The World Needs A Savior

As I was preparing for this message, I kept coming back to the simplicity of the title. It pretty well covers the subject for today. I think most everyone would agree that the world needs a savior.

In the message today, I want to try and answer a few questions. Obviously, we'll talk about why the world needs a savior. Then, since it is pretty evident that the world needs a savior, what kind of savior is needed. Finally, we'll talk about how the savior will “save the world.” In conclusion, we'll go to the Bible and talk about the Savior of the world.

Let's begin with why the world needs a savior. Wherever we turn, we see conflict and the ravages of sin. By sin, I mean an offense carried out one person against another. For example, we see natural disasters turn into even worse tragedies because of the sinfulness of man.


The devastating earthquake in Haiti in January 2010 resulted in over 200,000 deaths and ongoing suffering as people there continue to live in camps without much needed facilities. A few weeks after the Haiti earthquake at the end of February, there was a stronger earthquake in Chile (500x stronger). Yet there were only 300 deaths in Chile. In Haiti, 13 of 15 federal buildings completely collapsed. Even the government, a recipient of large amounts of foreign aid did not build in preparation for known fault lines and risk of earthquakes.

If you compare the two countries, you find that Chile is more prosperous. So, “Haiti defenders argue that Chile can do things right, because it's more developed.” But Time magazine responded to that logic with this answer: “Wrong. It's the other way around: Chile is more developed because it's doing things right.” (Chile was under a brutal military dictatorship from 1973 to 1990, so they have had their own problems.) So if the leaders of Haiti had the opportunity, how can you possibly get people to look past their own interests and do the right things?

Even in our own country, consider Hurricane Katrina. When the levees broke, 80% of the city of New Orleans flooded during the hurricane. Did you know that 50% of the city of New Orleans is below sea level? So if no levees existed, half of the city could not have even been settled and would have been underwater even before a hurricane. Why would you build in areas that would normally be underwater?

We see economic upheaval because of the sinfulness of man. The economic crisis which still plagues us today was driven by greed across the entire spectrum of society. Government agencies, financial institutions large and small, real estate speculators and some homeowners tried to make an unsustainable system provide a short term gain.

Just this past week, we got a letter in the mail. It started off, “This is not a chain letter.” Practical wisdom point. Young people, if you ever get a letter that starts, “this is not a chain letter,” there are two things you need to know. First, it probably is a chain letter. And second, you should almost surely not have anything to do with it.

This particular letter seemed harmless enough. There were two names and addresses included, and you were supposed to send a children's book to the one on top. Then, there were two blanks at the bottom, you move the person who sent you the letter up one spot, and then add your name to the bottom. Then, you mail to six of your friends who hopefully will mail them to 36 of their friends and after a short time, you should start receiving books yourself.

What's wrong with this process? Are you really “trading” two books for 36 books? Is this magic? No, what do you call this kind of thing? It's a pyramid scheme. When the pyramid gets really big, what happens to the people at the bottom? The don't get any books because there is no one else to send the letter to. The people at the top might get 72 books, and maybe some on the first levels, but eventually, the pyramid breaks down and people who sent books will get no books. So, why is this bad. Well, one thought that comes to mind is that you are forcing your friends to give to you under compulsion. A more critical view is that the people at the top of the pyramid are stealing from the ones at the bottom because it's not sustainable. There is a very finite limit to how far these things can go.

I digress. Let's get back to the world needs a savior, but I'm not quite done with financial failures.

Entire nations and states are teetering on the verge of bankruptcy due to poor financial decision making. As nations, we plan as though everything will be good, and adversity will never come. There will always be an increase of revenue, so we can borrow today and pay for it tomorrow when we have more money. Right? We act as though bubbles always get bigger and never pop, but even children understand this is false.

I used to love to chew bubble gum when I was a kid. You may not believe this, but bubble gum used to be a lot better that it is today. At least for blowing bubbles anyway. Old bubble gum brands had great elasticity which meant you could make bubbles as big as your face. It was also really sticky, so if the bubble popped on you, it would get stuck on your skin and in your hair and make a colossal mess. When a bubble would get really big, like above your eyes, and you couldn't see your friends faces. Then, everyone would get real quiet and start giggling a little bit because they all knew what? That bubble was going to pop. So you had to time it just right before it popped to suck all the air out of the bubble and keep from getting it stuck in your eyebrows and on your nose and your chin. If it was a really big bubble though, you almost always got some bubble gum stuck on your face. Bubbles pop. We know that.

Financially, bubbles pop too, so we need to take care not to create bubbles in the first place, and if there are bubbles, we need to figure out a way to shrink them slowly, or it gets really messy. But, nobody ever wants to be the one to shrink a financial bubble or shrink spending because that means either a loss of money or a loss of services.

