The Jesus I Never Knew

The Jesus I Never Knew is such a great example of really examining Jesus as to who he was. Yancey took an original approach of instead of explaining who Jesus was in the First Century, and then showing how our perceptions are wrong, Yancey started with our perceptions, and worked his way backwards! The beginning is a great way to invite people into the book, as reader and author both embark on a journey to get to know who this Jesus of Nazareth truly was. Yancey went over Jesus being a Jew, and also what Jesus’ desert temptation reveals about his character.

Another good quality is Yancey’s emphasis on Jesus’ ministry. I feel like he is proportional in his section about why he came with both ministry and death/resurrection. It’s a good balance, whereas I’ve seen in other books too much emphasis on one over the other. In reality, Jesus came for BOTH his earthly ministry AND to die on the cross and rise again. Yancey talks about the Beatitudes in this section on why Jesus came. It’s an interesting section because we sit down and wrestle with what Jesus meant by those famous yet archaic words. Yancey pulls out various levels of meaning from the Beatitudes, which I think could all be true. I have my own take on them, but I cannot wait to talk to Jesus face to face, and find out what his intentions were with the Beatitudes! Yancey concludes the section with two chapters on his death and resurrection, which were so vivid to me, it somehow hit home for me in a special way.

The last section of the book is called “What He Left Behind” and it basically adds application to the whole book. It basically asks the question, “Well, what now?” It’s a powerful conclusion to a fantastic book!

How did this book challenge my thinking? Well, actually this was the third time I’ve read this book. I read it once when I was in high school, and then again the summer before freshman year at Fox. So obviously I’m familiar with the book, and I don’t want to be the guy “oh it didn’t challenge me at all!” with this book, because it did! I just need to explain why I may not talk about some of the larger issues Yancey addresses because he probably challenged me on them a few years ago, but I can’t really remember how currently.

This read through made me really rethink the Beatitudes. The other times that I read the book it was the only literature on the beatitudes that I had ever read so this time I approached it much differently. Last year I looked at several books on the Beatitudes and listened to multiple sermons on the subject, so when Yancey broached the topic my ears perked up as I now had a reference for what he was going to say.

What I really appreciated was a lack of theological acrobatics on Yancey’s part. As soon as theologians spend pages and pages explaining away what scripture says I get uneasy because of course the Bible needs context, and proper context. My issue is when we bend over backwards scripturally to make our thought fit onto scripture. Yancey shies away from this and rather approaches the Beatitudes with a sense of “it could mean this, and it actually could mean this too! In fact, Jesus could have implied several layers to each of these sayings!” It challenged me to not take such a strong stand on what I believe the Beatitudes to mean, and enjoy the mystery offered to us in scripture.

There was one chapter in particular that enriched my understanding of the time after Jesus death, and subsequently a deeper comprehension of the resurrection. “Resurrection: A Morning Beyond Belief” is the title for the chapter, and it really blew me away. I think what was so powerful to me was Yancey’s stories of his own friends dying, thus bringing the reality of Jesus’ death on the cross so much closer to me. I have never been close to death. I’ve never had a member of my family die that I really was going to miss much, or ever had a lot of relationship with. Death has been a part of a dark world “out there” but never close to my heart.

When Yancey depicted his feelings after the death of his friends, I began to think on how the disciples must have felt. And though I’ve heard this a thousand times, it finally made the foot and a half journey from my mind to my heart. This revelation that they watched Jesus DIE. And that’d the end. There was no more Jesus. He was gone. He was gone forever. Death was final. There was no return; it was irrevocable. I can’t even imagine the despair.

Jesus conquered death. Our Lord has vanquished that horrible enemy. What a gift!! Thank you Philip Yancey for pointing that out to me in such a clear way!