The Eric Metaxas Show - Erwin McManus

Episode Date: September 13, 2021

Erwin McManus returns to the program with an encouraging message based on his new book, "The Genius of Jesus: The Man Who Changed Everything."

to the Eric McTexis show with your host, Eric Mettaxas. Hey there, folks. Oh, my gosh, Albin. Are you ready? What a weekend, yeah. Are you ready? I was with President Trump. I actually disagreed with him.

I kind of got almost in an argument with him, not an argument, but I'm not going to share this until tomorrow because Sean Foyt, who was with me during this experience, I want to do this with him on the air. I'm in the Trump Hotel in D.C. right now. We had an amazing weekend here. It's very tough to describe how much happened. I had the privilege on Saturday night of speaking on the National Mall of praying for the nation. Yesterday, I prayed. Sean Foyt and his Let Us Worship Team. There was a huge team in front of the White House. I prayed there. I think they recorded it. put this stuff on social media and on my email list. And then I prayed in front of the Lincoln Memorial. This was incredible. The whole thing was incredible. So in a couple of minutes, we have Irwin McManus. He'll be my guest for hour one today. And C. L. Brian, we're doing an encore with C. O'Brien in hour two. But before we go to that, I just wanted to update everybody because

there's, well, before I tell you the exciting stuff, let me do one bit of business here. Nutermetics said they're going to extend the 35% discount if you use the code Eric until midnight tonight. It was last week. They extended it to midnight tonight. So this is the last chance. Obviously, after midnight, when you use the code Eric, you still get the 20% discount. But until midnight, you get the 35% discount. And may I recommend 35% is better than 20?

20 is good. But 35% I'd like to say it's even better. Can I quickly say if you go to our website, the Texas talk.com, it says 20%, but it's still 35%. I've asked them to change that. But if it says 20% till midnight tonight, it's still 35%. Well, you can see when you do the checkout, it'll be 35%. So if you want to stock up on Neutrametics,

this would be it, ladies and gentlemen. Can I tell you midnight tonight? That's it. So, but this is generous of them. They want to introduce our audience to their products and get you hooked. You know, it's like the drug dealers do that, except this is positive. This is nutraceuticals. So, um, vitamin C, sorry.

Yeah, there's vitamin C. There's vitamin D. There's zinc. There's magnesium. There's melatonin. There's stevia. There's all the good stuff that you would want anyway. But in this case, uh, it's 35% off.

And 50% of their. their profits. This is kind of amazing. Goes to missions organization. So we just have to say this today, last day, midnight tonight. I suppose that's Eastern time. 35% off goes down to 20 after midnight. So we have to say that. That's number one. Number two, I want to mention the launch team for my book. My book is coming out. It's called Is Atheism Dead? There is stuff in there that no one will know. You're going to say, how did I not know this? Now, I promise you this is true, because I was astonished when I discovered these things.

So I put them in the book, your faith will be strengthened because you're going to be amazed at the evidence from science. And I mean recent science, right? For the fine-tuned universe, for the idea that it's impossible for life to have emerged out of non-life randomly four billion years ago. The science now shows this. 20, 50 years ago, you could say anything you like. Today, you can't. So I think atheism is dead, but you can be the judge of that. But the reason I say all this is that we're recruiting a launch team for the book.

A launch team means if you pre-order the book, and there's a on our, on my website, Eric Mataxis.com, one of them, it's 45% off the book. So the book is like 1497. So it was almost $30 list price. Most places it's listed at that price. You can pre-order it at any price, but one of them is 1497. I can't say which. So it's incredibly cheap for a $4.00.

plus page book with color photos, glossy photos. You know, it's an impressive price, right? But here's the point. If you pre-order it at that price and you want to be on the launch team, you will get the electronic version of the book emailed to you immediately, which means you can read it now. So you'll get the book, you pay your 1497. You'll get the book October 19th or 18th, 19th,

whenever they ship it to you. But you could read it now or tomorrow or the next day. And John's Mirak has already read it. He's writing a review. He was so excited about it. I thought, if John's Mirac likes the book, my job is done because as we know, I respect John so much. John read it and became a Christian instantly. That was funny. That was funny. Write that down. That was good. We're going to keep that one. So anyway, I'm very excited about this. So I want to say you should sign up for our newsletter in case you haven't. So many people still aren't signed up for the newsletter, folks.

