Was Thomas Jefferson Christian? #76
By Joseph Prescia
The first problem that needs to be solved in answering this question is to properly define “Christian.” If one says that they follow Christ and ignores the Scriptures then they are on their own religious trip. God’s definition from the Bible properly states that it is one who is saved or born again (John 3:3, Romans 10:9,10, I Peter 1:23). A true follower of Christ includes salvation, the supernatural. There is sufficient evidence that Thomas Jefferson was merely a “follower of Christ” in his own eyes and went to great lengths to avoid the supernatural of Christ.
Why is belief in the supernatural Christ so important? Because it will determine whether or not a person is genuinely saved and heaven bound. This two-part formula for success is repeated several times in scripture, but both elements are found in a single verse in the book of Romans.
Romans 10:9-10 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. (KJV)
To confess Jesus as Lord is part one and to believe God raised him from the dead is part two. Believing that God raised Jesus from the dead is to believe in the supernatural. Both are required for salvation. Thomas Jefferson omitted the supernatural from his version of the Bible called “The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth.” In this book he left out all references to miracles and supernatural healings and he only covered the period of the four Gospels. In his book, during the time after Jesus has died, the very last 2 verses of scripture are: “There they laid Jesus, And rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulcher, and departed.” Jesus never gets raised from the dead in his book. Jefferson leaves him in the grave. Christianity is contingent upon the resurrection. God raised Christ from the dead. There’s salvation, power and eternal life in the resurrection. If you take the supernatural out of Christianity all you have left is religion, man’s doctrine. The Gospels according to Jefferson were at best an intellectual discourse between Jesus and the Pharisees. And Jefferson himself was quite the intellectual. He started this bible while he was still President of the United States. The motivation for “The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth” was an attempt to give a chronological account of Christ’s life. He felt he could not include the miracles because he did not believe that Jesus could be “both God and man” (Henry Wilder Foote, The Jefferson Bible). He saw Christ as a prophet and possibly not as his personal lord and risen savior. But if at some point in his life he did confess Jesus as lord and believed God raised him from the dead, praise God, for he will be at the gathering of the Body of Christ.
Thank God for the freedoms Jefferson insisted upon in our Constitution. We can appreciate his efforts for individual liberty. But if Jesus Christ was not raised from the dead then you and I cannot have supernatural power today and freedom in Christ. Our ability to perform the supernatural is based on the accomplished work of the resurrected Christ. Those who believe the entire Bible to be the Word of God know how the story ends. Jesus is not still in the grave behind the rolled stone. God raised him from the dead and Christ is seated at the right hand of God. He is the savior of the world. The Bible says that Christ was the first fruits (I Corinthians 15:23), being raised from the dead. Since Christ was first, then God is telling us that there are more on the way. That includes all of us who are born again. We can look forward to Jesus Christ’s return sometime in the future as Christians. The Bible, as God gave it, clearly instructs mankind on what is in store for all. |
