He foresaw that others might come claiming to be the Messiah; but not apparently that his own followers would be corrupted by power.
If his mind worked in a different way from ours, then it is not much good our trying to imitate him, because it is not possible. If his life was not like ours, then we can only admire him; but then he is no Redeemer, because we cannot follow him, which was the heart of his teaching. We can only imitate him, if his life was like ours. Actually it looks as if his mind was very much like ours: a triumph of hope over experience, which we all indulge in from time to time.
But the clergy would say that everyone knows that Christ’s religion is other-worldly; he said so himself at his trial. It is quite unnecessary to repeat his miracles; modern medicine does it for you. What is necessary is to get into heaven; and they hold the keys. And there is no getting away from the fact that during his earthly life Jesus was profoundly uninterested in the wealth creation of society. He simply had no concern who was to grow the food for the community to eat, provided rich women provided the money for his own needs. Maybe he was right: if a greater than Solomon had appeared, then recognising him was more important than getting in the harvest. Finally the clergy say they have kept alive the message of the resurrection; for which we must all be profoundly thankful. But Jesus was wrong, if he thought that you can neglect the harvest and community indefinitely.
This attitude, of despising the welfare of the secular community, lasted in the Church at least until the time of Marcus Aurelius, AD 160 to 180; at that time Christians would not life a finger to support the Empire. The Empire was already beginning to fail due to the pressure of the barbarians on the frontier; yet Christians refused to join the Army, which was understandable, and refused to join the Civil Service, which was not. Their conduct surely was selfish and short sighted; and it is hardly surprising they were persecuted. Civilization took a long time to collapse; but in the end it did, when the German hordes crossed the frozen Rhine 200 years later, and turned Gaul into a flaming desert. Even at the time of Aurelius the danger must have been fairly obvious: he spent most of his 19 years as Emperor on the frontier trying to keep the barbarians out. Was the saving of a few saintly souls of more value than the collapse of the Empire? The parable of the lost sheep says “Yes”! In secular terms, his Ministry was so irresponsible that there could only be one end to it; in religious terms, miracles or Divine acts of healing were necessary to validate it.
The clergy’s answer to all this is to preach about the mortal Jesus, what he said and what he did 2000 years ago, and claim he was never mistaken about anything; not about the risen Christ, and the mighty acts of power he has performed through them, the clergy. The Liturgy makes it only too clear that we are still as hopelessly sunk in sin this week as we were last! In other words, although Christ “saved” us from our sins, it is an ineffective salvation in this world; because it fails to put matters right. The Liturgy voices the somewhat presumptuous hope of sitting on Christ’s throne with him after death (see the new Easter Collect in Common Worship); which is apparently the time when his “salvation” becomes effective. And the clergy welcome the invitation to repeat Christ’s healing miracles with lukewarm enthusiasm. For them it is mostly talk, and little action in this world. Salvation is reserved for the next. And if you ask them what they have done through the power of the spirit of the God who created the Universe, they have no answer; because they haven’t done anything.
The well known healer, Harry Edwards, who flourished in the 1960s and 1970s, refused to use the word “miracles” to describe the Gospel stories; and insisted on calling them “healings”. He ends one of his books by saying that after 2000 years we are just beginning to have the knowledge and experience to appreciate that the Gospel “healings” should be taken literally! Whether he was right or wrong, he was a voice crying in the wilderness; and the Church of England regarded his claims with incredulity, as did the medical profession at the time.