We're sending you pictures. We're sending you stuff. We can't do it on the radio program. So please just go to Ericmataxis.com, sign up for the newsletter. If I sound exhausted, actually, it's because I'm exhausted. What a weekend. As I said, a few days ago, I was in Fort Lauderdale. Then I flew back home to drive.

to New Jersey to meet with President Trump. We'll be talking about that tomorrow. I want to give you the details. It is insane. The story is crazy being with the president. I mean, the first thing that he said to me, when I get, he got out of the car, he came up to me, shook my hand. And he said, he says, I'm so glad finally to meet you. You know, because he's met me before, but he didn't know me and of my advocacy for him.

and talking about the election, obviously, until the last few months. And so it was such as anyway, we'll share this tomorrow. Sean Foyt and I will reprise this tomorrow. But then, of course, after that, I flew to Burlington, Vermont. Had an amazing time in Burlington, Vermont. I cannot begin to tell you. So wonderful. And I want to go back there and speak in that church.

But then I flew to Washington, D.C., where I am now going home soon. And what happened here, I will talk about it tomorrow. Yesterday I met Senator Josh Hawley. He claims to have read my books. He and his wife. And so when you hear that, you're like, what? He is an on-fire Christian. Brilliant.

He and his wife are absolutely brilliant. And they clerk for a Supreme Court justice who will remain nameless because I hate him now. And I hate him in love. But I met so many people. And what we got President Trump to say in this video is that we're launching, Sean Foyt and I will mention it tomorrow, 21 days of prayer and fasting for the country because we believe things are happening and are going to happen imminently. So I want to exhort people out there, even tonight, I'm going to fast dinner tonight, and pray for the nation, pray for the recall election tomorrow. We know there's a tremendous temptation to fraud and that the Democrats have unfortunately gone there in the presidential election.

And we really have to pray that God will do. But I'm convinced God will move if we pray. So tonight we're fasting dinner. We're going to pray. And over the next 21 days, we're going to be fasting and praying. We'll talk about that more tomorrow with Sean Foyt. So much coming up. Am I forgetting anything?

Yeah. Actually, frankspeech.com, you're on at 3 o'clock Eastern time. Oh, it's three. Okay. Every day, every single day, we're on TV. You go to frankspeech.com, and this program is going to be there. You know we're on the weekends on TVN, of course, but that's just a 30-minute show. This is every single day, an hour, frankspeech.com in the beautiful TBN studios.

Please go there. There's so much else to say, but I think we'll leave it there. I cannot wait tomorrow to give you all the update. Sean Foyt will be here. He is an amazing man, proud, so proud of him. But anyway, I'm exhausted. We'll be right back talking to our friend Irwin McManus. His book is the genius of Jesus. Amazing. So stay tuned.

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I don't know why. It just is. Erwin is a friend. He has a new book out called The Genius of Jesus. The man who changed everything. Irwin, welcome on the program. It's so good to be with you, Eric. I have to tell you, I got up this morning.

I told my wife I was coming to an interview with you, and she said, Eric Metaxix, he's my favorite writer. Now, that's a horrible thing to hear when you're a writer from your wife. Wow, wow. My wife says that about Tolstoy, and man, does it burn me up? You're not married to Tolstoy. Seriously, that is. So sweet. God bless your wife for having excellent taste. Seriously, Erwin, you write, you look,

you write a lot of books. You head up Mosaic in, where are you guys at Hollywood, Los Angeles? I always forget. Yeah, Los Angeles, but we're actually right on Hollywood Boulevard in middle of Hollywood. On Hollywood Boulevard. All right, I didn't know this about you. I was reading the notes for this book, and it says that you had committed your life to the pursuit of God and to the study of genius. What does that mean? I mean, you're really an eclectic person and I'm not surprised by this, but what does that mean that you committed your life to the study of genius? Like, when did that start and what does that look like? Yeah, it's, to me, an interesting kind of layered story because when I was around 10, 11 years old or so, maybe 12, I ended up in a psychiatric chair.

