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The Simple Truth about Jesus
One day Jesus asked His disciples, “Who do men say that I am?”
It’s a question that each of us must answer, and how we view Jesus is no small matter. In fact, the identity of Christ is the foundation of our faith. Jesus claimed that he was the rock the church is built upon. No structure can be strong unless it’s built on a solid foundation. For this reason, we must understand who Christ is, for if our understanding is flawed, the gospel won’t truly be understood. If our understanding is flawed, our faith will also be flawed. Let’s begin with Luke 9:18-22
18 And it happened, as He was alone praying, that His disciples joined Him, and He asked them, saying, “Who do the crowds say that I am?”
19 So they answered and said, “John the Baptist, but some say Elijah; and others say that one of the old prophets has risen again.”
20 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered and said, “The Christ of God.”
21 And He strictly warned and commanded them to tell this to no one,
22 saying, “The Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised the third day.”
In Matthew’s gospel, we are told that Jesus said that Peter was blessed, for flesh and blood didn’t reveal this to Peter, but the Father in heaven has done so. The true revelation of Christ comes from above.
Who is Jesus? His identity was in dispute during His lifetime, and it’s still in dispute among the world today. I say, in dispute, but the dispute is among those who do not know Him. To those who know Christ, that identity is revealed to us through the Holy Spirit, and through the scriptures (which is also by the Holy Spirit[1]). “Who do you say that I am?” It’s a question every person must answer in their heart.
Some are thrown by the fact that Jesus didn’t openly proclaim His identity. In John 10:24, the Jews confronted Jesus and said, “If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.” Since Jesus didn’t come straight out and say, “I am the Christ,” critics of Jesus point to this as evidence that Jesus wasn’t the Messiah.
Actually, Jesus did make this claim on several occasions,[2] just not before the Pharisees and religious leaders until his trial.
We can see the reasons why He was indirect in His public statements. The religious leaders made it plain that they wanted an opportunity to accuse Him. In fact, even Jesus’ indirect answers were close enough to make His identity known. When this was the case, the leaders tried to stone Him for making Himself equal to God.
Jesus veiled His identity to the masses until after He declared, “My hour has come[3],” referring to the crucifixion.
In the passage above, he instructs His disciples not to make Him known, and then gave the reason. Because of His identity, He would be condemned and crucified. This came to fruition when He stood before the Sanhedrin to be tried. The high priest said, “I put you under oath by the living God to tell us if you are the Christ, Son of the living God.”
When Jesus answered and said He was, the Sanhedrin declared, “We have heard it ourselves. He has spoken blasphemy and is worthy of death.”
His acknowledgment that He was the Christ (or Messiah) was the evidence that convicted Him to die. This is why Jesus didn’t openly declare Himself to the world until it was time for Him to fulfill His purpose of dying for man’s redemption.
I say all of this so there is no confusion. Jesus never denied that He was Christ / Messiah, nor did He ever deny that He was God. Quite the opposite, as we shall see. He did veil this truth to the masses and only revealed this to His disciples, but even when He chose to veil His identity, Jesus still didn’t deny it.
Is Jesus God?
To the world, the answer is ‘no’. But to the disciple of Christ, those who believe the scriptures, the answer must be ‘yes’. Before we look into the New Testament, let’s go back to the Old Testament and see how Christ was identified. Let’s begin with a passage that describes the attributes of Christ. Look at Isaiah 9:6
6 For unto us a Child is born, Unto us a Son is given; And the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
This is God’s proclamation to Israel of their coming Messiah – Christ. The first thing to take note off is how God distinguishes the child from the Son. The child is born, but the Son is given. What does this distinction mean? Hebrews 13:8 says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” He remains unchanged from the past, to the present, to the future. Add to this Philippians 2:5-8
5 Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus,
6 who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God,
7 but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men.
8 And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.
Though He existed in the form of God, Jesus humbled Himself, took on the likeness of men, and submitted Himself to die on the cross. Notice that it would not have been considered robbery to be equal to God. This next passage is strikingly clear in light of what Jesus explained about Himself. God declares that He alone is our Savior, and there will never be more than one God. Isaiah 43:10-11
10 “You are My witnesses,” says the LORD, “And My servant whom I have chosen, That you may know and believe Me, And understand that I am He. Before Me there was no God formed, Nor shall there be after Me.
11 I, even I, am the LORD, And besides Me there is no savior.
Not only is there one God, but there will never be another God formed. Add to that, the Lord declares, “Beside me, there is no Savior.” This passage foretells of the words that Christ would declare to the leaders of Israel. John 8:24
24 “Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.”
