Have you ever wondered why it is that Christian people feel they are never alone? It’s true, you know—we are never completely alone. In the night of the last supper, Jesus told his disciples:

If you love me, keep my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it sees him not, neither knows him: but you know him; for he dwells with you, and shall be in you.

It is curious that John calls it another comforter. The Greek word means advocate, and he uses the same expression in 1 John to refer to Jesus Christ. So Jesus is one advocate, and the Spirit of truth is another. But it doesn’t end there. Jesus urges the Father on our behalf, he encourages us, and we encourage one another. We’ll see this explained in the opening to 2 Corinthians.

One of the saddest things about the ministry of Jesus is the number of people who believed him, believed his message, believed what he said about who he was, believed on him, but could not openly confess any such thing. John told us about them in chapter 12:

Nevertheless among the chief rulers also many believed on him; but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue: For they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.

This is staggering, because it isn’t being said about leaders in secular society, but about religious leaders in the very religion of Jesus himself. And it is in this context that you can best understand what he said on another occasion. It is recorded in Matthew, chapter 10.

Not long ago, Someone I respect very highly commented that she did not have a relationship with God. She believed in God, she practiced her faith assiduously, but did not believe she had a relationship with God. In a way, this surprised me; but in another way it did not. Because I am not at all sure what people mean when they speak of a relationship with God. I have known people who said that they had an experience with God, but an experience is not a relationship.

You know all too well that when God is out of sight he is out of mind, and believing that he listens requires an element of faith. And we know that some relationships are closer than others. Just how close do you have to be to call it a relationship? And is the relationship horizontal, as between friends; or is it vertical, as between master and servant? And maybe this is where some of us come up short. We believe in God, we even practice our faith, but we have stopped short of relationship.

Jesus defies explanation. You can’t just put him in a category and then say you have him figured out. Nearly every conventional idea of Jesus is contradicted by the basic source documents—the four gospels of your New Testament.

On the one hand, you have the gentleness of Jesus, meek and mild. On the other hand, you have Jesus kicking over the money-changers’ tables in the temple and driving them out. You have Jesus who wouldn’t break a bruised reed or raise his voice in the streets. On the other hand, you have a vengeful Christ returning to make war and to destroy his enemies in Revelation.

John, in his gospel, is at some pains to recall and present those sayings of Jesus that identify him as God—the Son of God, even the God of Abraham. And then he turns right around and presents a Jesus so human that he is overcome with grief and weeps, along with Mary and Martha, over the death of Lazarus. We’ll find this revealing episode in John, chapter 11.

I must confess, I was a little puzzled at the reaction of the Jewish community to the movie The Passion of the Christ. But when I reflected on some of the persecution of Jews by Christians down through the centuries, it did make a little bit of sense. You would think, though, that in the modern world we would be past all that.

What the director of that film was doing is portraying as honestly as possible the last twelve hours of Jesus’ life as a man. What some call his passion. But because Jesus was being condemned by the Jewish leadership, some people—some fools—have blamed all Jews for what happened. This is an ignorant and foolish mistake, but people make it.

I suppose most readers of the Bible forget that Jesus’ mother was a Jewish maiden. And that Joseph, Mary’s husband, was a Jew. They forget that Peter, James, John, and all the rest of his apostles were Jews. They forget that Nicodemus, a Jewish leader, became a disciple. They forget that Joseph of Arimathea, who gave his tomb to Jesus, was a Jew. And they forget that a great multitude of Jews in that age would have given Jesus a favorable review. So what went wrong?

Jesus was a constant puzzle to the Pharisees. Sometimes he is a bit puzzling to us, too. And we have had a lot of time to digest what he was saying. And, let’s face it, some of the things he was saying were pretty far out. This is not just a good man we are listening to; not merely a great teacher.

He was standing in the environs of the Temple one day and he said to the people gathered around, I am the light of the world: he that follows me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.

The Pharisees recognized this as a very large claim on Jesus’ part and they challenged it. They said, Look, We’re not going to believe this just because you say so. You are bearing record of yourself. This was not an unreasonable objection. If I told you I was a prophet you would have every right to say, That’s what you say. Why should I believe it? Let’s take a look at Jesus’ answer in John, chapter 12.

Considering all that Jesus did, and considering his personal charisma, does it strike you as strange that there was a point when many of his disciples turned away and didn’t follow him any longer? What did Jesus do or say that led to the point where John says, From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him.

Having a religious leader lose some disciples is not a big deal. But we’re talking about Jesus—a man who healed the sick and the lame—a man of great love and appeal. But for some reason, on this occasion, a large group of his followers abandoned him. It was not anything he did. It had to be something he said. The incident comes late in the sixth chapter of John’s gospel.

He was teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum—not far from his old home. And something he said caused his disciples to say, This is a hard saying; who can hear it? What on earth could have offended them?

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. Everyone knows this verse by heart. But there may be something here that lies unnoticed even though it is crucial to the story. Later on in Genesis, And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help fitting for him. So, on the sixth day of creation, God not only created man and woman, he created something else. He created a relationship; we call it marriage.

And in his formulation, It is not good for man to be alone, God iterated a universal principle—a universal truth—that goes far beyond marriage. We know these things, almost intuitively, but sometimes it isn’t easy to express them clearly. Solomon, however, found a way. In the Book of Ecclesiastes, he said this:

Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labor. For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow: but woe to him that is alone when he falls; for he has not another to help him up. Again, if two lie together, then they have heat: but how can one be warm alone? And if one prevails against him, two shall withstand him; and a threefold cord is not quickly broken.

Now, this is so obvious, so true—not only in the Bible, but in human experience—that you would think it would transcend all argument. But you would be wrong. Let’s start with one very influential example.