There are so many other ways that the world is messed up and needing a savior. We haven't touched on the wars and conflicts that are happening. I haven't even spoken about crime and abuse that happens across the globe. What of the offenses and hurts we cause each other on a daily if not hourly basis? Regardless of where you go, tragedies happen and people young and old die every day.

The world needs a savior. The world needs to be saved from itself. If it is left up to us, the people of this world are unable to live together in any kind of peace or harmony. Sure, there are times and places of relative peace, but even in those places, we see hardship and hurt, tears and despair, and everyone will face loss, grief, and death.

Death. Here is the greatest point of man's need. We all come to an end. Our lives are so very short. We are like a flower that fades. Here today and gone tomorrow. We have no idea of when our time may come. Some will live 100 years. Others only a matter of days or hours. What sorrow there is in suffering and death? Is there one who can save us from such an abrupt and tragic end?

And so, I come back to the title. The world needs a savior. Websters dictionary first definition for savior says, “One that saves from danger or destruction.” If I say, the world needs someone to save all people from danger and destruction, then I think just about anyone on the planet would agree that is a true statement. But, what kind of savior does the world need to save all people from danger, destruction and death?

This is where it gets tricky, right? Because, you're all of a sudden faced with a choice. And if each individual gets to make a choice of what they think is right, well you can get about as many answers as there are people.

The President of our country is not the savior of the world, and if you could interview all the presidents, not one of them would try to take credit as savior. But, do you have any idea what the average approval rating is for our last 12 presidents? 54%. Just a little more than half. Probably the most amazing thing to me in the statistics is that Harry Truman's highest approval rating was 87% shortly after V-E day in June 1945 prior to the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Can a president get a little respect here?

What a president does can shift their approval rating, but it never reaches 100%. I think that has to do with one thing. Presidents aren't perfect. Even though they can accomplish some great things, there will always be other failures that people still remember. Those failings can be specific events that happened while in office, or they can be part of their nature or character, who they are. Generally, we all have some bad habits or attitudes that cause enmity.

How then can we identify what kind of savior the world needs?

Lots of characteristics come to mind. The Savior must be wise because He must know how to bring about salvation. The Savior must be humble because He must be able to put the needs of others above the needs of himself. The Savior must have a reason or desire to save the world because who would take on such a task if they did not have a reason to. I think that reason is likely love. You are willing to sacrifice for something or someone you love. Love relates to humility as well because a love that is unconditional that means that you are willing to endure rejection for the sake of that which you love. The savior must have the power to achieve salvation for the whole world. How can things be set right by one who cannot speak into the need of every single person on the planet both now and in the past in both life and in death. That's more than 10 billion people! Omnipotence including omniscience and omnipresence are requirements for the savior of the world. Finally, the Savior must be perfect. If the Savior is anything short of perfect, he could be rejected on some flaw in his character or nature. A true Savior must not have any grounds on which people could reject him in truth.

This list ought to significantly reduce the pool of applicants. Is there anyone who qualifies? Anyone who claims to qualify?

I'm no expert on comparative religion. But from what I've seen and read, there are very few individuals who make a claim that they are the savior of the world. Not only that, there aren't many who make the claim that they are God, big “G”, or even a god, little “g”.

Ancient kings often claimed to be gods, little “g”. The pharoahs of Egypt come to mind. They were supposed to be earthly representatives of the sun god or the sons of Ra. One night a few weeks back, I sat down and turned on PBS, and there happened to be a show about a pharoah's tomb which had been discovered during World War II but not widely published or reported.

Everyone has heard of King Tut, and we have seen pictures of the treasures found in his tomb. The pharoah in this show was Psusennes I. He was pharoah of the lower kingdom around 1000 BC, about 300 years after King Tut. Probably the most interesting find among his tomb that you may have heard of was his silver coffin. It is one of two silver coffins found among the pharoahs' tombs.

The thing about Psusennes that was most remarkable to me was a different detail: “Psusennes' outer and middle sarcophagi had been recycled from previous burials in the Valley of the Kings through the state-sanctioned tomb-robbing that was common practice in the Third Intermediate Period. A cartouche on the red outer sarcophagus shows that it had originally been made for Pharaoh Merneptah, the nineteenth dynasty successor of Ramesses II.”

This just blew me away. I mean, I thought the pharoah's considered themselves divine. At least they claimed to be little “g” gods. But instead, they went about and robbed the tombs of their supposed divine predecessors to maintain the high standard of their burials. The upper and lower kingdoms apparently also did this for political reasons. Regardless, there is an extremely “unreligious” and disrespectful attitude in this. This is more about legacy and making yourself look good than it seems to be about the divine nature of the pharoahs. What must state sanctioned tomb robbers think about their state religion anyway?

So even among those who have claimed to be God, there is evidence that the characteristics needed in a savior are lacking.