And I was really troubled. I was a straight D student first or 12th grade. And around, I think, fourth or fifth grade, they gave me all these tasks to see if I was mentally challenged. And they gave me IQ tasks. And so at a very early age, I became really aware of mental acuity and the spectrum of, you know, being mentally challenged to maybe being mentally gifted. And that, I think, in an early age, made me really aware of mental capacity. And which sent me, I guess, when I went to college, I became a psychologist. and philosopher. And in psychology, I started studying abnormal behavior, started studying psychosis, you know,

narcissism, sociopathic behavior and the... Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, you're hitting a little close to home. Back it up there, pal. I thought we were friends. Yeah, sorry, go ahead. I was just really fascinated by the phenomenon of human uniqueness, both from the negative and the positive. And so at Chapel Hill, I went to UNC Chapel Hill.

I took courses where we basically were the guinea pigs. We took every single assessment that was available at that time for assessing IQ and different kinds of mental pliability. And I've been a part of three neuroclinics over the last 20 years studying like brain capacity, brain fluidy and mental health. So, yeah, I've spent the last really 40 years of my life studying different aspects of genius and around the ideas of creativity, imagination, innovation, human capacity. And it's always been really something central to my own pursuit of understanding what we're capable of as human beings. And so I felt like these two journeys for me, searching for God, trying to understand

who Jesus was, and then the phenomenon of human capacity, of genius, of creativity, and they intersected together, mostly because I never saw Jesus on a single list of geniuses. And, you know, when you start looking at this for year after year after year, decade after decade, all of a sudden, it just becomes so obvious. Because Da Vinci is pretty much on everyone's list. He's like number one. And then you have Mozart, Picasso, you have Einstein. Then you may have others. Like, you know, you may have Hawkins or the more modern lists would have like jobs or Elon Musk.

But I would see Gandhi on list and Mohammed on list. I would see Mandela on list. And never Jesus. I even read one research study that talked about Paul being the genius of Christianity. that actually spread the movement of Christianity, but not Jesus. So I started asking myself the question, does Jesus qualify as historical genius? And that's a part of what drove me to write this book. Well, that's a fascinating question, particularly fascinating because I've never thought of that.

I love that idea. I mean, I think the reason Jesus wouldn't be on that list is because there's no metric to figure out how smart he was. unless you're kind of thinking differently. If you're thinking differently, it's obvious he was a genius. Even if you don't believe he's God, the things that he said are, some of them are just stunning, clear genius. I mean, the idea that he would say half the things he said, they are deeply profound, challenging.

I mean, you could go on and on and on. I assume in the book that's what you talk about. But how do you, you know, when you're talking about genius, what do we even mean? by genius. I mean, IQ is one thing, but I know a lot of people with high IQs who are idiots. And I'm two of those people, by the way. So what are you talking about when you say the genius of Jesus? Yeah, it's interesting when you just look at the historical etymology of the concept of genius. It comes from the Greek mindset. And the word genius and the word genie come from the same etymology. And so the ancient Greeks believe that when a person had this unexplicated,

explainable phenomenological expression of human capacity. It's not always just IQ. You know, I think a lot of times we think of geniuses who has the highest IQ, you know, who's in Mensa, who's a savant. But we also understand Mozart would be a genius because his ability to compose the hear music transformed our understanding of music or Picasso is clearly a genius, even though it's not related to his IQ. And even though his paintings are hideous, I'm just saying that for a friend.

would never say anything that unsophisticated, but his stuff is hideous. But please continue. Right, but before he did, before he could paint the hideous painting, he painted what everyone saw as beautiful paintings. Correct. And, uh, and then he translated that through a new way of seeing reality. Uh, you know, people would see Bobby Fisher as a genius because he could see the chessboard differently than anyone ever seen it. And so a lot of times genius, um, is not expressed in just physics or mathematics is expressed in so many different arenas of life. But you have to have a domain where that genius is expressed. And I think that's where the genius of Jesus is lost

because there isn't an expected domain. This is, hang on, I just want to say, that's a really cool idea. That's another idea. I've never thought of that. That's a big idea what you just said. That he didn't have, you know, he didn't write sonnets.

