Scripture
Almost twenty-five years ago, Dr. D. James Kennedy and Jerry Newcombe published a book titled, What If Jesus Had Never Been Born? It is a wonderful study about the incredible impact of Jesus on world history. This message is based on that book.
Our Scripture text for this message is Galatians 4:4-5:
4 But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. (Galatians 4:4-5)
Introduction
One of my favorite movies that I like to watch each Christmas is Frank Capra’s 1946 classic movie titled, It’s a Wonderful Life. George Bailey, played by Jimmy Stewart, gets a chance to see what life would be like if he had never been born. George wanted to see the world and do something important with his life. But, when his father died prematurely and the greedy Mr. Potter wanted to take over the Savings & Loan operation of George’s father, George gave up his dreams in order to help others. Eventually, things go wrong and George decided that he wants to commit suicide on Christmas Eve. This brings the intervention of his guardian angel, Clarence Odbody, to help him. He does so by showing George all the lives he has touched, and how different life in his community of Bedford Falls would be if he had never been born.
Kennedy and Newcombe write, “[Our] point in this book is that Jesus Christ has had enormous impact—more than anybody else—on history. Had He never come, the hole would be a canyon about the size of a continent. Christ’s influence on the world is immeasurable. The purpose of this book is to glimpse what we can measure, to see those numerous areas of life where Christ’s influence can be concretely traced.”
In Paul’s letter to the Galatians, he wrote in Galatians 4:4, “But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman.” This is an extremely important text. It emphasizes that Jesus was born at exactly the right time, what Paul calls “the fullness of time.” In God’s plan of redemptive history Jesus arrived “when the fullness of time had come.” Moreover, Paul told us the reason for Jesus’ arrival in redemptive history. He said in verse 5 that Jesus was born “to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.” Jesus was born so that sinners such as ourselves might be reconciled to our Creator.
However, Jesus’ birth impacted more than our salvation.
Lesson
In this lesson, I want to note some of the areas where Jesus has made a difference because he had been born. The birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus has made a difference in the following areas:
1. Jesus’ Impact on the Value of Human Life
2. Jesus’ Impact on Education
3. Jesus’ Impact on Science
4. Jesus’ Impact on Individuals
I. Jesus’ Impact on the Value of Human Life
First, notice Jesus’ impact on the value of human life.
I read an illustration in Kennedy’s book about a French engineer who asked his students a question more than a century ago, “What is the most important thing to come out of a mine?” Having worked in a gold mine in South Africa, I thought to myself that the answer has to be gold. I know some who have worked in coal mines, and I suppose they might say that the most important thing to come out of a mine is coal. Well, the professor’s students suggested various minerals. Eventually, he gave what is clearly the correct answer, “The most important thing to come out of a mine is the miner.”
This view of human life is embraced only where the gospel of Jesus Christ has been widely received.
Prior to the birth of Jesus, human life was exceedingly cheap. Even today, in cultures that do not have the gospel and there is very little of Christianity, life is exceedingly cheap. But, when Jesus came into this world—the one who said, “Behold, I am making all things new” (Revelation 21:5)—he gave humanity a new perspective on the value of human life.
In the ancient world, women and children had no rights. Babies were often abandoned and left outside for animals to kill and eat. Women were often treated no better than slaves, and were often the objects of sexual abuse. Slavery was rampant in those days. Half of the Roman Empire were slaves, and more than three quarters of Athens were slaves. Some of the slaves were turned into gladiators for the purpose of “sport.”
However, because of the birth of Jesus and the impact of the gospel on the lives of many, human life was treated as valuable. Sherwood Wirt wrote a book titled, The Social Conscience of the Evangelical. Wirt notes the positive influences for human life that the gospel had on people at that time, especially those emperors who were professing Christians:
Many permanent legal reforms were set in motion by Emperors Constantine (280?–337) and Justinian (483–565) that can be laid to the influence of Christianity. Licentious and cruel sports were checked; new legislation was ordered to protect the slave, the prisoner, the mutilated man, the outcast woman. Children were granted important legal rights. Infant exposure was abolished. Women were raised from a status of degradation to that of legal protection. Hospitals and orphanages were created to take care of foundlings. Personal feuds and private wars were put under restraint…. Branding of slaves was halted.
