The Jesus I believe in is found in the Bible
Have you ever heard someone talk about Jesus in a way that just didn’t quite fit with what was in the Bible? Or maybe you read a book or saw a movie or a play about Jesus that either fell short of capturing the true essence of Jesus or it kind of stretched the truth and over-exaggerated things? That’s not the Jesus I believe in.
Now just to be fair, I think each of us sees Jesus a little differently. All too often we see Jesus through the lens of our own opinions and preconceptions, of how we see ourselves. And that’s exactly what happened, even for the people who saw and interacted with Jesus in person about 2,000 years ago.
Their opinions of who and what he was ranged all the way from a partner of Beelzebub, the chief of the devils, to one of the Old Testament prophets, or John the Baptist, and some actually discerned him as the Son of God.
Why so many different versions of Jesus?
Why did all these people see Jesus so differently? Well, as I said earlier, it was the lens of their own thinking they were looking at him through.
Over the years I have seen a wide range of plays, books, movies, etc. which portray Jesus in many different ways. Some are very thoughtful. Some are a little two dimensional and stilted. Some are really not that great at all. Some of them are actually pretty well done.
Years ago, I was very inspired by the TV miniseries produced by Franco Zeffirelli called simply “Jesus of Nazareth.” But looking back on the production now almost 50 years later, it hasn’t aged perfectly. There are some very well acted scenes, but in particular, Jesus is a blue eyed stereotype of a Westernized version of who Jesus was.
At the time, it worked for me. But it doesn’t work as well now.
A new Jesus on TV
More recently, and I hope you’ve been watching, a new, much more involved story of Jesus is available and is being seen all around the world. It’s called, The Chosen.
It takes a very different approach to depicting Jesus, his disciples, and the Bible narratives. The director and writers have created far-reaching backstories to the familiar characters we know so well from the Bible. And they’ve created additional characters to help tell the story.
For example, it shows Mary Magdalene as a child and the events that caused her to be so troubled. It explains why Simon Peter was out fishing all night just before he met Jesus. It’s all so believable. And it’s so easy to relate to these characters.
Some of the scenes showing Jesus healing and teaching are so thoughtfully done and often very inspiring. Watching The Chosen, I have laughed and cried as Jesus, his disciples, those listening to him, and even the Pharisees, come to life.
And I heartily recommend this series. There will be seven seasons with eight episodes per season. Season 4 has just been released on TheChosen.tv.
Not the Jesus I believe in
But the reason for this podcast episode is to simply say, as I mentioned earlier, when you’re watching The Chosen, or any retelling of the story of Jesus, it’s really important to remember this is just a product of the writers’ and director’s perspective. They have created certain scenes and narratives that are not in the Bible. And they look at Jesus through the lens of their own theological persuasions, however objective they try to be.
The point is, I encourage you always to go back to the Bible to see how it depicts Jesus, who he is, and what he does.
That said, I simply have to say, as much as I love The Chosen, have been inspired by it, and recommend you watch it if you haven’t already, there are a few scenes that, to me, seem completely out of character to the Jesus I know from the Bible.
Does Jesus chose not to heal?
The first one is when the character called Little James, or James, the son of Alphaeus, one of the twelve disciples, who has a limp in the show, comes to Jesus. This is in Season 3, Episode 2. Jesus has just informed the disciples they will all receive power to go out preaching and healing. Little James asks Jesus how he could heal when Jesus hasn’t healed him of his own disability.
In the scene, Jesus explains he could heal Little James, but won’t right now and gives a reason that may or may not sound reasonable to you, depending on your own perspective of how God and Jesus operate in our lives. Here’s the scene on YouTube if you want to watch it for yourself.
There is nothing I find in any of the Gospels, or the rest of the New Testament, that justifies this sort of mindset toward healing. Jesus never told someone it wasn’t their time to be healed. He never declined to heal someone when they asked him. He never said it wasn’t God’s will for them to be healed. But in The Chosen, Jesus chooses not to heal Little James.
That is not the Jesus I believe in or follow.
Is Jesus not able to heal?
