Ask five different people about Jesus Christ and
you'll likely get five different opinions.
However, one question sits at the heart of
the religion that bears His name: Is Jesus God?
And today, we're gonna answer that question.
Don't go away.
♪
Greetings, and welcome to Tomorrow's World,
where we help you make sense of your world,
through the pages of the Bible.
We're glad you're here, and today's question
is one of the most important questions you could ever ask:
Is Jesus God?
Today, we'll answer that question, and we'll also
give you an opportunity to get our free resource
Restoring Original Christianity.
Believe it or not, that is not the Christianity you'll
find in most churches.
Keep an eye on your screen for the information you need
to get your free copy.
This question about Jesus is important.
Estimates indicate around 2.4 billion people in the
world claim Christianity as their religion--almost
half a billion more than claim Islam and more than
a billion more than claim Hinduism.
Yet, even as almost one-third of the planet claims a
religion centered on the person of Jesus Christ,
many of those same people disagree on exactly who
He really was.
For some, even some claiming to be Christian, Jesus was
simply a man--a Jewish teacher in the first century, who just
happened to have an outsized impact on world culture.
The late Shelby Spong, a bishop in the Episcopal Church,
was quite famous for his stance that Jesus was not actually God,
was not born from a virgin, and was never resurrected.
Other religions claiming to be Christian teach different
things about Jesus' divinity.
Some teach that Jesus was a created being, like the angels.
Some identify Him with the archangel Michael.
Others claim that Jesus and the Devil were brothers
in the past.
And others, further, claim that Jesus and the Father
are the very same person, and not two separate
divine persons, at all.
Outside of nominal Christianity, ideas vary, as well.
Some religions consider Jesus to have been a holy man,
or wise guru, or even a prophet, but not truly
divine in the way God is divine.
Others consider Him a manifestation of God,
like an avatar, or some sort of ascended master
in the manner of new age teachings.
And then, there are those who don't think He ever
existed--as if He were a figment of the imagination,
or a fiction created in the first century to form the
basis of a new religion.
Perhaps we should tackle this question first, in the event
some of you have been infected by this pernicious lie.
There is abundant evidence that Jesus of Nazareth did,
indeed, exist.
Even if we treat the New Testament not as
Scripture, but as a mere human product of history,
like Homer's Iliad or Caesar's commentaries, it provides
abundant evidence that Jesus was a real person,
going back to within two or three decades of His life.
We even have a fragment from the gospel of John,
the famous Rylands Library Papyrus P52, that dates back
to within a handful of years after the Apostle John is
believed to have written it.
And, outside of the New Testament, a number of
secular historical records refer to Jesus and the impact
of His teachings and example in the first century.
The contemporary Jewish historian Josephus,
the Roman historian Tacitus, and Pliny the Younger all
speak of Jesus Christ as a real person--much too
early in the historical record for some imaginary
account to have taken hold so profoundly.
In fact, one of the most effective defenders of the
very real existence of Jesus Christ is New Testament
scholar Bart Ehrman.
While Ehrman has publicly declared that he does not
believe Jesus was divine, does not believe in the
supernatural, and does not consider himself a
Christian, he is just as clear that the evidence
for Jesus' existence is overwhelming.
Referring to those who claim Jesus' existence
is just a myth, Ehrman writes,
"It is fair to say that mythicists as a group,
and as individuals, are not taken seriously
by the vast majority of scholars in the field
of New Testament, early Christianity, ancient
history, and theology."
In fact, almost all scholars, secular and religious alike,
tend to agree.
As Ehrman summarizes,
"Despite the enormous range of opinion, there
are several points on which virtually all scholars
of antiquity agree.
Jesus was a Jewish man, known to be a preacher
and teacher, who was crucified (a Roman form
of execution) in Jerusalem during the reign of the
Roman emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was
the governor of Judea."
In short, those who say that Jesus never existed should be
taken as seriously as those who say the tooth fairy or
Santa Claus do exist.
Facts are facts.
And the man Jesus of Nazareth did live and walk this earth
around two thousand years ago in Judea, teaching around
the Sea of Galilee and in Jerusalem.
But is that where the story ends?
A great teacher dies in His early thirties and just
happens to have a religion founded in His name?
Or was Jesus more than a man?
Is Jesus God?
In our next segment, we dive into God's own word
to answer the question.
But first I want to give you an opportunity to request
today's free resource, Restoring Original Christianity.
