A Matter of Validation

Leonardo da Vinci’s painting entitled ‘Jesus Saviour of the World’ has sold at auction in New York for £341 million. Sixty years ago the same item sold in London for a mere £45! Back then, the painting was judged by experts to be a mere copy.

When Jesus walked the earth 2000 years ago, the religious and legal experts heard what Jesus said and saw what he did. However, they reckoned him to be a pretender. Yes, they were waiting for the coming of a Saviour (or Messiah) for their nation, but Jesus simply was not ticking what they considered to be the right boxes.

Now, over the period of a few decades, the experts have come to recognise the genuineness of Leonardo’s painting ‘Jesus Saviour of the World’; they have given it their validation so that it has become the most costly painting ever sold. Question: Has the Jesus of 2000 years ago ever been similarly validated, or were the experts of the day correct in saying that he wasn’t the genuine article?

The validation that Jesus was indeed the promised Saviour/Messiah comes from God himself. After Jesus had been put to death as a blasphemer and fraud, God raised him to life three days later. He had never done that before, nor has he done it since. God would not have performed such a feat for someone who wasn’t the real deal.

At Christmas, Christians celebrate the arrival of Jesus the Saviour of the World. The Jews were expecting someone to come and save their nation, but God has a bigger agenda. It is one that encompasses not just people of a single nation, but people from all nations, hence Jesus is known as Saviour of the World.

He has come to save men and women from living lives where God simply isn’t in their picture. He tells us not to settle for some image of God that has no more life than paint on a canvas. Instead we are told to acquire the genuine and most costly article which is Jesus himself and for this we don’t need money. We can receive him as our saviour in the way prescribed by the traditional carol In The Bleak Mid-winter: ‘What can I give, poor as I am? ...what I can, I give Him; give my heart.’

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