Hello I recently came across your website and I must say I am beyond fascinated with what your website has to say and your recent book. To give some background about myself I am a former devout Christian but currently am sort of an Agnostic or still not sure. I was just wondering if Paul really is a false apostle as your site claims does that mean that Jesus  was a failed messiah? Because his followers today all believe he was God. I was just like to hear your personal beliefs and thoughts if you would be willing.

Chris.

Hi Chris,
You are precisely the kind of person I am hoping my books reach. Perhaps Christianity as taught/practiced made you give up on Jesus. Yet, my message is 'don't do so just yet.'

My new book Jesus' Words on Salvation quotes Bonhoeffer as saying we have developed a "Christianity without Christ." At my website is an article you might like to read called "The Problem of Paul." It shows Thomas Jefferson, Jews, Atheists, Muslims, all like Jesus Christ, and realize in different ways he was special, brilliant, witty, amazing and much more. The problem is that Paul's divisive doctrine and spirit has become imbued into modern 'Christianity' and made following Jesus so much more problematic.

When you encounter just Jesus, you and He alone, something amazing happens. Try it again. Please read the Gospel of Matthew from Chapter Two to the end.

I believe the presence of the Word of God in Jesus is what explains his superlative wit, genius, etc. (John 1:1,4, "the Word became flesh.") In this sense, the Divine was truly 100% present in a 100% human being.

Nothing written by playwrights, screenwriters, etc., tells a more engaging story with a more engaging figure than the gospels. And nothing reveals the writers of the gospels were anything more than fishermen. As I say in my article on the website "Its own miracle without the miraculous," I don't need to see Jesus raise the dead to know something beyond this world was operative in Him. The written gospels are their own miracle.

And wisdom is proven true by those who practice its teachings. Indeed when you follow Jesus' lessons, Jesus will give you the peace that passes all understanding, in a way the world can never give you. This is the personal witness that will ground you in knowing you have discovered the true Master (Lord) of your life -- a friend if you obey Him.

Blessings,
Doug