In 1976 Zechariah Sitchin's book The Twelfth Planet was released, with its thesis that the Gods of Mesopotamia are actually aliens from the planet Nibiru who genetically engineered the human race and were fundamental to the development of our culture. This is the moment when the "Ancient Alien" or "Ancient Astronaut" theories began to enter the popular consciousness. This theory is often used to explain the construction of the Pyramids of Egypt and other instances where ancient peoples seem to have possessed knowledge or skill which we think should be beyond them. The book of Job contains much of this kind of information. It speaks of the Earth being "hung on nothing" in contrast to ancient mythologies which imagine the world sitting on a tree or the back of an animal. It speaks of the "springs of the deep" which unmistakably refers to vents on the bottom of the ocean through which water enters the ocean from deep within the earth.
I think the Ancient Alien theory is an interesting replacement for mythology, because they both disappoint in the same way. The problem with ancient aliens is that they aren't really all that alien. And the ancient gods aren't especially divine. They are both just bigger, better versions of ourselves. There is nothing transcendent or ineffable about them. They are subject to the same petty jealousies, lusts, and betrayals as we are. But maybe there really is an Ancient Alien.
This morning my good friend Al was preaching on Job. Now in chapter one Satan appears before God and says that he has been "going to and fro on the earth, and from walking back and forth on it.” And God asks him a strange question. He says, "Have you considered my servant Job?" This seems to suggest that Satan must have been "considering" men for some reason. He was looking for something or someone. Al suggested that he was looking for the Second Adam, that is the child of Eve who was promised to break his head, in other words the Saviour. As I began to think about it I was reminded of a sermon series that another friend, Ray, preached some years ago. Ray's sermons were from the Gospel of Mark, if I remember correctly, and they dealt with the fact that although the Jews were looking for a Messiah they failed to recognize Jesus because He wasn't the TYPE of Messiah that they were, or we are, expecting. And I began to wonder if the same might be true of Satan.
Job would have been a pretty good candidate for Saviour. He was blameless and upright, he feared God and shunned evil, was the greatest of all of the people of the East, he acted as a priest sacrificing for his children to justify them before God. This is what we expect from a Saviour and I think what Satan expected too. Job later talks about all of the people he has helped and how everyone knows they can come to him to defend the weak against the strong and the poor against the rich. Job is well able to fend off Satan's attacks against him with the legendary "patience of Job" and he has deep and satisfying theological answers to every attack against him. He refuses to say anything against God throughout his whole ordeal and in the end God seems to acquit him, just as verse one chapter one does, implying that he was right from the beginning and his greatness, previously the greatest in the East, is doubled which must make him the greatest man in the world. He even obtains forgiveness for his friends for their sins. In short, everything we look for in a Saviour, Job had in spades.
I think that there must have come a day when God said to Satan, "Have you considered my servant Jesus?" And Satan must have laughed. Job had had everything a Saviour should have. Satan had seen lots of supposedly righteous men fall. The ridiculous carpenter from Nazareth really ought to be passed on to an underling tempter, a sort of Wormwood. Satan must have thought God was joking. The Messiah could not have been born in a barn. This boy was hiding from the law(or Law) his whole childhood. He had nothing. No possessions. No knowledge or training. No leadership experience. In fact He didn't even appear to have righteousness of any sort. He didn't shun evil like Job, in fact He spent most of His time at bars and parties. Despite His fondness for hookers, He doesn't even appear to have been much of a success with the ladies. He lived and died alone.
Jesus didn't have the debating skill of Job. His responses to the temptations, which Satan must have thrown at Him like a professional tennis player forced to serve to me, seem like non sequiturs. Just this blind, seemingly uncomprehending, attachment to the Word of God. When He had chances to become someone great, and more than one came His way, He fumbled the ball. His brothers couldn't understand why He didn't act like a public personality at the festivals. When He finally had a following He disgusted most, maybe all, of them with bizarre comments about cannibalism. All of the people who were so eager for a Messiah and so ready to be His loyal followers, He deliberately pissed off leading directly to His definitively unMessianic end. To die as a criminal is not the way a Saviours life is supposed to end.
In other words, Jesus is the one who is really Alien. He reacts in completely unexpected ways. His salvation could not seem more foolish to us. He resembles nothing so much as the lowest members of human society except for incomprehensible moments when He is clearly above and beyond any human being. He died friendless and yet two thousand years later a third of the human race claims Him for their Lord. His poor pitiful church has crushed the invincible Rome under its sandal twice.
Jesus Christ is truly the Ancient Alien, our incomprehensible benefactor, our transcendant teacher, the Lord Our Righteousness, in Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and righteousness. But they are hid. Hid under a poverty, foolishness, and offensiveness which defies all of our presuppositions. It is time that we stop trying to shoehorn this Jesus into our concept of wisdom and righteousness and begin to define our concept of wisdom and righteousness by the Alienness of Christ.
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