Franklin Graham, the son of late evangelist Billy Graham, scorched the Christian media magazine Christianity Today for claiming Jesus Christ was Asian.
On Dec. 27, Graham, 71, responded to the article from Christianity Today on X, formerly known as Twitter.
“[Christianity Today Magazine] is being criticized for their article about artists depicting Jesus as Asian—and I also have to ask why they would publish something so far off base. We don’t have to wonder or speculate about this—the Bible gives us very specific details about Jesus’ earthly lineage and where He was born and grew up,” he wrote.
Additionally, Graham stated, “We know that Jesus was Jewish” and noted that not believing or accepting the Bible as “the Word of God” puts everything “in question.”
“Guess what—we don’t get to make God in our own image. He is Who He is! We must be on guard against anything or anyone who attempts to undermine the authority of the Word of God,” he concluded.
This came after Christianity Today promoted the article Christmas Eve on X.
“Jesus was born in Asia. He was Asian. The artists in this photo essay bring him back to Asia—but not to ancient Israel,” the magazine wrote.
The magazine added, “These nine artworks proclaim the expansiveness of Christ’s kingdom.”
In the article, written by art curator Victoria Emily Jones on Dec. 18, titled “How Asian Artists Picture Jesus’ Birth From 1240 to Today” she stated, “Some may object to depicting Jesus as anything other than a brown male born into a Jewish family in Bethlehem of Judea in the first century, believing that doing so undermines his historicity.”
However, she claimed that “Christian artists who tackle the subject of the Incarnation are often aiming not at historical realism but at theological meaning.”
“By representing Jesus as Japanese, Indonesian, or Indian, “convey a sense of God’s immanence, his “with-us–ness,” for their own communities—and for everyone else, the universality of Christ’s birth,” she shared.