And more recently in Season 4, Episode 4, there’s another scene which I find heartbreaking, not only because one of Jesus’s followers, Ramah, is inadvertently killed by a Roman officer, but because Jesus comes to the scene and stands by doing nothing to help the dying woman, who happens to be the fiancée of Thomas.
Of course, none of this is in the Bible. And, I don’t have a problem with the show creating the backstories and additional narratives, but when they go against the spirit of what we know from the Bible about Jesus, I have a hard time swallowing the story line.
In this particular scene, Jesus shows up as Ramah is dying. Thomas asks Jesus to help her, to heal her. He expresses faith that Jesus can restore her. But Jesus just stands there, with a look of sadness and almost a sense of helplessness. He ends up saying something like, “It’s not her time to be healed.”
What on earth is going on here? Thomas is beside himself. He can’t understand why Jesus won’t heal his fiancée. And I can’t either. This is not the Jesus I believe in.
What does this refusal to heal say about who and what Jesus is? Or maybe the question really is, What does this say about the people producing The Chosen and their theological perspectives on Jesus?
The Jesus I believe in never turned down a request for healing
In the Bible, as I said, Jesus never refused to heal someone when asked. He was always willing and able to heal. Now, of course, I could be wrong. I was not there 2,000 years ago watching every single thing Jesus said and did. So I can only go by what the Bible tells me, everything the Bible tells me about Jesus.
It’s interesting that many followers of Jesus have watched these same scenes I just described of Jesus not healing someone and responded very differently. In fact, many of them have found comfort in these scenes, because it gives them hope to continue believing when they have prayed for healing but healing hasn’t come.
In fact, many viewers of The Chosen have responded on Social Media that seeing Jesus decline to heal Little James and Ramah has helped them deal with the fact they haven’t been healed themselves.
But let’s put this in perspective. This is an old theological teaching that’s been around for centuries. It’s just been given a new set of clothes, so to speak, in The Chosen. But it’s actually man-made theology dressed up in the Shepherd’s clothing.
So let’s talk about the real issues at hand.
Is God ever unwilling or unable to heal?
From the scenes I just described in The Chosen, either God is unable to heal everything or He chooses not to.
If God is unable to heal every situation, how are we supposed to know when He can and when He can’t? Think of how that affects the way you pray?
You prayer then becomes, “If it’s your will for someone to be healed, and You are able, let them be healed.” But Jesus never put the “if” in his prayers.
He taught us to pray for God’s will to be done here on earth, as it already is in heaven. In heaven, God’s will is that everyone is whole and free from any pain, sorrow, sin, or suffering. When you read the whole narrative of Jesus in the Bible, it’s pretty obvious it’s always God’s will for people to be healed.
In fact, Jesus says about God,
…with God all things are possible. Matthew 19:26 KJV
And even in the Old Testament, we have this reassurance from Psalms.
Praise the LORD, my soul, and forget not all his benefits—who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, Psalm 103:2, 3 NIV
Hard questions to answer
If we used the same human reasoning that has decided God will not or cannot heal every sickness or disease, it raises some serious questions.
Are there some sins God will not, cannot, or chooses not to forgive? Does He forgive one person for a particular sin but choose not to forgive someone else who committed the same sin and repented just as the first person had? Does that sound like God to you?
That’s not the God I believe in.
Peter confirms the impartial nature of God in
God is no respecter of persons: Acts 10:34 KJV
Jesus in The Chosen
Let’s come back for just a minute to the way Jesus is portrayed in The Chosen.
The Bible quotes Jesus saying,
Jesus gave them this answer: “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.
“I can do nothing on my own. I judge as God tells me. Therefore, my judgment is just, because I carry out the will of the one who sent me, not my own will.” John 5:19, 30 NLT
The implication then, in The Chosen, is that Jesus didn’t heal Little James or Ramah because it was not God’s will for them to be healed.
This is not the God I believe in. This is not the Jesus I believe in.
Several years ago, I did a podcast episode that talks about this very idea. If you’d like to check it out, it’s Episode 29: Is It Ever God’s Will You Are NOT Healed When You Pray?
