All in the Mind's Eye
Look at it this way. Suppose all your life your dad had been telling you about a great old long-haired buddy, "old Joe Stapzinski." Joe was a World War II veteran, your dad told you. He was weak with a pinched face. Stapzinski was a bent-over, sallow-complicated little weasel of a man — real timid. All your life as a young person you heard about "good old Joe Stapzinski."
You grew to know the man as if you saw him daily: Little weasel-like ferret-face, close-set eyes, gray, ashen, sallow-complicated, lung-cancer ridden, one-legged, hobbling along with a twinkle in his eye and a quarter for the kids.
One day your dad announced, "Hey, you know what? Old Joe is finally going to come over here for a visit. He's made it clear across the country, and I haven't seen him in over 20 years." You're 17, and all your life you've heard about little old, weasel, pinched-face, stooped, bent-over, one-legged Joe with his long hair. And you sure want to meet this character because you've heard dozens of stories about him.
So the doorbell rings and you go to answer it, and at the door is a six-foot-four giant. He's healthy, broad-shouldered, with a booming voice. He's not particularly handsome, just an average farmer-looking type. He's the picture of health. He reaches out with a strong, calloused hand and grips your hand and says with a deep voice, "How ya' doing, buddy?"
You say, "Oh, excuse me, I was expecting Joe Stapzinski." You look behind this big guy for little old weasel-faced, pinched-over, stooped, bent, one-legged, long-haired Joe.
He says, "Well I am Joe Stapzinski."
You say, "No, no, you couldn't be. You see, I've heard dozens of stories about Joe. I just feel like I know him. I mean, I'd recognize him anywhere. I could pick him out of a crowd. I mean, after all, somebody with a wooden leg, you know, with that long, wispy, gray hair and that kind of a half-sick expression, looking like he's near death with lung cancer — you couldn't be Joe Stapzinski!" you would argue.
What I'm illustrating is this.
The world thinks Christ had long hair. He didn't. The Establishment claims Christ was born December 25th. He wasn't. Religious leaders say Christ came to do away with the Ten Commandments. He came to make them ever more binding. The religious encyclopedias write that Christ said people go to heaven. Christ says the saints will rule the earth. “Hell-fire" preachers say their Christ condemned the wicked to burn forever. He said no such thing.
You can prove all these opposites, if you care to. It's all in the Book. Read the historical biographies of the historical Jesus — the books Matthew, Mark, Luke or John. The contents may shock you.
Job and You
Let's illustrate the point about the "other Jesus" a little further with a man whose name was Job, mentioned in the Bible.
Job thought he knew a lot about God. He'd heard, and he could argue! In the book of Job you can read some of the most eloquent arguments about all the qualities and the attributes of God's character from the lips of Job. With his three friends sitting there, arguing and telling Job why he was having such a rugged time of it and why he'd lost everything, and his family dead, and he was sitting there in that pile of ashes with all those horrible boils all over his body and aching with pain. Did they ever philosophize? They went on and on and on. They really had a rap session.
They were talking about all the attributes of this person of whom they spoke, and the name they used was "God." And the word "God" conjured up something in their minds. The same thing is true of you, isn't it? You ask a person, "What do you think of when you think of God?" And they say, "Well, I think of a father-figure. I think of my grandfather, I think of an ancient creature or a Being, probably in a long robe with long, absolutely snow-white hair, almost a Santa-Claus-type of image."
And so it was when Job and his three friends were talking about God. Every time they said the word "God," what got into their minds was their own attitudes, their own ideas about the qualities, the personality, the programs, the character, the requirements for obedience of this God. This was their concept of God.
Finally, after a long series of incidents, Job really broke down and came to see what his problem had been.
Job said something which is really a point to make right now to all you young hipsters who think Jesus had long hair, or for all of you middle-of-the-road, church-going, professing Christian people who have concepts of a "Christ" in your mind.
Take a look at the lesson Job learned.
Job said, "I know that thou canst do every thing, and that no thought can be withholden from thee." He said, "Who is he that hideth counsel without knowledge? Therefore" verse three, "have I uttered that I understood not; things too wonderful for me, which I knew not" (Job 42:2, 3).
Now Job Understood
He said, "I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye SEETH thee." He saw for the first time the true picture of that awesome Personality — the Creator God of whom he had been speaking. This had never before even reached his mind. His conscious mind had not really seen this God of whom he spoke, even though he could argue long and eloquently about "God."
He said, "I have heard of you by the hearing of the ear — but now I get it, now I really see, now I understand, now my eye sees you, now I comprehend — Wherefore," he said in verse six, "I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes."
Now he got the true perspective. He saw how great and how good was God, and how wretched and miserable and utterly blind he had been. And he made that most difficult of all human steps — he admitted he had been utterly wrong; not partly wrong, totally wrong. He said he abhorred himself!
It was just as alarming to Job to see with his mind's eye that great God as it would have been for you as a boy of 17 to open that door, expecting little old stoop-shouldered, pinched-faced, bent-over, one-legged, long-haired, sallow-complicated, lung-cancer-ridden Joe Stapzinski — and to see instead this big, six-foot-four man, a picture of health, sticking out his hand, and booming a cheerful greeting.
And it will be equally shocking to you when you see what the real Jesus is like!
"Turn on with Jesus," the hippie said. How do you do that when you don't know who Jesus is? How do you "turn on with Him" when you don't know how to contact Him? Why turn on with the very same kind of a Christ whom you hold responsible for being the guiding figure in a Judeo-Christian society which has brought this world to the point of virtual nuclear annihilation?
Find the Real Jesus
If you youngsters want to "turn on with Jesus," do it. But why do it with the traditional Jesus? Why do it with the pseudo-sanctimonious, long-haired, sad-faced Christ of tradition? Why accept a complete fabrication, a total fake, another Jesus, a false Christ?
I challenge you to find the true Jesus Christ, and I'll guarantee you a few things right now. You won't like what you see. Believe it or not, Christ was a law-and-order man, a short-haired Christ, a Jesus Christ who would not have stood out in a crowd, who looked rather plain, like anybody. And He was clean!
That Christ you find will very probably turn YOU off! He'll command you to KEEP THE LAWS! You'll be told to BE CLEAN! You'll find He would tell you it's a shame for a man to have long hair (I Cor. 11:14). He'll order you off drugs, and tell you the penalty for ruining your health, your mind, and your morals with licentious "free love" is the DEATH sentence! He'll command you, not ask you politely, to REPENT of your sins.
And if you do, He'll give you mercy, and pardon.
But He'll tell you that grace and mercy doesn't allow you the freedom to sin again and again!
The Christ of the Bible will not justify your flagrant lawbreaking, your "head-to-head" confrontations with the Establishment. He'll DRAFT you, too! That's right! He'll DRAFT you — right into His own service, into His Work.
That's why most of you won't find the true Christ! He's too much for you. You would probably hate Him if you found Him. You wouldn't want to take His orders.
Again, I challenge you young people to find the true Christ. Rub it in the face of the Establishment. They've never found Him! Ninety percent of the people you could talk to couldn't tell you what He looked like, who He was, what He stood for, what He said or anything about Him. Thousands of them can't even name the first four books of the New Testament that give His biography.
If you find that Christ of the Bible — and it's easy — just read about Him — just STUDY what the Book says instead of parroting the endless myths of the Establishment — if you find that Christ, you'll discover the ultimate in severing every last tie with society.
Jesus was Jesus.
And it got Him killed.
You'd better thank your Creator He didn't stay dead, friend.