I don’t know if you’ve ever heard this question from friends or family, but I have.  “Why didn’t Jesus just stay”(on Earth)?  “It would be a lot easier to believe in Him if He were still around to go and talk to.”  It makes sense if you think about it.  Being able to go and see someone would make you more likely to believe they lived(or were living).  No one alive today ever saw Abraham Lincoln(other than in pictures), but how do you know that really was a picture of Abrham Lincoln?  Maybe it was someone else pretending to be him – maybe it was all just a hoax.  Yes, you could go to his tomb, but how do you know that was really his body?  Or, to put it another way, how can you be certain Abraham Lincoln ever existed?  Well, there are a lot of books about him, as well as historical records.  It would be odd for someone to not believe that he lived and that he was President of the United States.  But you don’t know that; you never saw him.

The same arguments can be made about Jesus.  No one alive today ever saw Him while He was alive.  There are no pictures, but there were no cameras to take pictures when He was on Earth.  You might argue, “There were witnesses.”  See Acts 13:31.  In that case, someone now has to believe the eyewitness testimony of those witnesses, and they are all long since dead(by the way, the same is true of anyone who ever saw Abraham Lincoln).

Some might argue that “seeing is believing.”  Have you ever seen anything and not believed it?  Maybe a woman sawed in half by a magician.  An Elvis impersonator?  Seeing isn’t always believing, but it can certainly help.

Few people actually dispute that a man named Jesus lived in Nazareth about 2,000 years ago, or that He went around teaching people.  The two main things many refuse to believe are: (1) Jesus did miracles(because those things cannot happen); and (2) Jesus is God(and some do not believe this because they do not believe that God exists).  But if Jesus were still here in this world, He could show Himself to them, and they would have to believe, right?  He could do a miracle, and they wouldn’t be able to not believe.  He could prove to them that He really is God.

“If I could just see a miracle, I would believe.” 

Let’s see how well that worked when Jesus was here.

 In John 9:7, Jesus healed a man who was born blind.  His blindness since birth had been known by locals and his parents(9:20).  The fact that he could now see could not be disputed, but some people(in this case, Pharisees) refused to believe he was blind and now could see(9:18).  Some people just refuse to believe, and these people refused to believe that a miracle had been performed.  But what about if Jesus were here today, would things be different?  Why would they be different?  He was here before and did miracles that were clearly obvious, yet people refused to believe.  In fact, when Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, those who hated Jesus plotted to kill Jesus and Lazarus(John 11:38-53; 12:9-11).  They believed he had somehow raised Lazarus, and they wanted to get rid of the evidence.  The miracle did not create belief; it created hatred.

Seeing is not always believing.  Sometimes there are good reasons to disbelieve what we see(e.g. optical illusions, etc.), but some refuse to believe because believing would require admitting something.  In this case, admitting that Jesus could do a miracle would mean that He had power from God, and that God actually exists.  For some, that is just not acceptable.  But what about those who are not atheists?

As far as we know, the people living in and around Judea in the first century were not atheists, yet people still would not believe in Jesus.  There were occasions when Jesus would perform a miracle, like healing, and as a result many brought their sick to Him to heal(Matt. 8:16; Mark 1:32).  There were other times when He performed a miracle and people wanted Him to leave(Matt. 8:32-34).  Some believed and some did not believe . . . just like today.

“I have questions.”

While Jesus was here, a variety of people asked questions for a variety of reasons.  Some asked questions out of a genuine desire to know the truth(Luke 18:18-23).  Others merely wanted to test Him(Matt. 16:1; 19:3; 22:35).  Some who asked questions followed Jesus, but others left(Luke 18:23).  There were times when Jesus was very popular(Matt. 21:8; John 6:2), yet so many of those crowds just left(John 6:66).  After Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection, there were about 120 disciples that remained faithful to Him(Acts 1:15).  There were doubtless others who still believed in Him(to some extent), but were not following the apostles at that time.  However, these numbers had dropped well below the thousands that used to come out to see Him when He would travel from town to town.

The real question is, “Why would things be any different today than they were back then when Jesus was here?”

The simple answer is that things would be no different.  Some people are going to believe, because they are convinced based on the evidence provided in scripture.  Some people will not believe because they do not want to believe, for whatever reason they have.   I suspect that the most prevalent reason would be that believing would require them to change something about the way they live their lives, and they do not want to make that change.  Many people simply like being their own “god.”  They can decide what is right and what is wrong.  They don’t need Somebody else telling them what to do.  This kind of rebellion is nothing new; Eve did the same thing in the Garden of Eden when she decided that she would decide for herself what was best for her(Gen. 3:6).  The same was true during the time of the judges(Jud. 17:6; 21:25 – people did whatever they wished).  Times change(i.e. time passes); people do not change(Eccl. 1:10).

Would it be nice to be able to go and see Jesus with our own eyes?  Yes.  Would your faith be stronger?  Probably not.  Just look at the experiences a variety of people had with Jesus.  Some believed and some did not, even though He was right there, and He performed miracles in front of them.

If Jesus staying would cause more people to be saved, don’t you think God would have done that?  He wants everyone to be saved(II Pet. 3:9), and He would know if Jesus remaining would cause more to be saved.  If that were the case, Jesus would still be here.  But since He is not still here, that leads us to the only logical conclusion . . . Jesus remaining here would not make a difference.  It sounds unbelievable on the surface, but based on Jesus’ interactions with people when He was here, it appears more and more clear that His remaining here would NOT make a difference.

Wanting to see a miracle or wanting to see Jesus in the flesh sound like legitimate queries on the surface, but the simple fact is that some people are going to choose to believe in God and in His Son, Jesus.  Others are going to refuse to believe.  It is not up to us to try to guess which category people belong in.  It IS our responsibility to expose people to the truth, and then let them make their own choice(Matt. 28:19).