Yes, one-third of the world's people claim to be Christian,
but, to be very frank, the religion that Jesus Christ
founded is nothing like the religion that the vast
majority of Christians believe and practice.
If we want to truly walk in the steps of Jesus Christ,
to live according to His actual teachings,
and to understand and obtain the reward He
actually offered, then we need to be willing to
embrace Christianity as He founded it--not the subtly
twisted version we find in the world around us.
Request your 100-percent free copy of Restoring Original
Christianity right now, and I'll be back in just
a moment to show you the Bible's evidence concerning
who exactly Jesus was.
Don't go away.
♪
For today's free offer call...
Or go to...
This clear and straight-forward resource
will help you understand this vital truth--
straight from the pages of the Bible.
If you're calling for the first time, you will also
receive a free annual subscription to Tomorrow's
World magazine.
Six inspiring issues discussing news, science,
and modern culture will help you make sense of
your world from a biblical perspective.
Call today and join millions around the world
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Call now!
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♪
Welcome back.
In our last segment, we discussed the many
different opinions about who Jesus was, and we
highlighted that, no matter anyone's opinion,
He was real--He did exist.
And the question at the heart of our discussion today--
Is Jesus God?--is either true or false.
So, which is it?
Admittedly, the idea that Jesus could be God, like God
the Father is God, is a large and audacious claim, to be sure.
And the only way to know is to let God, Himself,
reveal the answer to us.
Let the scholars and skeptics have their
opinions and debate their conclusions.
What should concern us is what God says of Jesus.
What does God's word say?
Was Jesus merely a man?
Or, perhaps, something greater than a man but
less than God, like an angel?
Or was He truly God in the flesh?
The Bible answers these questions plainly:
Jesus is God.
In fact, His identity as God was declared
long before He was even born.
In his gospel, Matthew explains that Jesus' virgin birth
had been prophesied long before by Isaiah,
"So all this was done that it might be fulfilled
which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying:
"Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a son,
and they shall call His name Immanuel," which is
translated, "God with us."
That's right: Jesus is, literally, "God with us".
The Apostle John, in his gospel account, explains
this in some detail.
Let's read it in John 1, beginning in verse 1:
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word
was with God, and the Word was God.
He was in the beginning with God.
All things were made through Him, and
without Him nothing was made that was made.
In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.
And the light shines in the darkness, and the
darkness did not comprehend it."
The "Word"--or, in Greek, the "Logos"
or "Spokesman"--is the One who became Jesus Christ.
In the event it is not clear, John specifies
a few verses later:
"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."
John is plain.
The One now known as Jesus Christ had been with God
and was, Himself, God also.
He had been with God in eternity past before Creation existed.
In fact, in His final Passover on this earth,
Jesus prayed that after His crucifixion He would
be returned to this state of glory with His
Father--back to the state of eternal co-existence
they had known before He became flesh.
We read it in John 17 and verse 5, where Jesus prays,
"And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself,
with the glory which I had with You before the world was."
Yes, existing in eternity past with the One we
now call the Father, Jesus, too, was God.
John calls Him the Word, or the Logos in Greek.
This is because He has always been the Spokesman for God,
representing the Father's will and the Father's word.
Jesus says this, in John chapter 12,
"For I have not spoken on My own authority; but the Father
who sent Me gave Me a command, what I should say and what
I should speak."
Jesus plainly knew who He was--one of the two divine
members of the God Family.
During His ministry, He made numerous statements
illustrating this--so clearly that Jewish
authorities sought to stone Him for what they
saw as blasphemous claims.
In John 8, for instance, Jesus speaks of the ancient
patriarch Abraham, beginning in verse 56:
"Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day,
and he saw it and was glad."
Then the Jews said to Him, "You are not yet fifty years
old, and have You seen Abraham?"
"Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM."
There should be no doubt about this statement.
Jesus did not say, "Before Abraham was, I was."
He said, "before Abraham was, I AM."
That otherwise ungrammatical statement is a direct call back
to God's statement to Moses in Exodus 3:14,
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.'"
The Jews of Jesus' day understood His claim
and sought to stone Him for it.
Later, He makes a similar claim of His own divinity.
We see this in John 10:
"I and My Father are one."
Then the Jews took up stones again to stone Him.
Jesus answered them, "Many good works I have
shown you from My Father.
For which of those works do you stone Me?"
The Jews answered Him, saying, "For a good work we do not
stone You, but for blasphemy, and because You, being a Man,
make Yourself God."
Yes, Jesus knew who He was, and the religious
leaders of His day understood exactly
what His claims meant.