Finally, what must this Savior of the world accomplish to “save the world.” How must this come about? When we talked earlier about why a savior is needed, there were two main problems. The hurt and offense that man causes man and then the hurt and end of man because of death. Really, we can't solve either of these problems, but we sometimes see relative peace between men. However, we will all die, so that seems like the greater need of mankind. A true savior would be one who could stop men from dying.

Why do we die? Why can't we live forever? Well, scientists would start talking about the breakdown of our cells due to age. Then there is the presence of disease which compromises life. And, there is trauma too great for the body to endure. In other words, we're frail and susceptible to any number of things that cause our bodies to stop working. Some would say that our bodies are like machines and if they breakdown beyond repair, the result is death. What sorts of things go on in medicine these days to try and break through these barriers like trauma and old age? You guys have heard about the stem-cell debate. The thought with stem cells is how can doctors make your body think that it is still young and heal itself quickly. I am amazed at how quickly children recover from injury. I am also amazed at how long it takes me to recover from injury.

The systems of your body are amazing. In fact, the atoms that make up your body are constantly being exchanged. Your cells have the capacity to make duplicates of themselves millions upon millions of times. If our bodies really can keep remaking themselves, then why do we have to get old? Well, cells don't remake themselves as good as they did when we were younger. Scientists and doctors can't really explain this. But, it's like we just aren't allowed to live forever. I think we don't question this too much because that's just the way it is and it's the way it has been.

But the savior of the world, he would know how to save us. If he were the true savior, he could defeat death. That would be how he could save the world.

We've talked about why we need a savior, we've talked about what kind of savior we need, and we've talked about how the world would be saved. I think that I have kept you in suspense long enough. I think you know where I'm going with all of this. Let's look at what the Bible says about the savior of the world.

Isaiah wrote just before 700 BC,

A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him -- the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord -- and he will delight in the fear of the Lord. He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes, or decide by what he hears with his ears; but with righteousness he will judge the needy, with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth. He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth; with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked. Righteousness will be his belt and faithfulness the sash around his waist. Isaiah 11:1-5

This prophecy is talking about one who will come. The terms I underlined there relate directly to the list earlier about the attributes of the needed savior. There are many prophecies predicting a coming savior of the world. One reference I found said there are 360 prophecies about the Savior. One of the key elements of many prophecies is that this coming Messiah or anointed or chosen one would have attributes and characteristics which would be required of the savior of the world.

Who is the one that fulfills these prophecies. It is Jesus Christ. So many of the circumstances of his life have been foretold in the Old Testament before he was born. And most of these prophecies were beyond Jesus' control. Could Jesus determine the city where he would be born, that he would go down to Egypt, and that he would return to Nazareth in Galilee all while he was an infant or young child, only 3 or 4 years old? Many of these prophecies affirm that Jesus is who he said he was. It's like an unbelievably complex address of sorts. This Savior would be born in this place and go to these places and be raised up at exactly this time and die by this certain type of execution. If you are really hungry for more, I would recommend Evidence That Demands a Verdict by Josh McDowell.

Before we finish up, I would like to take a look at how Jesus fulfills the requirement as Savior of the world who overcomes death. Our bodies don't last forever, they wear out and we die. The Bible explains why we die:

… sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned … Romans 5:12

We all sin. The world needs a savior because it is broken. People do wrong to one another, and people ignore and reject God pretending that he does not exist. What is the remedy for sin?

But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God's grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one man's sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification. For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. Romans 5:15-17

Justification means the part of us that was broken can be repaired.

What is this gift of righteousness? How do we receive this gift?

This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. Romans 3:22-24

The gift is received by faith in Jesus. We need only to trust in him for salvation from death, and he will save us.

Jesus himself said,

I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. John 11:25-26

Those words of Jesus are recorded by the apostle John. Later, John also wrote.

And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. I John 4:14

As we prepare for Christmas, there are a lot of things we have to do. I imagine that many of you have calendars or lists or some means of keeping up with all that you have to do and all the places you have to be. There are gifts to be purchased, there are cards to be bought or made or written, there are foods to prepare and decorations to place. There are pictures to take and parties to attend. There is family to visit and programs to participate in.

I happened to read a passage in Job this week, and he described it this way:

“My days are swifter than a runner; they fly away without a glimpse of joy. They skim past like boats of papyrus, like eagles swooping down on their prey.” Job 9:25-26

I hope that you can step back from the rush of the holiday, and come to the savior. He is so patient and loving and kind. The prophet Isaiah wrote

Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on him and he will bring justice to the nations. He will not shout or cry out, or raise his voice in the streets. A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out. In faithfulness he will bring forth justice; he will not falter or be discouraged till he establishes justice on earth. Isaiah 42:1-4

Jesus will not break a bruised reed. Jesus will not snuff out a smoldering wick. He is tender and gentle. If we come to him, he will receive us. Let us come to the savior of the world.