Sadly, today, for example, we see abortion as still a problem in our country. One sees a decline in the value of human life wherever there is a loss of an understanding of the gospel.
II. Jesus’ Impact on Education
Second, let’s examine Jesus’ impact on education.
Kennedy and Newcombe write:
Every school you see—public or private, religious or secular— is a visible reminder of the religion of Jesus Christ. So is every college and university. This is not to say that every school is Christian. Often the exact opposite is true. But the fact is that the phenomenon of education for the masses has its roots in Christianity. Nor is this to say that there wasn’t education before Christianity, but it was for the elite only. Christianity gave rise to the concept of education for everyone. Furthermore, the phenomenon of the university has its roots in the Christian faith as well; the greatest universities worldwide were started by Christians for Christian purposes. While many of them may be quite hostile today to the Christian faith, the fact is that it was through the sweat and sacrifice of Christians that Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and others were created.
God’s people since the earliest times have been known as “people of the Book.” Even though writing was not invented by believers in ancient times, God nevertheless instructed Moses to write down his words to his people.
J. D. Douglas, general editor of The New International Dictionary of the Christian Church, writes: “From its beginning the religion of the Bible has gone hand in hand with teaching…. Christianity is par excellence a teaching religion, and the story of its growth is largely an educational one…. As Christianity spread, patterns of more formal education developed.”
It is Christianity that has set many of the world’s languages to writing so that people can read the word of God in their heart language (as Judy Vander Ploeg used to say).
The belief that education should be for everyone, and not just for the elite, grew out of the Reformation. Dr. Samuel Blumenthal wrote a book titled, Is Public Education Necessary? He argued that education for the masses began at the Reformation, particularly under the teaching of John Calvin. He writes:
The modern idea of popular education—that is, education for everyone— first arose in Europe during the Protestant Reformation when papal authority was replaced by biblical authority. Since the Protestant rebellion against Rome had arisen in part as a result of biblical study and interpretation, it became obvious to Protestant leaders that if the reform movement were to survive and flourish, widespread biblical literacy, at all levels of society, would be absolutely necessary.
Kennedy and Newcombe conclude this section on education as follows:
Much more could be said on how Christianity has promoted education and literacy worldwide. For instance, consider the Sunday school movement of the late eighteenth century, founded by Robert Raikes of Gloucester, England. The purpose of this was to provide Bible-oriented schooling for poor children who otherwise would not have received it. Here again, Christianity made education available for the masses. Or think of the excellent Christian schools (particularly Catholic ones) in our decayed urban areas that provide a lifeline for many poor children.
Had Jesus never been born, man would yet remain in the darkness of sin and the darkness of ignorance. It’s unlikely that there would be education for the common man. Unfortunately, as we move away from the Light of the gospel in the West, we are reverting back to the darkness—both of sin and of ignorance.
III. Jesus’ Impact on Science
Third, let’s look at Jesus’ impact on science.
Today there is a fierce opposition to Christ and the gospel from those in the scientific community. It is often said that people of faith cannot believe in science, and vice versa.
However, Christianity is not the enemy of science. In fact, had Jesus never been born, science would likely not have come into being, or at least, it would not have made the rapid strides it has made. A number of scholars have noted how it is Christianity that has birthed the modern scientific movement. Francis Schaeffer mentions some of them:
Both Alfred North Whitehead (1861–1947) and J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904–1967) have stressed that modern science was born out of the Christian world view. Whitehead was a widely respected mathematician and philosopher, and Oppenheimer, after he became director of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton in 1947, wrote on a wide range of subjects related to science…. Whitehead [in his 1925 book, Science and the Modern World ] said that Christianity is the mother of science because of “the medieval insistence on the rationality of God.”