Not only did Jesus understand who He was,
His first century followers did, as well.
And if He is anything less than God, the core beliefs,
practices, and truths of Christianity become a lie.
We'll see this in our next segment.
But first, let me give you another opportunity to request
today's free offer, Restoring Original Christianity.
Will you take a stand for the truth?
Or are the lies told in Jesus' name too comfortable?
Request your free copy of Restoring Original Christianity
right now, and we'll be back to show you what Jesus'
disciples understood about His divinity--and the
implications for us today.
♪
This clear and straight-forward resource
will help you understand this vital truth--
straight from the pages of the Bible.
Call now!
Or go to...
♪
Yes, Jesus knew who He was.
And His followers did, as well.
In Colossians 2:2, the Apostle Paul referred to
"the mystery of God, both of the Father and of Christ."
Yes, the godhead consists of the Father and Christ--
the two members of the God family.
Speaking of Jesus Christ, Paul writes earlier in
Colossians 1, beginning in verse 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.
And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist."
Such words echo what we read earlier from John 1, that:
"All things were made through Him, and without Him
nothing was made that was made."
That is a very thorough statement.
Henry Ford is properly credited with creating
the "Model T" in America, but others were the hands
that accomplished the work.
So, too, God the Father is our Creator, yet the Bible
makes plain whose hands, as it were, did the work:
those of the One who became Jesus Christ.
All was created through Him and for Him.
Jesus Christ is, in a very real way, our Creator,
just as the Father is.
Together, they are the reason that Genesis 1:26 says,
"Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness..."
Because there were two God beings speaking.
In fact, the Hebrew word translated "God" in this
passage, Elohim, is unusual for being a singular word
that is plural in form-- another hint that there
is more to "God" than meets the eye.
Paul is just as blatant in Ephesians 3 and verse 9,
where he says he seeks
"to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery,
which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in
God who created all things through Jesus Christ."
These passages and others make it clear that Jesus Christ
is not an angel, not even the archangel Michael.
Note Hebrews 1 and verse 5,
"For to which of the angels did He ever say:
'You are My Son, today I have begotten You'?
And again: 'I will be to Him a Father, and He shall
be to Me a Son'?"
And, too, in verse 13,
"But to which of the angels has He ever said:
'Sit at My right hand, till I make Your enemies
Your footstool'?"
These are rhetorical questions because the answer is meant
to be obvious: To none of the angels has God ever said this.
They've only been spoken to the Father's co-creator,
who was with God and who was God--the One we now call
Jesus Christ.
In fact, all the vital truths at the very heart of the faith
of the Bible depend on the truth that Jesus is God.
Consider...
How is it that Jesus Christ has standing to die in our
stead for our sins?
He has that standing because, as our Creator, He can take
that responsibility on Himself.
And how is it that His life is sufficient to pay for
all of our sins?
It is because, as God, His life is worth infinitely more than
all of our lives combined-- an eternal life given as the
payment for the eternal death that we've earned.
And so, our Creator became a human being, born of a woman,
to be able to die and pay that penalty.
In explaining this, the Apostle Paul, again, explains just
who Jesus really is.
Read with me in Philippians 2, where some translations don't
always communicate the fullness of what Paul is saying:
"Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who,
being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery
to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation,
taking the form of a bondservant, and coming
in the likeness of men.
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."
The New King James' phrasing here about
"consider[ing] it robbery to be equal with God"
and "making Himself of no reputation" is awkward,
and other translations take it differently.
For instance, the English Standard Version
translates verses 6 and 7 this way, saying that Christ,
"though he was in the form of God, did not count equality
with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking
the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men."
Although He existed in glory with God from eternity past,
He did not consider that something He had to desperately
cling to, but, instead, was willing to empty Himself
of His divine prerogatives and become just like us,
His creation, to serve us with His life and death.
The awe-inspiring truth of Jesus Christ--the Word,
the divine Spokesman of the God Family--is truly
humbling to consider.
He lowered Himself from glory to become like us,
all so that He might one day lift us up to join Him
and His Father in that same glory.
But understanding this profound truth about the
identity of Jesus is more than an academic exercise.
It has profound implications for our lives and choices today.
We'll discuss those in our final segment.
But before we do, let me give you one more opportunity to
request today's free resource, Restoring Original Christianity.
Everyone today seems to be looking for a cause to
throw themselves behind, but what greater cause can
there be than restoring to the world the Christianity
of Jesus Christ, Himself?
