If Dawkins is correct, one might imagine the following conversation . . .
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: Let’s have another round of drinks. I’ve an idea I want to run past you.
𝐉𝐨𝐡𝐧: Sure. What’s on your mind?
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: You probably heard about the Nazarene named Jesus who was crucified yesterday. I think he could be the perfect candidate for our fake Messiah project.
𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐤: One tiny problem: he’s dead!
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: Yes, but that means we’ll control the narrative. We’ll be in charge of his reputation.
𝐌𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐰: Who would follow a dead Messiah?
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: Nobody, so we’ll begin with a resurrection myth. We’ll hire some thugs to fight off the soldiers guarding his tomb so we can get rid of the corpse.
𝐉𝐨𝐡𝐧: But a missing corpse isn’t the same as a resurrection.
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: You’re right, so we’ll have to persuade Jesus’s friends to spend the next 30 years telling everyone he’s risen from the dead, even if sticking to that story means they’ll be imprisoned or killed.
𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐤: Okay, then what?
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: Well, to make a conspiracy credible you need precise details. So we’ll invent stories where Jesus interacts with people in specific locations.
𝐌𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐰: Won’t people just disprove the stories by visiting those places and asking around?
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞 There’s no need to worry about that. We could invent a story about a synagogue ruler’s terminally ill daughter being healed, give the synagogue ruler a name, set it all in a particular place, and still no one—absolutely no one, not even the people living in that place—would trouble to fact-check. Everyone would simply swallow the story whole!
𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐤: It sounds like we’re on safe ground there. But if we want people to follow Jesus, he’ll need a message. People have been waiting for the Messiah for centuries. He’s got to be worth listening to when he finally appears.
𝐉𝐨𝐡𝐧: Good point. I’ll cook up some deep quotes.
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: Thanks, John. Mark’s right: you’ll need to put profound wisdom on Jesus’s lips that theological scholars can happily study for their entire careers.
𝐉𝐨𝐡𝐧: Not a problem.
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: Guys, it will take us a while to put these documents together. We need to get communities of people worshiping Jesus in the meantime so that when our books come out they’ll get a good reception.
𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐤: There’s a guy I know called Saul, he could help with that.
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: Saul the Pharisee? I can’t imagine him getting involved with this kind of thing.
𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐤: Trust me, he’s our man. I see him leaving behind everything he’s been trained to do and planting congregations of Jesus worshipers throughout the Roman Empire, whatever it costs him personally—beatings, shipwrecks, and the like.
𝐌𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐰: Awesome. But Luke, can you just remind me, what’s the point of all this? I mean, what exactly do we get out of this?
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: Come on, Matt, it will be so much fun. We’ll watch people being brutally martyred, and we’ll know they’ve been deceived by our dishonest fiction! What’s not to like about that?
𝐉𝐨𝐡𝐧: I agree with Luke. This is definitely worth years of effort on our part. Count me in.
𝐌𝐚𝐫𝐤: Me too.
𝐌𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐰: I’ll do it if my name comes first in all the promotional material.
𝐋𝐮𝐤𝐞: Deal. Let’s get to work.
-----
Twenty years ago, The Gospel Coalition began with an urgent longing to see the gospel of Jesus Christ remain central in the church, upheld with clarity and conviction in a world filled with confusion and noise.
As we mark this milestone, we invite you to partner with us by giving $20 a month to celebrate our 20th anniversary and help us fuel the next generation of gospel-centered ministry.
Join the community empowering gospel-centered resources for over 40M believers every year: https://pages.thegospelcoalition.org/collective
𝗜𝗳 𝗥𝗶𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗗𝗮𝘄𝗸𝗶𝗻𝘀 𝗜𝘀 𝗥𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 by Bernard N. Howard. Originally published November 7, 2015.