Description
They Saw Jesus is a fascinating book detailing modern day accounts of face to face encounters with Jesus Christ. These are not just spiritual experiences of Jesus’ presence but actual physical encounters where dramatic and dynamic conversions, healings and deliverances took place.
One encounter that I include is of a very good friend in Aberdeen, Scotland, who was a follower of Jesus for more than 80 years. His life was dramatically changed when, as a teenager, he was seriously ill in hospital and one night he saw Jesus at the foot of his bed. He said he knew then that he would make a full recovery. He did and he lived a full and active life with a vibrant Christian faith until he died aged 93.
Other accounts detailed in this book are of those who have had “face to face” encounters with Jesus. Some are well known leaders others, like my friend, are relatively unknown but the encounter has been equally real and life changing.
The criteria I have used to include and assess such encounters have been:
They have a biblical framework and are consistent with Scripture
Something significant took place because of the encounter which acts as another source of verification.
The person or persons involved in the encounter exhibit the character and ministry that help to substantiate what they have said.
Such vision and apparition experiences in which people believe they encounter Jesus Christ have been reported among Christians for two thousand years. This should not surprise us because Jesus rose from the dead and is alive. As I have researched this book I have come across hundreds of such Christic encounters and what is interesting is that there are so few similar experiences claimed for the leaders of other religions. Indeed, as you will read those from such faiths were crying out for God and it was not Mohammed or Krishna or Buddha who appeared but Jesus Christ. This should not surprise us either because they did not rise from death, they are dead. While many religious leaders rose to greatness only Jesus rose from the grave.
I am well aware that there is much confusion and counterfeit when it comes to investigating such experiences and encounters. Therefore I have been careful in using the above criteria in evaluating the accounts mentioned in this book. I do not claim that each one is inerrant but we need to realise that if there is a counterfeit it is only because there is also the real thing. There are also a number of appendices at the back which deal with theological and historical issues in more detail.
I have been blessed beyond measure writing this book, I pray that you will be equally blessed reading it and if you don’t yet know the living Jesus as your Lord and Saviour you will do so before you get to the end.