He didn't write, so yeah. So he just lived his life and shared things that other people grabbed and wrote down. So keep going, but that's a fascinating concept. Right, and I think this is why the genius of Jesus is so easily missed because his domain was the human spirit. That his work of art was the way his teachings, his ideas, his influence transformed what it looked like to be human. And so when you have a genius that affects the domain of humanity, it can be so easily overlooked. It's like the oxygen in the room.

You don't think about the air in the room except when there is no. oxygen and the domain of Jesus is the transformation of the human spirit now Eric during you know quarantine and during COVID everybody has like their crazy moments and I wrote this book during quarantine I was in my back house and having a conversation with myself which I do all the time which is why I'm rarely lonely and but you know how sometimes you have those conflicting voices and you're not sure which one is you but you're having an argument with yourself and and I have this thought how odd that my entire life is centers around this person who lived 2,000 years ago. Now, I know I'm not supposed to be having that question because I'm the founder of Mosaic.

I'm a pastor of a church. I'm a follower of Jesus, but I always have these questions. And I thought to myself, how odd that my whole life is centered around this person named Jesus. And I said, one thing I can't deny is that my life has been changed by Jesus. But objectively, I could argue that Jesus doesn't exist. I could argue that Jesus isn't God. But I can't actually argue that my life hasn't been changed by this dynamic that I've identified as Jesus. So I had this thought, either I've been changed by the reality of Jesus being God himself,

or I've been changed by the idea of Jesus. So I just step back and let myself go to this kind of objective process of going, all right, let's just say Jesus isn't God. isn't it even more phenomenal that a person 2,000 years later would be changed by the idea of a person? And that's actually what caused me to begin to write the book. I'm going to extricate the divinity of Jesus. I'm going to write this book as if I do not believe in Jesus. But I'm going to write this book from an experiential space where I know that I've been changed by the idea of Jesus.

And somehow this idea is so transformative that it led me to live a life. for I wanted to do good. I wanted to be a part of creating the beautiful. I wanted to live a life that expresses the true. And so I wrote this book at first going, the genius of Jesus is this. Every other genius that we've ever seen expressed in human history is not transferable.

If you spend your life at Mozart, you will not become a composer. If you spend your life with Picasso, you will not become a painter. If you spend your life at Steph Curry, you will not become a three-point shooter. Whatever the genius is, it is not transferable. and that is the most frustrating thing about genius. Wait, so I, so then I shouldn't go to the basketball camp, you're telling me,

if I can get my money back? It's probably too late for you. I just thought if I hung around with tall people, I would get taller. I bought into this nonsense. All right, we're going to be right back. We're talking to Irwin McManus. Amazing idea, amazing book. The genius of Jesus, the man who changed everything.

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They really do put their money where their mouths are. So if you're in pain from exercise or even just getting older or to the three-week quick start for 1995. Let's see if we can get you out of pain too. Go to relieffactor.com. Relieffactor.com or call 800-500-384-800-500-584. Relieffactor.com. I use it. It works. Hello there. I'm talking to Irwin McManus. You know him probably as the author of a bunch of books, The Artisan Soul, The Last Arrow, The Way of the Warrior,

a new book. It's called The Genius of Jesus, the Man Who Changed Everything. Honestly, Irwin, what you just said before the break, this is deep stuff. The idea that Jesus changed everything, that his wheelhouse, you know, was not art, it was not writing. It was not, it was humanity.

It was a way of being. that's pretty profound. And you were saying that other geniuses are not transferable, right? So if I see the genius of Mozart, that doesn't mean that I can replicate it. But you're saying that that's what's different about Jesus. Talk more about that. Right. This is to me what is so fascinating when you just look at it from a phenomenological perspective

that every other expression of genius in human history was not transferable, but the genius of Jesus is transferable. That when you actually begin to embrace the person, or at least the principles of Jesus, it begins to translate into the person that you are. And I was just looking at even from a personal level, I've been married almost 40 years, and I cannot tell you how many times my wife has said to me, what happened to you? And I think it's a really interesting question, because if you, if you, pull out of the equation that Jesus is God that he has changed my life, you still can't change

the reality of something happened to me. Something changed. I actually began to learn how to see life differently, how to engage people differently. My emotional intelligence elevated to a level that was unexpected, my ability to make wise choices, to avoid choices that are self-destructive, to create a, to make choices actually create a better world. And all of this is rooted in my, in the fact that my life has actually been built on this, and using this, this context, the idea of Jesus. And the moment I began to kind of break this to go,

wow, the genius of Jesus is actually transferable. You cannot deny this. But why is it transferable? Because in other words, see, what I'm thinking, because I'm trying to figure this out as you're talking, It's fascinating, but it seems to me that we're talking about the work of the Holy Spirit, right? And it's not just principles. I'm not just reading, you know, some great thinker or the ideas of some great thinker.

