Socrates Meets Jesus

I read a book this year called Socrates Meets Jesus. Basically what happens is Socrates gets time jockeyed to the year 1987 and is enrolled at a college in Massachusetts. After many days of conversation filled with logical content and classes Socrates reads both the New Testament and Old Testaments of the Bible to learn about this thing called Christianity. Since Socrates lived before Christ he never knew about Jesus and what He did. Near the end of the book Socrates is in a Christology class debating with the professor and classmates about the validity of Christianity. By that time Socrates had met Jesus and come to know Him as  His savior and wanted the others in the class to know that Jesus was real and what He did was really true.

Socrates was fervently debating with the professor about the resurrection of Jesus. The professor thought that the disciples stole Jesus' body to make it seem like He was raised for the dead. However, Socrates asked:

"What did these disciples get out of their lie? When someone deceives another, the deceiver is always motivated by some thought of advantage. What advantage did the disciples gain by their conspiracy?"

One of the classmates names, Ahmen, responded with:

"I will answer that question for you, Socrates. I'll tell you what they got out of it. They got mocked, hated, sneered at, jeered at, exiled, deprived of their property, their reputation and their civil rights; they got imprisoned, whipped, tortured, clubbed to a pulp, stoned, beheaded, sawed in pieces, boiled in oil, crucified, fed to lions and cut to ribbons by gladiators. That's what they got out of it."

I really liked this statement because its so true. People don't die for a lie. People don't go through torture for what they know is myth. God is real, what He did happened, and it has a lasting affect on our lives. We wouldn't follow God and become martyrs if He didn't do anything for us.

We don't live for a lie. God is real and He is profoundly moving in this world. Would you die for what you believe in?