As C.S. Lewis wrote, the Gospels leave no gray area: Either Jesus was God Incarnate or a madman for claiming to be so. Merely being “a good teacher” doesn’t cut it.

The New Testament says that Jesus is not only the Jews’ long-awaited Messiah but the Son of God, who was sacrificed for the sins of the whole world, rose from the dead and grants eternal life to all who believe in Him. He is the second part of the Trinity comprising the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

For 2,000 years, this has been orthodox Christian doctrine. Meanwhile, Jesus‘ name has been invoked on behalf of nearly every cause, including some particularly diabolical ventures.

Today’s Progressives, for example, brazenly misquote the Sermon on the Mount as if it were the first draft of “The Communist Manifesto.” They claim that Jesus would back open borders, forced redistribution of wealth, seizure of private property and, most of all, sexual anarchy.

In early April at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), Jesus was even compared to Cuban communist triggerman Che Guevara — a fellow “martyr.” 

“As God created light — is light — Che is radiance,” said Professor Emeritus of Art History David Kunzle, as reported by Campus Reform.

During “Chesucristo: The Fusion in Image and Word of Che Guevara and Jesus Christ,” Mr. Kunzle also referred to Che’s name as a “sacred trinity of letters” and to a portrayal of Che as “a quasi-divine cosmic force.”

The real Che machine-gunned Fidel Castro’s opponents. He was not remotely like the sacrificial King of Kings.

While the presentation might be defensible as a display of how various artists have sanctified Che, Mr. Kunzle also said that Jesus was “leader of an armed guerilla struggle against Rome,” a patently false statement.

In fact, the Jerusalem crowds who had welcomed Jesus as a conquering king only days before when He entered the city on a donkey demanded His execution after Jesus refused to lead an armed rebellion against Rome.

Democrats have been working hard to spin their version of Jesus. Alarmed by millions of evangelical Christians and Catholics defecting to the Republican Party, they and their media allies have been working overtime to create a Christ who would bless their leftist politics. Cory Booker, who proclaims that “Christis the center of my life,” said State Department Secretary then-nominee Mike Pompeo in April 2018 was unfit because Mr. Pompeo, an evangelical Christian, refused to support same-sex marriage or agree that homosexuality is not “perverse.”

Pete Buttigieg, the openly gay mayor of South Bend, Indiana, boasts of being a Christian while disparaging the faith — and character — of Vice President Mike Pence. Unlike Mr. Buttigieg, Mr. Pence takes biblical sexual morality seriously.

In 2008, Barack Obama co-opted Christians by pretending to support traditional marriage during his interview with Saddleback Church Pastor Rick Warren. When asked in another interview about supporting legal recognition of same-sex unions, President Obama belittled biblical sexual morality and said of critics, “I would just refer them to the Sermon on the Mount, which I think is, in my mind, for my faith, more central than an obscure passage in Romans.” A weasel trifecta.

As president, Mr. Obama had the Justice Department attack the Defense of Marriage Act while he stacked the U.S. Supreme Court to impose a “smarter than God” definition of marriage. He celebrated by lighting the White House in the LGBTQ rainbow flag. Similarly, New York Democrats feted a law in January legalizing abortion up to birth by lighting pink the spire of One World Trade Center.

The Democratic Party and its presidential candidates, many of whom make sure everyone knows they go to church, proclaim without irony that anyone who thinks marriage requires a man and a woman are un-Christian “bigots.” Also, that pro-life people are “anti-woman.” And those who believe in legal immigration, enforceable borders and keeping men out of women’s sports and locker rooms are haters, period.

The left’s ever-expanding net has caught up none other than Jesus Christ. Regarding marriage and sex, Jesus cited God’s timeless standard from Genesis: “He who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’” (Matthew 19:4-5)

Mr. Buttigieg insists with a straight face that his unholy union with a man is blessed by God and “very conventional.”

There is a wonderful scene in the 1977 film “Annie Hall.” Woody Allen is waiting in a movie line and suffering while a conceited professor regales a woman with his knowledge of philosopher Marshall McLuhan.

A fed-up Allen pulls from off-screen the real McLuhan, who tells the pretentious poser, “you know nothing of my work.”

What would Jesus say? It might be something like: “I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!” (Matthew 7:23)

• Robert Knight is a contributor to The Washington Times.