Paul: Liar, Lunatic or Lord’s Apostle

C.S. Lewis made this argument famous about the divinity of Christ: Jesus is either a liar, lunatic, or he is Lord. What this means is that Jesus in the Bible claimed to be Lord. If you accept that Jesus actually claimed this, then these are the only three options for Jesus:

1. He claimed to be the Son of God, even though he knew full well that he wasn’t. He was a liar or deceiver.
2. He honestly thought he was the Son of God out of self-delusion, which makes him a lunatic.
3. Or he was indeed who he claimed to be–our Lord.

Many Christians, including myself, find this argument quite compelling, as long as you believe that the Bible accurately records Jesus’ teachings/words. Remember, Jesus didn’t write any of the Four Gospels, his followers did. This is one flaw many people find in this argument for the divinity of Jesus. They hold out the possibility that Jesus never made these claims for himself, but his followers later attributed these notions to him. However, I believe that Jesus did indeed make these claims, so the argument is solid for me.

We don’t have this problem with Paul. Paul actually wrote some letters, and those letters written by his own hands are contained in the Bible. As a result, I think this argument is even stronger for Paul than it is for Jesus. Let me lay out why I think this, and anyone who sees a fallacy in my logic, I’d like to hear it.

Some people try to pit Paul against Jesus, saying that Paul’s gospel of salvation contradicts Jesus’ gospel of the kingdom of God. For example, Paul’s gospel emphasizes that one needs to only believe in Jesus Christ as Lord in order to be saved. They would say it is hard to find such notions in the Gospels (except the book of John, which is a completely different topic). Jesus, on the other hand, seems to have a message more about how we ought to live, and if we don’t forgive, or if we don’t feed the hungry, we won’t be saved.

Much of the Church’s theology of salvation, sin, the Old Testament Law, and explanation of what the Gospel is comes from Paul’s writings. Yet, he wasn’t one of Jesus’ disciples while on earth. As a result, many scholars feel like Paul sabotaged Christianity and Jesus’ message, turning it into something that Jesus never intended. They feel that Paul took Jesus and his message, and using his own logic, ingeniously formulated conclusions and theologies that reflect more of his contemporary culture and upbringing. They would say that we must only follow what Jesus says himself (although we have already seen that Jesus never wrote anything down in Scripture himself–we are still trusting that his followers got it right).

Well, let’s see what Paul says about himself. In Galatians 1:11-12, Paul says this about the Gospel he preaches:

I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man. For I never received it from man, nor was I taught it, but I received through revelation of Jesus Christ.

Paul is claiming that his teaching didn’t come from another person, or even his own head, but that he received it by revelation. And look at the first verse in this letter to the church in Galatia:

Paul, an apostle (not sent from men nor through the agency of man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised Him from the dead)

Wow, Paul is saying that not only is his Gospel not from men, but that Jesus himself–and God the Father–called him to be an apostle. He is not giving us much room here. Either Paul was a liar, a lunatic, or he really was an apostle of Jesus Christ to be trusted with the Gospel of Jesus just as much as those who followed Him while He walked on this earth.

He goes even further with claims concerning himself in chapter 1, verses 15-16:

God, who had set me apart even from my mother’s womb and called me through His grace, was pleased to reveal His Son in me so that I might preach Him among the Gentiles…

Wow, either this guy really is a big liar, or really self-deluded, or…could this be true? He later says in this passage that three years after Jesus converted him by supernatural revelation, he met Peter and James, but no none of the other apostles. To eliminate our first possibility that Paul is lying about all these things, he says in verse 20:

Now in what I am writing to you, I assure you before God that I am not lying.

He is basically swearing by God that he’s not lying about all of this. If he is, he is a liar of such enormous degree now, that anything he writes is simply laughable, if not blasphemous to the highest degree. And if he is delusional, it’s pretty severe. In verse 24, he claims that the Jewish churches where the apostles were serving, who hadn’t yet met him but had heard of him, were “glorifying God because of me.” Then in chapter 2, verse 2 he states that 14 years later:

It was because of a revelation that I went up, and submitted to [the apostles] the gospel which I preach among the Gentiles.

Once again, he claims that it was by a revelation, not because of any human desire on his part or anyone else’s. In verse 9 of chapter 2, Paul then states:

And recognizing the grace that had been given me, James and Peter and John, who were respected as pillars [of the church], gave to me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, so that we might go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised.

Now he claims that after he explained to them the Gospel as he preached it to the Gentiles, he received the approval of the apostles who followed Jesus on earth to continue doing so, and their only request was that he “remember the poor–the very thing I also was eager to do” (verse 10).

So he is claiming what again?

1. God the Father, the One who raised Jesus from the dead, called him to be an apostle.
2. Jesus called him to be an apostle.
3. He received his Gospel by revelation from Jesus himself.
4. The Gospel he preaches is indeed from God, not his opinions.
5. Peter, James and John approved him as an apostle alongside them.
6. Peter, James and John were in agreement with his message.
7. He was called by God before he was even born.

Unlike the claims of Jesus, these are not claims written by someone else who is trying to remember what Paul said about himself. Paul is writing these claims himself. So there is no question that Paul is making these claims.

In this book of Galatians, Paul attacks those who would teach a different Gospel than the one he teaches. He warns them of the danger of straying from what he taught:

I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting God who called you by the grace of Christ for a different gospel, which really isn’t another gospel.

He is saying that if we desert Paul’s Gospel, we are really deserting God himself. Wow. And he says there is no “other” Gospel than the one he preaches. There’s only one gospel. He continues:

There re some who are disturbing you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed!

Once again, he says his Gospel is really Jesus’ gospel. And he says that even if Paul himself returns to them and changes the gospel or contradicts the gospel as it was preached to them–even if an angel from heaven were to do so–don’t believe them! Let that person or angel be accursed! Can he make it any clearer? Paul believed that his Gospel was the gospel truth. And he instructed the church to test what other people say based on what Paul taught them, because he is saying that it wasn’t really Paul teaching them, but actually Christ through Paul.

Why should it be any different today? Why shouldn’t we test the claims of Christian teachings today against what Paul teaches us is the Gospel? We should do so, unless you think he was a liar or a lunatic.

If not, he was who he claimed to be: one of the Lord’s Apostles. And his Gospel message then is that of the other apostles, because in Paul’s own words, there is no “other” gospel.

If I haven’t made myself clear that there shouldn’t be a distinction between Paul’s gospel and that of Jesus or the other apostles, I’ll let Paul speak for himself again from his letter to the church in Corinth:

Each of you is saying, “I follow Paul,” and “I follow Apollos,” and “I follow Peter,” and “I follow Christ.” Has Christ been divided? Paul was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?”

By following the Gospel, as Paul lays out, we are not following Paul. We are following Jesus. What Paul wrote didn’t come from himself–it came from God.