I mean, that has to play into it. But at the same time, we're touching on the divine. We're touching on something that actually can affect me and change me. But in a way, that really is supernatural. I don't think it's just changing the way I think, although that plays into it. I don't know. I mean, is there a dividing line? I don't know.

No, it changes your essence. And, you know, you almost have to reverse the argument, Eric, because what we end up doing is we believe in Jesus and then we try to live our lives better. And I think it's actually the other way around realizing that what Jesus does. And after I finished the book, my editor said, hey, could you go back and add what you really believe about Jesus so that people who believe in Jesus will know that you really do believe in Jesus? And I'm going, yeah, I'm happy to do that. And so I actually went back and refused the narrative of faith into the book because I wanted to first write the book so that Jesus stood alone as a genius. But yes, Eric, this is what I think is so compelling about the message of Jesus and the person of Jesus. When you give your life to Jesus, because now we're going back full circle, I absolutely believe and convinced that Jesus is God and that he brings transformation to our life.

But what happens is that the work, as you describe, the work of the Holy Spirit in us is actually to give us the genius of being fully human. We have lost the capacity to be human. And if you just look at it from a psychological perspective, we're the only species that goes to therapy. I mean, to me, there are other species that should be in therapy. I mean, you know, zebras should be in therapy. Absolutely. They're very conflict. Yeah, you know, platypuses.

hippopotamuses, they have such bad PR. But we're the only species in therapy because we don't even know how to be human. The reason we're in therapy is we are living beneath our essence, beneath our intention. And so we as a species who have been given the highest intention, actually the only species that can live outside of our intention. And what Jesus actually does is he doesn't just change our lives or forgive us of our sin or change our eternal death. He actually places within us a new essence so that we can begin to live our life most beautifully human. And that is a work of genius. That is a stroke of genius. Well, this whole thing is amazing. You have a knack, Irwin, for really making some things clear that aren't often that clear. And there's genius in the

way that you communicate these things, because we're all thinking around this, but you've really gone to the core here. The title of the book is, is the genius of Jesus, the man who changed everything. Now, the word genius you were saying earlier, it literally means the spirit. So that's another story. But when people say the genius, sometimes we can confuse about what that means. But it's just a word. We all know what we mean when you say the genius of Jesus.

But it is kind of confounding to try to figure out what was it about Jesus. When Jesus at age 12 says to his mother and father, you know, come to like, what are you doing here? Like, we've been walking miles and we find out you're not here and we come all the way back and you're in the temple. And he says, well, didn't you know that I must be about my father's business? And you're thinking at 12, he's already saying something that's kind of cheeky, profound, provocative, like, what does he mean?

It's, there is something, you know, if you didn't believe he was God, I think you'd have to say that, well, he sure is, uh, he. He sure is uncommon. There's not a lot of people who've lived in history. I can't think of anybody in history. Right. And what's interesting is that you just noted the very experience in the life of Jesus that's chapter two in the book.

Because chapter one creates an argument for Jesus, for genius. But chapter two is about the prodigy. They're telling me I've gone over time, Irwin. Hang on one second. We'll be right back. Hear the latest reporting and analysis on the big stories of the day. On the daybreak Insider. podcast. It's top-notch reporting from SRN News, along with the sharpest insight from

Hugh Hewitt, Mike Gallagher, Dennis Prager, Sebastian Gorka, and the voices of townhall.com. The daybreak insider podcast. It's your first look at today's top stories, available at Apple Podcast, Spotify, Google, and at Salem Podcast Network.com. Hey folks, I'm talking to Irwin McManus. Erwin, we were just talking about Jesus at age 12 in the temple and you were you're going to make a point let's uh yeah i just it's interesting that you uh you highlighted the very passage or moment in the life of jesus that's the basis of chapter two chapter one is simply called genius it's an argument for what genius is and does jesus qualify chapter two is about how there's this phenomenon of children that are prodigies and so they're

