The British scholar C.S. Lewis commented, “A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher.” A mere mortal claiming to be the Son of God would not be taken seriously by others. He would probably be ridiculed, put away in a mental institution, or considered mentally challenged. Lewis goes on to say that if Jesus were not the Son of God as He claimed to be, “He would either be a lunatic-on a level of a man who says he is a poached egg-or else he would be the Devil of Hell.”

“You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else He is a madman… or something worse. 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.”

Many people who don’t believe Jesus was divine nevertheless say they believe He was a great man whose positive influence has reached over the centuries and around the world. But as Lewis explains, God didn’t leave us the option of considering Jesus simply a great man or a great teacher. God wants you to believe in Jesus as your Savior, and then to take Him into your heart and life. Why?

Because God wants to live with you, and in you, in order to give you all the good things that He has for you out of His limitless love. How does He do that? In the Bible He says, “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you” (Ezekiel 36:26). What years of psychoanalysis, self-help methods, group therapy or even personal determination can’t do, God can do in one instant, as an answer to the prayer of a believing heart: He can give you a new spirit. It’s the start on the road to a new life.

A Choice and a Change, Copyright © 1998-2012, The Family International