It's time for you to take your stand alongside them--
and alongside your Savior.
Request your free copy of Restoring Original Christianity,
and I'll be right back to reveal the implications of
Jesus' identity as God that many lack the courage to accept.
♪
For today's free offer call...
Or go to...
This clear and straight-forward resource
will help you understand this vital truth--
straight from the pages of the Bible.
If you're calling for the first time, you will also
receive a free annual subscription to Tomorrow's
World magazine.
Six inspiring issues discussing news, science,
and modern culture will help you make sense of
your world from a biblical perspective.
Call today and join millions around the world
who are turning to Tomorrow's World for
truth, prophecy, and hope in these confusing times.
Call now!
Or go to...
♪
When we understand who Jesus really is, it's no
wonder the Apostle Thomas, upon seeing the
resurrected Christ, called Him "my Lord and My God."
And it's also no wonder that those living under
the Family of God in the Millennial reign of the
Kingdom of God will refer to Him as
"Mighty God".
The Word, the Logos, the divine Spokesman for the
God Family willingly set aside the indescribable
glory, power, and majesty He had eternally shared
with the Father to live a perfect human life,
set us an example of righteousness, and became our
perfect sacrifice so that we might be cleansed of our sins.
Then, three days and three nights later, after His death,
He was, in the words of Paul,
"declared to be the Son of God with power according to the
Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead."
Yet, many who claim to be Christians seek to avoid
the full implications of Jesus' identity as God.
For instance, many write off the God of the Old Testament
as cruel and heartless-- unlike Jesus, who is seen
as loving and merciful.
And God's commandments are often slandered as too
restrictive and harsh.
Yet, consider--who was it who thundered the Ten Commandments
to ancient Israel on Mount Sinai and served as the Commander
of the Army of the Lord, as He called Himself to Joshua?
The Apostle Paul makes the matter clear; we see this
in 1 Corinthians 10, beginning in verse 1:
"Moreover, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware
that all our fathers were under the cloud, all passed
through the sea, all were baptized into Moses in the
cloud and in the sea, all ate the same spiritual food,
and all drank the same spiritual drink.
For they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them,
and that Rock was Christ."
Yes, it was Jesus Christ--as the divine Logos or Spokesman--
who thundered the Ten Commandments.
Consider: Exodus 33 and 34 explain that Moses saw
God from behind with His own eyes.
And the account of Exodus 24 is even more explicit:
"Then Moses went up, also Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu,
and seventy of the elders of Israel, and they saw
the God of Israel.
And there was under His feet as it were a paved
work of sapphire stone, and it was like the very
heavens in its clarity."
Note, it says plainly:
"[T]hey saw the God of Israel."
Yet compare that to John 1:18, which says,
"No one has seen God at any time,"
and Jesus' words of John 6:46,
"Not that anyone has seen the Father, except He who
is from God; He has seen the Father."
Yes, the elders of Israel saw God, but they did not
see the Father.
Rather, the Member of the God Family they saw was
the One who would become the Son, the divine Logos.
So, if it was Jesus Christ who spoke those Ten Commandments,
including the Sabbath command, should they not mean more
to followers of Jesus Christ than they seem to mean to
most self-proclaimed Christians today?
And consider, too, our ultimate destiny.
In 1 John 3 and verse 2, note what the Apostle writes to us,
"Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet
been revealed what we shall be, but we know
that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him,
for we shall see Him as He is."
If we're to become like Christ is now, and Christ
now possesses the glory He had with the Father before
the world was, then what does that say about the glorious
future existence ahead for those who await His return?
And what does it say about Jesus' prayer on His last
Passover that His followers may one day be one, just as
He and His Father are?
My friends, we are only scratching the surface.
Understanding the deity of Jesus Christ is the beginning
of tapping into the most profound truths of God.
If you're brave enough to begin tapping into those
truths yourself, I highly recommend today's free offer,
Restoring Original Christianity, as a great way to start.
And I recommend, as well, that you'll come back to
Tomorrow's World again.
When you do, you'll find Gerald Weston, Richard Ames,
Rod McNair, and me right here waiting, eager to
share with you the teachings of Jesus Christ, the good news
of the coming Kingdom of God, and what Bible prophecy
reveals about the days just ahead of us.
Until that time, take care.
♪
For today's free offer call...
Or go to...
Call today and join millions around the world
who are turning to Tomorrow's World for
truth, prophecy, and hope in these confusing times.
♪
The preceding program is produced by the
Living Church of God.
♪