11 years old and they become masters and chasse or a world renowned violinist or you know a mathematical genius and and you can see the foreshadowing of this genius and and you can see the foreshadowing of this and you see that in Jesus at age of 12 with this extraordinary level of intention. And it's interesting that in that conversation at age of 12, it says that they were confounded by his answers, but actually right before that, says that what Jesus was doing as asking questions. And what Jesus had an incredible capacity to do is to cut through everything that was false

to get to that which was true. And it is this foreshadowing that when Jesus, came back at the age of 30, that he was here reflecting to us, revealing to us, what it looks like to be fully human. And he could cut through the falseness of religion, this falseness of a superficial spirituality, and talk to us about what our humanity was supposed to look like. And what's interesting to me about genius is whenever a person expresses their genius, it looks simple, it looks easy. And you see these strokes of Jesus with the adulterous woman in John chapter 8 where they want a stone this woman and he just says whoever's without sin cast the first stone in one statement

in one simple stroke of the brush he wipes away all the the judgmentalism and condemnation and in one moment looking at her who condemns you woman no one and it's in the second stroke removes all shame and guilt being the elegance of the genius of jesus to me is astonishing well it really is and this is something i've thought about over the years but not as intentionally so to speak you have, but it is, it's astonishing the things that he says, you think who in history has ever talked like this and thought like this? No one, there is no genius in history who even approaches this kind of thing. Jesus is completely unique in this. And when he says, you know, should we pay taxes? And he says, you know, give me a penny whose picture and

inscription is on it. Caesars will then render under Caesar the things that are Caesars and to God the things that are gods. And you're like, boom, like mind-blowing profundity. But over and over, you see that with him. And it's kind of, I think it's startling. It's a little shocking. It could be scary almost. Who is this man?

Where does he get this from? Where did he come from? You can see how the Pharisees. and Sadducees, they were really threatened by him. Yeah, and what's fascinating even is the way Jesus reconceptualizes power and freedom when he tells them, look, when someone forces you to carry their bag one mile, you carry at two miles. And just in this one moment, Jesus re-frames freedom.

You know, it's interesting when we're children, when we want to be free from our parents' authority, we never want to be free to be better. We want to be free to be worse. You know, you don't have any 14-year-old saying to his mom or dad, stop it. Would you just stop trying to make me less? I want to live a life of integrity. Don't tell me I can come home at midnight. I'm going to come home at 11.

Why in the world would I jeopardize my own reputation? We're rarely fighting for freedom to be more. We're always fighting for freedom to be less. And here Jesus reconceptualizes freedom and says, no, you always have the freedom to be more, even when people are trying to force you to be less. And you start looking at everything Jesus says, and he violates our view of reality.

it begins to transform the way we not only see ourselves, but we see the world around us. I mean, I love this in part because it's a non-religious apologetic. I mean, anybody looking at the character of Jesus from history would see some of what you're saying, and you're helping us to see farther and to try to understand who this is. why is he saying these things that just their mind blowing over and over? I mean, if you believe that the New Testament is a fiction, somebody came up with it, that person would have to be infinitely wiser and smarter than Shakespeare. Because Shakespeare does not, for all of his genius, Hamlet is like a nothing compared to Jesus.

This is just not something people often talk about. So let me just say thank you, Irwin McManus, because this is really important. I'm just so glad you wrote this. You know, Eric, on a personal level, I feel this is the most important book I've ever written, the most important work I've ever given myself to. And I have a sense that people who are open to God but have been closed to Jesus because of the way he's been communicated and expressed will have a fresh new perspective and a way of seeing Jesus in the way he needs to be seen.