Jesus is quoting God’s declaration to the people in Isaiah. They must believe that Jesus is ‘He’ as foretold in the Old Testament. Let’s look at another passage in the Old Testament that testifies to Jesus’ divinity. Look at Isaiah 44:6
Thus says the LORD, the King of Israel, And his Redeemer, the LORD of hosts: ‘I am the First and I am the Last; Besides Me there is no God.
There is something we must note regarding the English translation of the Old Testament. There are several Hebrew words that are translated into ‘lord’. However, when you see the word LORD in all caps, it indicates that this word was translated from the word ‘Jehovah’. Jehovah is ONLY used for God. This is true when Jehovah is translated into GOD. All caps means the word is YHWH or Jehovah. Nothing but God, the creator of all things, is called Jehovah/YHWH.
Knowing this is important when looking at the promise of Christ in the Old Testament. In Isaiah 44:6, the LORD / Jehovah refers to himself as the King of Israel. Not only that, He declares that He and His Redeemer, who is also Jehovah, LORD of hosts are one God and beside Him there is no other God. A similar declaration is made in Isaiah 48:16-17
16 “Come near to Me, hear this: I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; From the time that it was, I was there. And now the Lord GOD and His Spirit Have sent Me.”
17 Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, The Holy One of Israel: “I am the LORD your God, Who teaches you to profit, Who leads you by the way you should go.
This is a prophecy of the coming Christ. As with many prophecies, it is told in real time as though God were declaring it as it unfolded. Another example of this is Psalm 22. This prophecy in Psalms is told from the perspective of Christ on the cross, and is spoken as though it happened during the crucifixion.
In the passage from Isaiah 48, the Redeemer, who is GOD, is sent by the Spirit and the Lord GOD. Then the Redeemer declares, “I am the LORD your God.”
In this passage we see that Christ, the Redeemer is being declared as Jehovah, and we also see the future declaration of Jesus when He calls Israel before He is crucified. The Lord GOD (God in all caps, Jehovah) and His Spirit have sent Me (the Redeemer). So Jehovah and His Spirit (the Holy Spirit) are sending Jehovah (the Messiah) to His people to teach them the way they should go.
In Isaiah 7:14, the virgin birth is foretold, and God said that the child shall be called Immanuel. Immanuel simply means, “God with us.” That’s exactly what Jesus became at birth, God with man.
We can see through the Old Testament that God is sending God to be the Redeemer. He also makes it clear that there is ONLY one God. Confusing? It can be, but hopefully it will be clearer by the time you finish this chapter.
The point you need to understand at this time is that God himself has declared that the Messiah is God, was sent by God, and that God alone is our redeemer.
The New Testament Christ
Let’s look at Christ’s divinity in the New Testament, beginning at Colossians 2:8-10
8 Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ.
9 For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily;
10 and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.
The purpose of this passage is to warn God’s people not to adopt their view of Christ from the world or human philosophy (including religion), but to understand that in Christ dwells the fullness of the Godhead. What does that mean? The word ‘godhead’ in this passage is the Greek word ‘theotes’, which means, the state of being God. We’ve already examined the Old Testament, where God himself refers to the coming redeemer as Jehovah. The following New Testament passages will continue to affirm this truth.
Before we move ahead, let’s first examine a phrase that seems to confuse some people. Look now at Colossians 1:15-18
15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
16 For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him.
17 And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.
18 And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence.
When this passage is looked at in its full context, there is little to be confused over, yet that word ‘firstborn’ causes some to get caught up into a human way of thinking. We have already seen that God foretold that the child would be born, but the Son would be given. He existed before the world began. Look at the words of Jesus just before his crucifixion in John 17:5
And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.
We’ll dig into this a bit later, but first let’s understand the word firstborn. Normally, the firstborn son was just that – firstborn. By birth right, the firstborn son had honor over his brothers. The firstborn received a double inheritance, carried the family blessing, and took the spiritual leadership over the family. As in the days of the patriarchs, the firstborn became the prophet whom God revealed Himself through, and even foretold what would occur in the later years of Israel.
There were times when the honor of the firstborn was given to someone who wasn’t first. We’ve already looked at one example in the previous chapter. Esau was the firstborn, but the honor of that birth right was given to the second, Jacob. Esau sold his birthright (firstborn position) to Jacob, and then God gave the blessing of the firstborn to Jacob as well. Then the promise came through the second son as though he were the firstborn.
