Jesus said...

Everyone wants Jesus on their side. If you want only men in key leadership positions in churches you bring up the fact that all 12 of Jesus’ key leaders in his job training program were male. If you want women in key leadership positions you speak of the women who followed Jesus, and who appear to be the venture capitalists, funding his project (Luke 8:1-3). Everyone knows, “money talks.”

If you want to approve homoerotic behavior, you mention Jesus didn’t talk about it so he must not have been against it. Except that the evidence from ancient Jewish culture is this was considered such a forbidden practice that he wouldn’t need to address it (e.g. Robert Gagnon's work)

You might say, “Jesus would never support war,” because he said, “Turn the other cheek.” Of course in the context of the Sermon on the Mount he is describing what Kingdom Life looks like for a disciple, not giving military advice to the nations.

Jesus wasn’t married and so priests shouldn’t marry. Jesus said, “Tithe.” Jesus didn’t say, “Tithe.” This list is endless, but I will stop.

So, what is going on here? Obviously Jesus gives us the general model of the godly life. His words and actions from the Gospels are key to understanding God. But, if you are a Christian, why stop there. Normal, straightforward teaching of Christianity is that Jesus is the source behind the whole Bible, not just the Gospels. You may disagree with Peter or Paul or any other of the 40+ authors of Scripture but Jesus doesn’t disagree with them. Why would he disagree with himself?

Certainly we are always interpreting the Bible through our own filter and we have challenges and confusion with many passages. But overall the source of the message of Jesus is Genesis- Revelation, not just Matthew- John.