And also those of us who are people of faith have underestimated what Jesus can do in our lives to who he is. And for me, it's really exciting. I've never been more compelled to share a message in my life. Well, I mean, and it makes sense that you would see these things and write about them, because that's kind of who you are, anybody who knows you and the books you write and what Mosaic is like. But I do think it's important that we try to reach people who would not say that they're Christians

and to say to them, hey, what do you make of this? Like, don't bring any preconceived notions to it, but what do you make of this? Have you looked into the wild humanity of this person? I mean, this is, it's profound. And the title of the book is The Genius of Jesus, the Man Who Changed Everything. And I think that's the coda, right, is that he changed everything. Like slavery is now been wiped out as an idea that it's okay because of Jesus and on and on and on. racism. I mean, people say like, well, racism is wrong. Where do you get that idea, pal? Where did that idea

come from? Like, you just bubbled up from the goodness of your heart? No. Yeah, even the idea that nations should care about restitution, that somehow there should be reparations for past sins, that that nation should be here for our good and to protect our freedoms and our future. These are concepts that only come from Jesus is transforming the way humans think. There's never been any conquer who thought, oh, I conquered these people. I feel terrible. I should probably give them land back. And people don't even realize that our entire view of political engagement and responsibility,

our view of power and nationals has changed because Jesus walked us for 2,000 years ago. I want to come back to that. We've just got a few minutes left. Folks, I'm talking to Irwin McManus. The book is The Genius of Jesus. Heavy, important. We'll be right back. dressin black

why you never see bright colors on my back and why does my appearance seem to have a somber tone where there's a reason for the things that I have Folks welcome back. I'm here from Texas show. I'm talking to my friend Irwin McManus, who is the author of a new book, The Genius of Jesus,

the man who changed everything. You know, Irwin, I am just about well, I'm finished with a book. It'll be coming out in October called Is Atheism Dead? Which is a kind of an exploration of science and faith, what science says about God, biblical archaeology, and then just what is atheism, what is belief, and all this kind of stuff. And my passion as yours is is always to reach people who would not describe themselves as Christians. They're just free thinkers. They're trying to figure out the world. and it's often hard to get books by folks like you're me into the hands of those people

because we have this kind of, you know, delivery system. But I think that that's what I love about you and about this book, The Genius of Jesus, it's the kind of thing that everybody could read it. Everybody should read it. Everybody should think about who is this historical figure? Maybe I don't like Christians. I don't go to church. But who is this figure because we know we existed.

We know we affected the world. And then when you start looking into it, as you do in your book, you think, has there anybody, has anyone ever lived who's like this? I mean, there's, I don't think there's anybody that even comes close. I don't think Buddha or Muhammad or Socrates or anybody is like Jesus. No, and even if you just look at how Jesus transformed human tragedy into the material from which beauty can emerge, when you look at the cross, the most cruel instruments of, of, of, murder, of death, of torture. And he takes this tragic moment of the crucifixion and turns it into history's most profound moment of sacrifice and beauty. And I mean, who could take tragedy and turn it into beauty? To me, the whole culmination of the life of Jesus was teaching us how to find meaning

and suffering, how to find joy in the midst of pain, and how to turn our most tragic experiences into the material from which we can discover our most beautiful selves. It's amazing. And again, I see it as a non-religious apologetic. You don't have to do anything except think about it. So who is this figure and where did this stuff come from? And it doesn't make sense that some writers were able to come up with this because nobody was able to come up with.

The things that Jesus says, they stop you, they blow your mind, and they make you think more deeply for years or decades about what he meant. And I just think that if you'd been alive at the time, it would have been freaky to be around Jesus. I mean, imagine when he says he looks at the temple, which is the most glorious thing that has ever existed in Jerusalem ever. And he says, you know, that everything here is going to be torn down. Not one stone will be on there. You'd be like, what is he talking about? And then he blows your mind with, oh, and by the way, in three days, I will raise this up.

You know, he's not saying that he's going to bring a new way to worship God. God won't live in the temple. He'll live in it. But, I mean, it's operating on multiple levels. And we kind of unpack it through the millennia. It's just amazing. It's just amazing stuff. I assume you deal with the statements of Jesus all through the book.

We've just got seconds left, but you can tell them excited. I do. I just tried to highlight six. different virtues that Jesus engaged in a transforming narrative where we could never see them the same again. And it's almost as if when you begin to see through the eyes of Jesus, you begin to see even reality from a new vantage point. That's the idea. It's amazing. Erwin, I'm just so grateful for you, for your mind, the mind that God gave you, and for the book and the books he write. The genius of Jesus is this book.

The author's Irwin McManus. Thank you, Irwin.