The Heroes of the Bible?

I read an interesting article this week by Glenn Packiam in which he points out an interesting perspective on every traditional Bible "hero": they're human. While the God-inspired Bible could have been lacking in mention of your typical Sunday School story hero's sins, it isn't. Every one has a flaw.

David is not a ruddy kid with a fuzzy Jewish afro who killed the giant and ruled the nation with wisdom and strength. He is a man wrestling between a desire for vindication against King Saul and a conviction that God's authority must be respected. He is a man who lies to a priest and feigns allegiance to a wicked king. Both actions cost hundreds of innocent lives. And who can forget his scandalous affair and botched cover-up that led to murder?

The more you turn the pages of Scripture, the faster the flannel board heroes tumble. Moses, in his passion for God's people kills a man. That same impatience later leads to a disastrous disobedience that prevents him for entering the Promise Land. Noah, after saving his family from the destruction of the world, got so drunk his sons had to walk in backward to avoid seeing his naked, shameful condition. Rahab, the woman who saved Joshua and Caleb's life, allowing them to enter and eventually possess the Promise Land, was a prostitute. Peter cuts off the ear of the high priest's servant—which in today's world, might be like shooting Billy Graham's assistant in the leg! And let's not even get into his wholesale denial of the Messiah. Paul, the great apostle, had a temper that led to a few severed partnerships.

While we shouldn't be complacent or accepting of our sin, it is a real encourager to know that even those Bible greats, through whom God accomplished great things, were just like everyone else and had their own sins. But God's aim is not just to encourage us in our failures, instead the utter humanity of our heroes leads to something else.

Due to the humbling of our heroes we need a new hero; someone who we can relate to, a human like ourselves. We need someone who faced all the temptations, trials and heartaches that we faced only did it perfectly. We need someone who not only took on our humanity and temptations but also became our savior; dying for the sins of the world. We need Jesus.

"In some sense, all the other Bible stories go out of their way to detail the flaws of their main character so as to anticipate the flawlessness of Christ...Humans, not heroes, are the stuff of earth. The humanity of all other Biblical characters is intentional. In them, we see ourselves, and an example of how to surrender our brokenness to Christ; in Christ, we see our hope. In the end, this business of looking for a hero must only lead to Christ, the Savior of the world."