What is God’s will?
Where does this idea come from, that it is God’s will for some people to be healed but not His will for others to be healed?
In the show, Peter tries to console Thomas by sharing what God says in Isaiah.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:8, 9 NIV
When you read just these two verses, it could imply there’s some higher purpose for God not healing someone. And that’s what Peter is trying to do with Thomas in this scene from The Chosen.
But when you read the rest of this passage from Isaiah, it gives a fuller sense of what God’s ways and means are.
As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands. Instead of the thornbush will grow the juniper, and instead of briers the myrtle will grow. This will be for the LORD’s renown, for an everlasting sign, that will endure forever.” Isaiah 55:10-13 NIV
This doesn’t sound like it’s a reason God doesn’t heal someone. God promises Isaiah, as well as you and me, that His words and promises will not be empty but will accomplish His will.
What lens are you looking at Jesus through?
So again I ask, where does this thought that it is not God’s will for someone to be healed come from?
As I mentioned at the beginning of this episode, all too often we look at Jesus through the lens of our own limited thinking, our own belief systems of faith, our theological opinions and preconceptions.
If you, for whatever reason, believe God is not willing or able to heal, through Christ, every disease or situation, even when asked in prayer, then you will see Jesus in this light, or rather, lack or light.
And you may actually find comfort when you pray for healing, but healing doesn’t come, because you will believe it to be God’s will.
But again, that’s not the God I believe in. That’s not the Jesus I believe in.
Now I realize this can be a complex issue because of deeply held religious beliefs. But the real issue is about God’s willingness and ability to heal in every situation.
Are you praying for healing?
Is there something in your life you’re praying about right now that needs to be healed? If it gives you comfort to think it might not be God’s will for you to be healed, I have to admit I don’t really understand that.
It seems depressing to me and almost pointless to pray for something that, no matter how hard I pray, if it’s not God’s will to heal it, it won’t be healed.
It sounds a little bit like one version of the doctrine of predestination. If God has ordained you to be saved, then you will be saved when you turn to Him. But if God has pre-ordained someone not to be saved, there is nothing they can do about it. Believe it or not, there are people who believe this, or some version of it.
If this is your view of God, it saps your prayer of a full-fledged faith in God’s power to heal “all your diseases.” (Psalm 103:3)
When we pray for healing and it doesn’t come, do we find solace in the assumption it might not be God’s will? Or do we hear Jesus’s answer to his disciples when they failed to heal the epileptic boy?
Jesus’s explanation
Jesus said they weren’t able to heal in this case
Because you have so little faith… However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting. Matthew 17:20, 21 NIV
It wasn’t so much the quantity of their faith but the quality. And something more was needed. Something in their thinking had not totally yielded to God’s power to heal.
I’ve mentioned this before, but have you ever noticed that not too long after this healing, Jesus’s disciples are arguing about who would be greatest among them. You can find this in Mark 9:33.
This could have been what Jesus was referring to that would have come to light with a humble sense of fasting and prayer. The disciples’ egotistical, self-focused thinking prevented them from healing the epileptic boy. It clouded their spiritual vision. They were preoccupied with themselves and who would be greatest. This is not an attitude that will bring healing.
That same undetected, unrepented-of self-focus in our hearts, which might show its ugly head with many disguises, prevents our prayers from healing today.
If we console ourselves with the thought that it must not have been God’s will for something to be healed, but have not been aware of nor dealt with what needs to change in our hearts, it’s almost as if we’re accusing God of what is a result of our own shortcomings.
Remember God’s promise
When you’re praying for healing, your own or someone else’s, it’s important to remember the promise, which I quoted earlier, that God heals “all your diseases.” (Psalm 103:3)
If there is something hidden, and sometimes not so hidden, in our hearts, that would prevent us from receiving God’s healing power, I find this passage incredibly helpful.
Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
Point out anything in me that offends you,
and lead me along the path of everlasting life. Psalm 139:23, 24 NLT
Sometimes however, when you’re praying for healing, it’s not so much an internal but an external thought that needs to be detected and defeated with prayer.
