bumbling, mangled presentations of him, Jesus is powerfully present in our culture. Remember, they like Jesus, they just don’t like the church. Now, I like the church and I believe that Jesus loves the Church. But that’s really beside the point for our purposes today. As we consider how to be witnesses for Jesus, we must look to Jesus our Contemporary. We need to help people get over their mistaken notion that being a Christian believer is mostly about knowing facts about this person, mostly facts of long ago.

Peter Berger notes that if you asked the question, “Can a truly contemporary person be a Christian? Many Europeans would answer, “Of course not!” They answer this way because they believe that Christianity has only to do with a dusty and brutal past – togas and robes and religious wars. Many Americans, even those who consider themselves sort of believers have trouble in locating Jesus anywhere other than in a distant past and existence. But that is not the message and Kingdom that Jesus proclaimed. Nor did Jesus talk about a Kingdom that was some gigantic event in some special place. That is human thinking. Jesus said think (repent) again.

“The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, “Look! Here it is! Or “There it is!” For, in fact, the kingdom of God is right where you are.” Luke 17.20-21


Jesus teaching in the Gospel is actually an extension of an Old Testament teaching:

“The Lord will again take delight in prospering you, just as he delighted in prospering your ancestors, when. . . .you turn to the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. Surely, this commandment I am commanding you today is not too hard for you, nor is it too far away.

“It is not in heaven, that you should say, “Who will go up to heaven for us and get it for us so that we may hear it and observe it?” Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, “Who will cross to the other side of the sea for us and get it for us so we may hear it and observe it?” No, the word is very near to you; it is in your mouth and in your heart for you to observe.” Deuteronomy 30.9-14


The word is very near to you. Jesus is telling us that eternal life is close and all who want it may have it but we must seek first His kingdom to have access to life as it is truly meant to be. This is how we know Him as Savior and Lord. This is how in the fullest sense Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life (John 14.6). St. Paul puts it this way to the Romans:

“If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” Romans 10.9

Again Willard, “But this is not a thing you say to get you into heaven after death. It is what you do to live in Christ’s kingdom now. What is saved is our life, and of course we along with it.”

Many seekers and skeptics today, I think, need more than a kingdom that is a distant event, no matter how gigantic. They need to know what, if anything, Jesus can say or do about their rocky marriage or their son’s addiction. They want to know if Jesus “lives in the real world.” One thing that never ceases to interest me is the reaction I get from people when they find out that I am a pastor. They may express some surprise or even disinterest but what usually happens then is I am put in the same category as their picture of the historical Jesus, the bearded one in the robe and sandals. I am a guy somehow disconnected from how life really is but concerned with proper language and good morals. I don’t think some of these people would be shocked if I grew a beard and dressed in white robe and sandals! But you know, as a citizen of the kingdom my life is about much more than good morals (yes, that must be there) But hey, my dog has good morals. My dog never swears or lies or cheats. My cats on the other hand. . .are creatures of low morals I’m convinced.

Contemporary people have the So What question on their minds. So what if religion has some interesting or truthful claims, so what difference does that make to my life here and now? Jesus has an answer for them. Jesus is passionately interested in living with them, their lives, the lives they are actually living here and now. How is Jesus with me on the jobsite? How is he in that office with me among my coworkers? How does he go on the road with me? The answer to these questions can be known and experienced. Any who would follow him don’t have to travel back in time culturally to know him and live in him. Jesus meets us in the time and place and life in which we now live.

Malcolm Gladwell is a very successful author today who writes stories about culture and social dynamics. You might say he has a finger on the pulse of contemporary society. And he says that one of the things that holds true about people from the time we are infants and all through adulthood is our curiosity about other people’s lives. In infants, psychologists call this the Other Minds Problem. Infants don’t understand that what they are thinking about, like, hate is not necessarily what others are thinking about, like, or hate. As adults we continue to be curious about what goes on in other people’s minds. We don’t just want to know of a doctor, “What do you for a living?” We want to know what it feels like to be a doctor and see patients.

“Curiosity about the interior life of other people’s day-to-day work is one of the most fundamental of human impulses,” Gladwell writes.

Can I suggest that Jesus, Son of Man, is at least as curious as we are about the lives people are living? He not only meets people at church, but out fishing, on the road, at the tax collector’s office, at a dinner party, in the hospital. Jesus likes to be with people.

Jesus is our contemporary. And he is interested above all in people and seeing them change in heart, mind, and life to become God’s people. Jesus will speak through contemporary methods and mediums to get a hearing with all kinds of people. This is the whole point and the only point of changing our methods and styles of worship and evangelism, music and youth ministry – to let Jesus speak in a language that contemporary can understand and to which they can respond. But don’t confuse the style and methods with the message and certainly not the person of Jesus.

Jesus will not be boxed up by any faction, any age, any culture. He is the misfit. And so he is available to any and all who would seek him. To take one example, how is it that the hippie generation of the late 1960’s and early ‘70’s that turn to Christ and became known as the Jesus People worship the same Lord as the stereotypical straight-laced church types of the previous generation? Is it because these two very different generations happened to arrive independently in choosing the same religion? Or, perhaps is it because Jesus, the Son of Man, is able to speak in time at any time He so chooses?


In what ways do see Jesus speaking in contemporary culture today?

How might the church use the language/methods of our culture to give witness to the Lord?

How can you show the people in your life how the life of Jesus is real in you?