Why is there a need for Jesus?

[Timi_Celcer]

Why didn’t God just do what Jesus did without being born as a human and dying. He is almighty after all. And why is there a need for Jesus in the trinity?

 

[catholictiger]

to put it simply, which is difficult to do.

Anselm’s cur deus homo is the best answer to this question but it is long and complex.

but the idea behind it is that we offended God in a way that only a God Man can pay satisfaction for our sin.

When we offend someone we must be forgiven by them and we must repay to them what we did to them plus some. Lets say your teenage son breaks a window in the house, in some way the son will have to repay what he caused damage to. He would be punished in some way and he wouldn’t be unpunished till he satisfied his parents demands that repay the damage done.

We have offended and sinned against God. There is no possible way that we can repay God plus some, God is eternal we are finite its impossible.

one of the proposed ways (I think Thomas proposes a different reason for Jesus coming) our debt to God can be satisfied is through a God Man. It is the only way, according to anselm, it can be repaid. The reason being is that God would be sacrificing himself. The divine is the only one who can repay the debt of sin. But God isn’t guilty of the sin it would go against his nature if he sinned. So God became man and took on the penalty of sin without actually committing it, sacrificed himself, and paid our debts to God.

So to answer your question simply We have a need for Jesus because that is the only way we can be righteous with God and this is his will. Because he wants to redeem us he sent his only son to die for our sins.

 

[mandy2]

Jesus was our perfect example of how we should live as humans. Yes He is almighty, but he humbled himself and became human to show us the way we ought to live. Yes it would had been easy for Him to tell us how to live, but He loves us so much He came to SHOW us how to live.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Why didn’t God just do what Jesus did without being born as a human and dying. He is almighty after all. And why is there a need for Jesus in the trinity?

Good question.
The question has so many possible meanings (due to your underlying assumptions that may have prompted it) it is somewhat difficult to know how to proceed.

Maybe talking through some of the assumptions may help…

Is there anything in your life (or that of the human race) that actually needs a save-er in the first place? As a young man I could never understand why Pentecostal preachers on downtown street corners would always harangue me and others that we needed to be saved. I never felt that I was particularly lost or out of relationship with the universe.

Buddhists say much of the manifold ills of the human race are self-inflicted through wrong views of how nature and society actually work for our benefit. The rest of our ills (sickness finally death) are intrinsic to nature and while we cannot avoid them they can be alleviated somewhat by wise and right living also. The rest is not worth worrying about as most wise men have told us (including Jesus).

So I am suggesting we prob need to understand whether and what we need to be “saved” from before we can begin to understand why we need Jesus and whether or not Jesus/Christianity is going to be any better at doing this than any other religion or social group that passes on life-skills and teaching.

Personally I think the intrinsic attraction of grace from Another (regardless of whether or not sin exists) is far more meaningful to me than needing to find any door I can to escape my own personal hell-hole.

 

[Robyn_p]

I find this explanation from Frank Sheed’s book Theology and Sanity really helpful in understanding this. Hopefully you find it equally helpful.

If the human race were to be brought back from servitude to sonship, here was the man who was in Himself Son and not servant; if the human race was once more to be at one with God (atonement=at-one-ment) here in Christ Jesus humanity was united with the Godhead in a union of inconceivable closeness. Christ our Lord alone could offer to God an act both human and divine…He could offer a true human act in expiation of human sin, an act of total love, dying completely to himself, to balance out humanity’s self-love. (Which is what cut us off from our relationship with God in the first place.) and because He was God, the human act he offered was of infinite value and so could satisfy and more than satisfy for the sins of men.

Maybe there was another way God could have chosen to save us, but this is the way He did choose. He didn’t have to even save us at all, He could have left us in our miseries, left us separated from Him, the only source of Goodness and Happiness and Peace. But He chose freely to unite himself to our brokenness, and by doing that He transformed us. Now united to Him, our pains and sufferings MEAN something now, because GOD, the infinite, holy, perfect Being, went through them! We’re not alone, He knows, and He’s shown us the way out. He joined himself to us, because He wanted us to be united to Him.

This is a deep, profound mystery, that can’t possibly have justice done to it in one small post. But the obvious truth we can see from the Incarnation and Passion and Death and Resurrection is God’s ultimate Love. Love doesn’t see someone in a pit and just tell them how to get out. Love dives in and pulls them out himself. That’s exactly what Jesus did, and it blows the mind the more you meditate on it.

 

[Robyn_p]

Good question.
The question has so many possible meanings (due to your underlying assumptions that may have prompted it) it is somewhat difficult to know how to proceed.

Maybe talking through some of the assumptions may help…

Is there anything in your life (or that of the human race) that actually needs a save-er in the first place? As a young man I could never understand why Pentecostal preachers on downtown street corners would always harangue me and others that we needed to be saved. I never felt that I was particularly lost or out of relationship with the universe.

Well, I can’t speak for the OP, but I know personally I’m a mess without Jesus. I’m incredibly stupid and selfish and lazy. I know when I try to do things my own way, I always end up hurting myself and others. Only Christ shows me what I really am made for and what I’m really worth, life makes sense with Him finally. When I see that this God, Who needs nothing from me, wants me to know Him, and became man so that I could do that. It’s really…so awesome.

Sorry I can’t explain it very well. I guess it probably sounds silly but it’s true, it’s the truest thing I can say.

Buddhists say much of the manifold ills of the human race are self-inflicted through wrong views of how nature and society actually work for our benefit. The rest of our ills (sickness finally death) are intrinsic to nature and while we cannot avoid them they can be alleviated somewhat by wise and right living also. The rest is not worth worrying about as most wise men have told us (including Jesus).

Well, there’s some truth to this. Catholics would agree that the ills of the human race are self-inflicted. But we would say that only makes the need for a savior more acute, not less. I on my own through wrong view of how gravity works might walk into a ditch, but I won’t be able to get myself out. That’s what we believe Jesus did. Humanity was stupid and chose itself over God, the only Source of goodness and hope and peace, and we were stuck. So God came down and joined himself to us again. He lifts us up out of the hole we got ourselves into. He lifts us up out of ourselves. :yup:

So I am suggesting we prob need to understand whether and what we need to be “saved” from before we can begin to understand why we need Jesus and whether or not Jesus/Christianity is going to be any better at doing this than any other religion or social group that passes on life-skills and teaching.

Agreed. I would suggest anyone serious to look at the lives of the saints, the ones who really let Christ transform and really lived according to his teaching. There’s something incredible and different and joyful about them. Just like there was something different about Him.

 

[Timi_Celcer]

Some extra questions(one was in the OP also). Why is there a need for Jesus in the trinity? I understand the Father and the Holy Spirit roles but what about Jesus? Is it possible for more than three persons to be in the God?

 

[Linusthe2nd]

Why didn’t God just do what Jesus did without being born as a human and dying. He is almighty after all. And why is there a need for Jesus in the trinity?

All you have to see is all the confused ideas people have on these Forums and that will explain why we needed Jesus. Just think how confused people were without Him.

Linus2nd