John Clayton Quotes

Could the one whom Christians worship be merely a mythological creation, or is he real? These questions have exercised many great minds and have been the dominant issue in New Testament studies during this century.

The story of Jesus is very fascinating. It still has such a tremendous power, even after 2,000 years! We don't really know if he existed as a historical figure.

Whenever the names of the disciples are enumerated in the New Testament, St. Peter's stands at their head.

The New Testament is not a historical document.

I think if you place Jesus firmly in the historical context... you can make very educated hypotheses and guesses about how he lived.

Re-telling the Christian story is the essence of my vocation. That has been going on since the Evangelists in one form or another.

The word 'Christianity' is already a misunderstanding - in reality there has been only one Christian, and he died on the Cross.

For nearly 2,000 years, most people assumed that the only sources of tradition about Jesus and his disciples were the four gospels in the New Testament.

I won't say that the papers misquote me, but I sometimes wonder where Christianity would be today if some of those reporters had been Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

What makes you a Christian is whether or not you really are in accord with biblical theology and whether you know Jesus Christ as your Saviour.

The New Testament is of full authority and open to the understanding of simple men as to the points most needful to salvation.

During my life I have heard many sermons on the Resurrection. I can recite the events of that first Easter Sunday. I have marked in my scriptures passages regarding the Resurrection.

I am a Christian in the only sense in which Jesus wished any one to be; sincerely attached to his doctrines in preference to all others.

When I wrote 'The Da Vinci Code,' I told myself that this story of Jesus makes more sense to me than the story I read in the Bible.

I never heard the Gospel until I was 18 years old. Jesus Christ... the name was synonymous to me as the Tooth Fairy or Santa Claus.

The New Testament is an invaluable book, though I confess to having been slightly prejudiced against it in my very early days by the church and the Sabbath school, so that it seemed, before I read it, to be the yellowest book in the catalogue. Yet I early escaped from their meshes. It was hard to get the commentaries out of one's head and taste its true flavor. [...] It would be a poor story to be prejudiced against the Life of Christ because the book has been edited by Christians.

It can not be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians, not on religions, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ!

I look upon all four Gospels as thoroughly genuine, for there shines forth from them the reflected splendor of a sublimity proceeding from Jesus Christ.

About six years ago, Life magazine ran an article on the historicity of Jesus and I was floored to find that they conceded the only evidence we have for his existence is in the Gospels. But don't take Life's word for it. In his book The Quest of the Historical Jesus, the most definitive study that's ever been done on the subject, Albert Schweitzer admitted that there isn't a shred of conclusive proof that Christ ever lived, let alone was the son of God. He concludes that one must therefore accept both on faith.

Certainly I have no faith in Jehovah, although I think it quite likely that Jesus Christ, as a preacher and a wise man, did indeed exist.

Nothing but Christianity will give you the victory. Until a man believes in his heart that Jesus Christ is his Lord and Master... his course through life will be neither safe nor pleasant. My only regret is that I was so long blinded by my pleasures, my vices and pursuits, and the examples of others that I was kept fr...om seeing, admiring, and adoring the marvelous light of the gospel.

Odd, the way the less the Bible is read the more it is translated

The Old and New Testaments contain but one scheme of religion. Neither part of this scheme can be understood without the other.

The Atonement of Jesus Christ is real; it brings immortality to all and opens the door to eternal life. The gospel of Jesus Christ is again on the earth. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is true and living.

Scholars have found that references to Christ in Josephus were deliberately planted in the translation long after it was written, and the Latin references to Christ are not to a person of that name. In the Dead Sea Scrolls there was mention of a particular "teacher of righteousness" who had characteristics somewhat like those attributed to Christ, but it might easily have been someone else.