The success of Jesus? This world or the next? (Counter-productive Christian evangelism)

It seems to me that much Christian evangelism is counter-productive - putting people off becoming a Christian, rather than encouraging them; because of the Christian having a mistaken understanding of what Jesus did; and also because the Christian is incoherent about whether Jesus succeeded in his mission, or not. 

Many or most Christians seem to have the idea that Jesus made this a better world. That the life of Jesus was therefore an inflexion-point in history - Before Jesus, bad; after Jesus... getting better. 

Such Christians (and they seem to have been a large majority, at least among writers) seem to believe that after Jesus, life started started improving - especially for Christians. 

They assume Jesus made this world a better place. 

This kind of Christian usually believes that Jesus's core mission was to set up a church; and the church's mission was to make this a better world - and that this was actually done. 

Such Christians look at history and believe that the Christian societies were better than the others. They look at modern life and perceive to their satisfaction that the Christians are the best people - that conversion to Christianity improves people, that the Christian church is a force for good in the world. 

The first problem with this conceptualization of what Jesus did, is that there are plenty of people who disagree that the life of Jesus was an inflexion point after which the world began to get better - they just don't see this; they perceive many and terrible exceptions to it.

Some people would say that Jesus made no significant difference to the world - that the world carried on much as before. Some would say that the difference Jesus made was sometimes good, sometimes bad. And same with the Christian church/ churches - a mixed picture. 

There are plenty of people who don't see the founding of Christian churches as a net positive achievement, and who do no agree that any particular Christian church has been a force for good in the world.

In a nutshell - many people feel it is just wrong to claim that the life of Jesus made the world a better place; or that the Christian church has been and is a force for good in improving human life.   

They conclude that - if making a better world including better human lives is what Christianity is about, and the "evidence" for this is the history of the world and the nature of human society today; then Christianity cannot be true; and indeed might well be a force for harm. 

A further confusion is the Second Coming of Christ. 

Many Christians don't seem to realize what a weird and unconvincing idea this is! 

It means that Jesus's life was actually a failure, or else at best a very partial success; because the Second Coming predicts that despite Jesus, and the church he is supposed to have founded; this life will either stay bad, or get so bad, that Jesus will need to come again and "finish the job". 

("Finishing the job" means, pretty much, that Jesus (second time around) will make this life and world so much better that it is perfectly satisfying in every way.)

The need to finish the job; means either that Jesus did not wholly succeed - or that he actually failed. 

This idea is strange enough in itself to many people; I mean, why on earth would not the divine Jesus do everything that needed to be done in his first coming? Why would it be a good thing to delay the necessary by some indefinite (and now very long) period?

And then there is the problem of why the Second Coming has been delayed for two millennia? 

If life on earth can be made perfect, and if doing this really was Jesus's work and achievement - then surely it ought to be made perfect ASAP - rather than being delayed, and delayed? 

The many, various, and often complex explanations for the delay in the Second Coming are very seldom convincing; such that those who conclude that this was the way things work in Christianity, almost always become impatient for the Second Coming - or believe it to be imminent. 

So far many generations have so far been disappointed in this hope or expectation. 

 

The point I have been working towards is that the above are misunderstandings of what Jesus came to do, and what he did, and the nature of his success. 

Jesus did not come to make this world a better place, neither did Jesus come to found a church that would make this world a better place. 

So whether the world was made better or worse by the life of Jesus, or by Christian churches, is not relevant. 

That's not what Jesus was about. 

Jesus came to make possible, eternal resurrected life in Heaven: he came, in other words, to offer a new possibility of life everlasting to all Men - which we call "salvation". 

 And Jesus succeeded completely this aim, his real aim. 

...Which also means that the Church is not (and never has been) essential to the success of Jesus: a church may be helpful or unhelpful for a partiucar person in attaining salvation. 

But Jesus ensured that Men's achievement of salvation was possible (although not equally easy, because Men differ) for all Men, in every situation; in all religions and churches (or no religion nor church).  

I think Christians can be, and ought to be, quite clear and simple about this - for themselves, and in interacting with others... 

Jesus's life and work was not about improving this mortal life on earth. If it had been, then Jesus failed.

Jesus's life and work was about improving the next world, the world beyond death: and in this Jesus succeeded completely and first-time around. 

(No need for a Second Coming to "finish it off - it is already finished.). 

Jesus's work was done - is done.  

Now it is up-to-us, each of us; to choose or reject the possibility that Jesus has made available.