Articles
Turning Points in Bible History - 15
This last turning point we will discuss is the most obvious one, for nothing compares to the sea-change of Jesus’ entrance into the world. Everything God said or did prior to this had its eventuality in mind; everything since finds its true meaning and resolution in the coming of the Christ.
His birth was accompanied by angelic announcement, but only to a select few. His early life is given scant attention, certainly not the coverage one would expect for the most significant life ever lived. His adult ministry, about a three year period which laid the foundation of His identity and mission, is but a sliver of Scripture. He surrounded Himself with common folk, not the cadre of movers and shakers who could “get things done.”
Jesus was an iconoclast, an outsider, as many trendsetters are. But His methodology was devoid of the normal tactics used by those trying to make their mark in the world. No false promises; no politically correct speech to woo the influential; no publicity machine to spread His message; no army to threaten the establishment; no “the rules don’t apply to me” elitism. Jesus seemed to do everything backward, according to conventional wisdom, to make His life a turning point.
But what a – no, THE – turning point it was. And through Him each of us is given a turning point of our own: “Repent … and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord” (Ac 3:19).