Another example comes from Jacob’s children. At the end of Jacob’s life, he adopted two of his grandchildren to be named among his inheritance. An interesting thing happened. Manasseh was the older child, yet Jacob blessed Ephraim and declared him as the firstborn. Not only was he exalted over his older brother, but he was exalted over his uncles as well. He was named among them as if he were a brother, and declared to be the firstborn. In Jeremiah 31:9, God called Ephraim the firstborn tribe in Israel. In special circumstances, the firstborn was given to someone outside of the physical birth order.
I say all of this to point out one important truth. Firstborn is used to identify honor, and not always the order of birth. Therefore, calling Jesus the firstborn over all creation does not mean Jesus is a created being. It simply means that He has preeminence over all creation. In fact, the passage in Colossians explains that Jesus is declared as the firstborn for this very reason – that he might have the preeminence.
Also note the rest of the information in these passages. “He was before all things.” “In Him all things consist.” Though he was born in a manger two-thousand years ago, He existed before the world began. The Bible also makes it clear that Jesus is the creator of the world. We’ll look at this further in a moment. Before moving on, notice that Jesus is called the firstborn over all creation, and then called the firstborn from the dead. Not only does He reign over all creation, but He is the first to rise in a glorified body.
The Bible says that all who are in Christ will be raised like Him – in a glorified body. Though Jesus raised two people from the dead during his ministry, both remained in a corrupt body, still under the curse of sin. When Jesus died, He was raised incorruptible, and He gave this as an example of what we hope for and the promise of things to come. He is the firstborn from the dead, and we will be raised in that same eternal life when all things are fulfilled and we enter the Kingdom of Heaven.
Creator of the Heavens and Earth
Jesus is called the Creator of all things. Some have taught that Jesus was first created, and then created all other things, but this contradicts the scriptures. God created all things. Look at Genesis 1:
1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
Each step in Creation is performed by God. God said, “Let there be light.” “Let there be land in the midst of water.” He then called plants, animals, and all other areas of creation into existence. Throughout the Bible, God attributes everything created to the work of His own doing. Look at Isaiah 45:18
18 For thus says the LORD, Who created the heavens, Who is God, Who formed the earth and made it, Who has established it, Who did not create it in vain, Who formed it to be inhabited: “I am the LORD, and there is no other.”
Who created all that we see? According to the Bible, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formed by God – the LORD – Jehovah. Then God needed to make sure we understood that He alone is God and there is no other. Jesus is not a god, the Father a god, and the Spirit a god. There is only one God. Remember the passages in the Old Testament we looked at earlier? When Jehovah declared that he was sending Jehovah to be our Redeemer, He affirmed that even though Jehovah was sending Jehovah, there was still only one Jehovah.
This can be confusing. The problem is that we serve an infinite God. The Bible contains all that God has revealed about Himself, but not all that God is. A limited mind can’t grasp an unlimited God. To put this into perspective, think about numbers. Can you picture the highest number possible? Of course not. Pick any number, and you can always add more to it. Divide any number, and you can always divide it more. Eventually, any avenue of numbers becomes incomprehensible. If we can’t comprehend something like the infinity of numbers that we use in everyday life, why are we surprised that we can’t comprehend an infinite God?
Some things have to be taken by faith. I can look at known evidence and reasonably conclude that something is true without having to see all the evidence. Science does this all the time. It’s called ‘theory’. In scientific theory, nothing is proven. We prove certain attributes true or false. In reality, little in science can be proven true. When something doesn’t fail, science draws conclusions based on the assumption that what wasn’t proven false will continue to pass future experiments. Yet even those logical assumptions are often proven false as knowledge increases and then the theory is updated with a new assumption.
With God, we have certain truths he has revealed about Himself. These show us what we need to know in order to trust his word and walk by faith, but it never will fully reveal the infinite God to the human mind. It may not make sense to my mind for God and His Spirit to send God as my redeemer, but that is something God has declared about Himself. I can see the Father as he has been revealed in scripture. I can see the Son. And I can see the Holy Spirit. These all reveal something about God, but they don’t reveal all that God is.
I know this is a bit wordy, but it’s important for you to understand this, for there are people who deny the divinity of Christ based solely on the fact that they can’t understand how He can be God, and the Father be God. It doesn’t matter if I understand. It matters that God has declared this to be true. Look now at John 1:1-14
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 He was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.
4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.
5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.
…
10 He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.
11 He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him.
12 But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name:
13 who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
In the Old Testament, God declared that He, Jehovah, created the heavens and the earth and that there is none beside Him. He alone did this. Now we see that Jesus is that creator. Colossians declared this truth, and now we see the book of John making the same declaration. God entered the world He created, and the world did not receive Him. Just as the people of Jesus’ day did not recognize Him, people in this era also do not. But if you receive Him, God gives you the right to be called by His name and adopted as His child.
