Jesus as a Salesman

"Some day...someone will write a book about Jesus. Every businesss man will read it and send it to his partners and his salesmen. For it will tell the story of the founder of modern business" (Bruce Barton).

During class we discussed this quote, and how the idea of "Jesus as a salesman" wouldn't fly today. Much of the class came to the conclusion that this is because people of any religion would not want to think of their religion as something that needed to be sold. Others said things like salesman aren't always completely honest in order to sell their product, and people would not want to think of their religion as something that was untrue in any way.

However, advertisements are used to sell a new idea, or something better about an older product. Not that they are always done in the most honorable ways, as we've seen advertisements target children in a debatable unfair ways, but they get the point across that their product is better. I do believe that Jesus did a similar thing. His ideas were new and different, and he was trying to get people to believe him and see his beliefs were good ones to follow. Of course now Jesus' ideas are not something novel, so we don't have to buy into it, we just believe it.

Similar to how Jesus "sold" the idea of Christianity, Clarence Birdseye sold the idea of a freezer. Now we wouldn't think about having a household without a freezer and refrigerator, but when it first started Birdseye needed to show people that they needed it and how it could be used. Like how Jesus' followers taught people about the teachings of Jesus.

This is not to say that Christianity is like a freezer exactly, but the way in which people believed in them is a similar process.