The word “science” comes from the Latin word Scientia, and it simply means “knowledge.” God is omniscientia, or, as we say, omniscience (all knowing). Science is simply the acquisition of knowledge about God’s world. Or, as some have said, “Science is thinking God’s thoughts after him.”
Again, it is interesting to note how prominent the Reformation was in the development of modern science. One writer put it this way:
It was with the rediscovery of the Bible and of its message at the time of the Reformation…that a new impetus came to the development of science. This new impetus, flowing together with all that was best in Greek thinking, was to produce the right mixture to detonate the chain reaction leading to the explosion of knowledge which began at the start of the scientific revolution in the sixteenth century, and which is proceeding with ever-increasing momentum today.
Kennedy and Newcombe overstate perhaps, but I don’t think by much, the impact of Jesus’ birth on science in their conclusion to this section. They write:
All sorts of good things have been harnessed by modern science for our everyday use. Had Jesus never come, it is unlikely science would ever have come to be. Take a break from reading this book and look around you. What do you see? Electric lights? An electric clock? A stereo? A television? A computer? If Jesus had never come, I strongly doubt these would have ever been invented.
There would be no satellites; there would be no airplanes. If you went to work today, you would probably have gone by foot or horse or donkey or camel. You would not have fixed your breakfast on an electric stove or in a microwave oven, for such things would not exist. You would not have fixed your toast in a toaster. Countless other benefits of science would not exist if Christ had not been born.
IV. Jesus’ Impact on Individuals
And fourth, let’s notice Jesus’ impact on individuals.
Only Jesus is able to transform lives. There is no other person or power that is able to transform lives at a deep and personal level. And throughout the millennia countless lives have been changed by the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Kennedy and Newcombe tell the story that in the nineteenth century, Charles Bradlaugh, a prominent atheist, challenged a Christian man to a debate on the validity of the claims of Christianity. The Christian, Hugh Price Hughes, was an active soul-winner working among the poor in the slums of London. Hughes told Bradlaugh he would agree to the debate on one condition. Hughes said, “I propose to you that we each bring some concrete evidences of the validity of our beliefs in the form of men and women who have been redeemed from the lives of sin and shame by the influence of our teaching. I will bring 100 such men and women, and I challenge you to do the same.” Hughes then said that if Bradlaugh couldn’t bring 100, then he could bring 50; if he couldn’t bring 50, then he could bring 20. He finally whittled the number down to one. All Bradlaugh had to do was to find one person whose life was improved by atheism and Hughes— who would bring 100 people improved by Christ—would agree to debate him. Bradlaugh withdrew!
There are many other ways in which Jesus has impacted our world. But I leave it at this.
Conclusion
Therefore, having analyzed the areas that have been impacted because of Jesus, let us give thanks to God for the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
No-one in all of history has had the kind of impact on the world as Jesus. Dr. James Allan Francis put’s Jesus’ life and influence into perspective in his famous narrative titled, One Solitary Life:
He was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in another village, where He worked in a carpenter shop until He was thirty. Then for three years He was an itinerant preacher. He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never had a family or owned a home. He didn’t go to college. He never visited a big city. He never traveled two hundred miles from the place where He was born. He did none of the things that usually accompany greatness. He had no credentials but Himself. He was only thirty-three when the tide of public opinion turned against Him. His friends ran away. One of them denied Him. He was turned over to His enemies and went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed to a cross between two thieves. While He was dying, His executioners gambled for His garments, the only property He had on earth. When He was dead, He was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend. Nineteen centuries have come and gone, and today He is the central figure of the human race. All the armies that ever marched, all the navies that ever sailed, all the parliaments that ever sat, all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man on this earth as much as that one solitary life.