There are so many scriptures that identify Christ, that we would need a separate book to explore this topic more fully. For the sake of time, I’ll wrap up this subject with the words of Christ as He equates Himself with God. Read through the book of John and notice how many times the religious leadership called Jesus a blasphemer for making Himself equal to God. On one occasion, Jesus introduced Himself as the Son of God. The Pharisees were outraged because they said this was to claim equality with God. Jesus did not refute their interpretation. In fact, He repeatedly affirmed it.
Christians are called ‘children by adoption’, but Jesus is called the only begotten Son of God. As the Bible states, He is the word made flesh; He was in the beginning with God, and He is God[4]. On one occasion, Jesus is explaining how the Old Testament pointed to Him.
As the Pharisees disputed with Jesus, He made the claim that Abraham rejoiced to see His day. The people scoffed at such an idea that a man who was not even fifty could claim to have seen Abraham, who had been dead for thousands of years. Jesus then made a statement that was unquestionably a claim that He was the God of the Old Testament. John 8:57-59
57 Then the Jews said to Him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?”
58 Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM.”
59 Then they took up stones to throw at Him; but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.
Without knowing the Old Testament, it’s easy to miss the significance of Jesus’ statement. The significance was not lost on the Jewish leaders, for they immediately rushed to get stones with the intent of executing Jesus for claiming to be God.
To understand what Jesus was saying, we need to go back to the second book of the Old Testament, Exodus. Israel was in bondage and God called Moses to go into Egypt and declare their coming deliverance. Now let’s look at Exodus 3:13-15
13 Then Moses said to God, “Indeed, when I come to the children of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they say to me, ‘What is His name?’ what shall I say to them?”
14 And God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” And He said, “Thus you shall say to the children of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ “
15 Moreover God said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the children of Israel: ‘The LORD God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. This is My name forever, and this is My memorial to all generations.’
This is what Jesus is referring to, and the Jews fully understood this. There is no other way to interpret the phrase, “Before Abraham was, I AM,” other than that Jesus was claiming to have existed before Abraham, and to have done so in the form of God.
There is much more that could be said about this topic, but it’s sufficient to say that the scriptures affirm that Jesus is Jehovah, creator of all things, and God of the universe. The Old Testament identified the coming Messiah (or Christ) by declaring God / Jehovah would visit his people as their Redeemer. Jesus identified Himself as God. The apostles called Jesus God and the creator of all things. In the Old Testament, God calls Himself the First and the Last, the only God and declares that there is no other God beside Him, nor will there be any afterward. In Revelation – which by the way is actually called the Revelation of Jesus Christ – Jesus calls Himself the First and the Last. His glory was veiled on earth, but the Book of Revelation gives a glimpse of Christ in His revealed glory.
In the revealing of the glory of Christ in Revelation, God identifies Himself as the beginning and the end, first and the last, the one who was dead, and behold is alive forevermore[5].
As stated at the beginning of this chapter, a false Jesus cannot save. If Jesus was a glorified man, He still cannot save.
The message of the gospel is this: God is just, but redeemed mankind by paying our penalty in His own body so we could be reconciled to Him, righteous and pure because He died for us. This is the miracle of love. A passage that adds to this is Acts 20:28
“Therefore take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood.
It is God who purchased our redemption with His own blood. This is yet another testimony that God was in the form of Christ, redeeming us by shedding His own blood on the cross.
In the next chapter, we’ll examine the amazing gift of being transformed from corruption into a new incorruptible spiritual nature. It’s all because of grace – the unmerited favor of God – and was given to us through Christ by His sacrifice on the cross, where He bore the penalty of sin in His own body.
As you can see, there is no shortage of information on this topic. The Bible says that God establishes His word by two or three witnesses. God fulfills this requirement for the testimony concerning the divinity of Christ. Jehovah in the Old Testament declared that the coming Messiah would be Jehovah. Jesus declared Himself as the Messiah and the I AM of the Old Testament. The writers of the New Testament also declare that Jesus is God, the creator of all things.
Jesus is Immanuel, God with us[6] and He is God, who purchased our redemption with His own blood to reconcile us to Himself. Jesus is the embodiment of God’s love and grace toward you.
[1] 2 Timothy 3:16
[2] Matthew 16:16-17, John 9:35-37, John 4:25-26, Matthew 23:10, Mark 14:61-62
[3] John 12:23
[4] John 1:1
[5] Revelation 1:11, 1:17, 2:8, and 22:13
[6] Isaiah 7:14, Isaiah 8:8, Matthew 1:23