Living Jesus: Learning the Heart of the Gospel

This book is ideal for anyone who wants an inspirational, fast-paced overview of the New Testament. The main thrust is this: Christianity is about the living Jesus as found in the sacraments, the scripture, the personal and communal (Church) experiences of the Holy Spirit, and the lives of the saints (who heroically apply the Good News to the specifics of their lives). Johnson provides a 30,000 feet overview of the epistles and the Gospels, with this theme in the foreground.The key challenge is to draw upon these resources that reveal the Living Jesus to live a life of holiness in your own time and place. As uplifting and educational as this book is, it will also challenge you: he is quite clear that – whatever their many differences—all of the Gospels emphasized Jesus’ profound love for the “least among us” and His self-sacrifice. To experience the living Jesus is, above all, to imitate Him in these fundamental ways.And so, How much time each week do you spend in self-sacrificing love of the least among us? In deed, not only in word? After Jesus rose from the dead, the Holy Spirit came down upon the disciples in powerful ways; today, the Holy Spirit of the resurrection can likewise animate us to continue Jesus' work on earth.Johnson always writes with vigor – his prose is energetic and brisk, opinionated but thoughtful, devout and proudly so. I read and re-read his books and look forward to re-reading all of them again.

I am a pastor and read this book while doing background work on a Bible study for high school students, and I think it is outstanding. Johnson writes with a scholar's insight while continually pointing to the practical aspects of what a disciple's life looks like. His overall thesis is that Christ is not a dead, quasi-historical figure, but is the Lord and Leader, alive and well in the Church and world today. In the sacraments and the Scriptures, the proclamation of the Church and the lives of her saints, He makes Himself known and experienced.LTJ is my favorite biblical scholar alive today, and this book has cemented that opinion. I think that laypeople, especially college students would benefit from reading this book. Yet pastors and scholars will find something in it beautiful and beneficial as well.I disagree with reviews that state Johnson is a "fundamentalist." That's just silly; he is, rather, a believing, orthodox Christian in the Catholic Church and so he writes for others who want to deepen their relationship and "learn" from the Living Jesus who still speaks today...

Luke Timothy Johnson picks up where his, The Real Jesus, left off. His main premise is that we worship a living Jesus of the present, not a dead and static Christ of the past. This sterling truth is forgotten by those whose searching for the historical Jesus often reflect their prejudices going in more than anything else. He demonstrates this admirably. Learning Jesus is more than an academic exercise. While grateful for the work and insights of the academic community, I have often found that the academy is less often about searching out the truth than discovering a novel approach which, of course, they rush into print to share with the world (which all too often is reduced to the 'world' of other academics). Johnson's anchoring of learning Jesus to the community of believers and tradition begins to look less like the impingement of academic freedom it is often represented to be, for tying it only to the academy has its own problems. Worth reading and pondering from an excellent scholar presenting a truly alive Jesus.

Luke Timothy Johnson does a masterful job at creating a book that engages the reader's mind and heart. Though this book is written from an ex-priest and still retains much Catholic tradition, the Protestant reader can also enjoy and gain insight from this well written text.This book is not written for the skeptic or the Christian revisionist, like his previous book "The Real Jesus." Instead this material will penetrate the heart of the believer. As he wonderfully points out, "To be a Christian means to assert that Jesus is alive, is indeed life-giving Spirit." This book reminds the Christian that we should be learning from a living Jesus. To often, we look at Jesus as a piece of history. This is a wake-up call to Christians everywhere.We are to learn from Jesus from great Christians, the church, and the New Testament. I find Dr. Johnson's book to be honest and forthright and appreciated his candor about the church and himself. This is a must read!

This book is more or less a sequel to Johnson's REAL JESUS, which exposes the fallacies of many New Testament scholars who enjoy pop culture status on various cable channels by extolling the idea of a "Jesus Movement" that seeks to interpret the gospels from a purely historical perspective. In this articulate, logical, and compelling book, Johnson moves past the arguments of the Jesus Movement and demonstrates how a divinely inspired New Testament focuses on a risen, living Christ. Johnson's book is a dynamic blueprint for understanding Christian living in the twenty-first century. In flowing prose, he shows us the diversity and richness of the gospels that have been seen one-dimensionally for such a long time. Johnson's scholarship is of the highest caliber and is used here to show what is truly at the heart of the Christian tradition.

This book is a thoughtful defense of the Bible as the unique and authoritative witness to Jesus as the Christ. Johnson carefully outlines the many different ways of portraying Jesus that are provided by the writers of the New Testament. There are differences in perspective, but all work together to help us to know the real Jesus.Johnson also defends the church in rejecting efforts of Marcion and Tatian to streamline the New Testament in ways that would present only one point of view. The diverse witnesses to the character of Jesus help us to develop a relationship with him.

Knowing that Professor Johnson is a Roman Catholic, an ex-Benedictine monk and a thoroughly enjoyable academic lecturer, I really hoped that this book would clarify for me the reason why highly intelligent people (like the Professor) believe that (i) a man was a god; (ii) he died a horrible death because his father - also a god - created humans and infected them all with an "original sin" that needed atonement and (iii) this dead man/god came to life again after being crucified, walked around for a while then ascended "bodily" into "heaven" ..... because bared down to essentials, this is surely what the resurrection is claiming?Sadly Living Jesus did not answer my questions and I actually found the details of Professor Johnson's private life -- how he renounced his monastic calling and married a divorcee with six children, and the fall-out from this radical (and I'm sure emotionally courageous) action -- far more interesting than the theological arguments for accepting the "resurrected Jesus".Once again I'm inclined to believe that all pro-resurrection arguments will only convince those who don't really need convincing anyway.