David brings this out in Psalms.
All my enemies whisper together against me; they imagine the worst for me, saying, “A vile disease has afflicted him; he will never get up from the place where he lies.” Psalm 41:7, 8 NIV
Sometimes people around you may be imagining the worst for you. David felt this and it’s something he prayed about, asking God to deliver him from the hands, and negative thoughts, of his enemies.
And who is the real enemy that would try to prevent healing, but Satan himself, with his lies and suggestions that we are unworthy to be healed, or that God is not willing to heal us, or whatever the suggestion might be.
Jesus’s promise to you and me
When his seventy followers, whom Jesus had sent to preach the gospel of the kingdom of heaven returned and reported all the healings they had done, Jesus made a bold statement that applies not just to them, but to you and me as well.
I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you. Luke 10:19 NIV
When the enemy tells lies about you or the person or situation you’re praying for, remember that Christ has given you spiritual authority to trample on and overcome all the power of the enemy, Satan.
We have this power and authority, but if we don’t exercise it, it’s as if we don’t have it. Take this to heart and remember what Christ has given you.
The Jesus I believe in heals
Coming back to The Chosen, I will continue to watch the show and I hope you will too. I have found so much inspiration from it, even if there are a few things I disagree with. It’s actually those moments which send me back to the Bible to rediscover who Jesus really is, instead of just accepting someone else’s version of Jesus.
I do not distrust the motives of the writers and producers of this program and I am deeply grateful for the enormous undertaking of producing this show. They have a deep and humble desire to present Jesus and his message of salvation to the whole world. They have opened a dialogue as never before, all over the world, of who Jesus is and what it means to follow him.
And they freely acknowledge the elaborate back stories and non-Biblical content are clearly that, not in the Bible. Their hope is turn you back to the Bible to read for yourself the stories of Jesus and his followers.
All this really begs the question: How can you and I do a better job of sharing the message of Jesus with the world. Obviously, The Bible Speaks to You Podcast is one way I’m beginning to do that. And I’d love to hear how you are sharing Christ with the world.
Finding Jesus in the Bible
The thing I want to leave you with is, no matter what others say about who Jesus is or what he does, always come back to the Bible to find him. Don’t take The Chosen’s version of Jesus. Don’t accept a preacher’s version of Jesus. Don’t take the Church’s traditionalized view of Jesus without coming back to the Bible.
Jesus said we would find him in the Scriptures.
You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, John 5:39 NIV
When you find Jesus in the Bible, you will find the Jesus you can follow and believe in.
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James Early, the Jesus Mindset Coach, is a Bible teacher, speaker, and podcaster. He conducts Bible workshops online and in person. His focus is on getting back to the original Christianity of Jesus by embracing the mindset of Christ in daily life. Contact him here.
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Bible References
Matthew 19:26 KJV
26 with God all things are possible.
Psalm 103:2, 3 NIV
2 Praise the LORD, my soul, and forget not all his benefits—
3 who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases,
Acts 10:34 KJV
34 God is no respecter of persons:
John 5:19, 30 NLT
19 Jesus gave them this answer: “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.
30 I can do nothing on my own. I judge as God tells me. Therefore, my judgment is just, because I carry out the will of the one who sent me, not my own will.
Isaiah 55:8, 9 NIV
8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD.
9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
Isaiah 55:10-13 NIV
10 As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,
11 so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.
12 You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands.
13 Instead of the thornbush will grow the juniper, and instead of briers the myrtle will grow. This will be for the LORD’s renown, for an everlasting sign, that will endure forever.”
Matthew 17:20, 21 NIV
20 Because you have so little faith…
21 However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.
Psalm 139:23, 24 NLT
23 Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
24 Point out anything in me that offends you,
and lead me along the path of everlasting life.
Psalm 41:7, 8 NIV
7 All my enemies whisper together against me; they imagine the worst for me, saying,
8 “A vile disease has afflicted him; he will never get up from the place where he lies.”
Luke 10:19 NIV
19 I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you.
John 5:39 NIV
39 You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me,
