The Deity of Jesus Christ:
Now we find at once that the Bible tells us two main things. The first is that it makes many claims to the effect that He is divine; it asserts and teaches His divinity or, still more accurately, His deity. The evidence for this is voluminous and it could occupy a great deal of time, so we must just look at some brief headings at this point. You can look at the evidence and check it for yourselves at leisure; I simply want to classify it in order to make your study a little more easy.
The first evidence is that certain divine names are ascribed to Him. Indeed, altogether some sixteen names are ascribed to Him, each of which clearly implies His deity. Here are some of them. He is described as the ‘Son of God’ forty times; He is referred to as ‘his Son’ (God’s Son); God refers to Him audibly as ‘my Son’. So there in various forms is that title ‘Son’, ‘Son of God’.
Then five times He is also referred to as the ‘only begotten Son of God’. You find it in John 1:18—‘the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father’—and there are many others: a notable one is the parable of the wicked husbandman, when God says, ‘They will reverence my son’ (Matt. 21:37). The teaching there is perfectly clear, the words are uttered by our Lord Himself.
He is described in Revelation 1:17 as ‘the first and the last’, and in verse 11 of the same chapter as the ‘Alpha and Omega’, the beginning and the end. These are obviously terms of deity; there is nothing before the beginning and nothing after the end. Then Peter, preaching in Jerusalem—you will find it recorded in Acts 3:14—refers to Him as the ‘Holy One’: ‘But ye denied the Holy One and the Just.’ Again, these are terms of deity.
Take also that great term ‘the Lord’ which is used of Him several hundred times in the New Testament. That word is equivalent to the Old Testament term ‘Jehovah’, which we have already considered together, one of the highest titles ascribed to God. Another term used for Him is ‘the Lord of glory’. You will find that in 1 Corinthians 2:8: ‘Had they known it,’ says Paul, ‘they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.’ It is a most exalted term.
Then He is actually referred to as ‘God’; Thomas says, ‘My Lord and my God’ (John 20:28). He is also described as ‘Emmanuel … God with us’ in Matthew 1:23; and there is a most remarkable statement in Titus 2:13 where He is referred to as our ‘great God and Saviour Jesus Christ’. Again, another equally remarkable ascription is found in Romans 9:5: ‘Whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever.’
So there you have a number of names which are ascribed to Him, all of which are divine names.
But, second, the Bible also ascribes to Him certain divine attributes. You remember that when we were dealing with the doctrine of God we considered the divine attributes. Now you will find that those very attributes are also ascribed to our Lord. For instance, omnipotence: Hebrews 1:3 says that He upholds ‘all things by the word of his power’—no stronger statement than that is possible—and that ‘all things are put under him’ (1 Cor. 15:27). There are others also which you can find for yourself.
Then omniscience is attributed to Him: in Matthew 11:27 we read, ‘No man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.’ In John 2:24–5 you will find the same claim: ‘he knew what was in man’. It was not necessary for anybody to tell Him.
Then in a very extraordinary way omnipresence is attributed to Him also. In Matthew 18:20 it says, ‘For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I …’ In Matthew 28:20 He says, ‘And, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end …’ And in John 3:13 there is a very striking statement: ‘No man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.’ He said those words while He was on earth—the Son of man who is ‘in heaven’. And, indeed, the apostle Paul writes, He ‘filleth all in all’ (Eph. 1:23)—again, a very comprehensive statement.
Another divine attribute is His eternity: ‘In the beginning was the Word’ (John 1:1). We also have statements about His immutability: He cannot change. Hebrews 13:8 tells us, ‘Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.’ Then, of course, the Bible asserts His pre-existence. Colossians
Finally, to sum it all up, we have another comprehensive statement of His deity in Colossians 2:9 where Paul says, ‘For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.’
Then, third, we go on to consider certain divine offices which He is said to hold and to fill. First of all creation: ‘All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made’ (John 1:3). You find the same thing repeated in Colossians 1:16, and again in Hebrews 1:10. But we are also told that He preserves everything. Hebrews 1:3 refers to Him ‘upholding all things by the word of his power’. And again in Colossians 1:17 you will find that ‘by him all things consist’.
Notice also that He did not hesitate to claim the power to forgive sins. He said to the paralysed man, ‘Thy sins be forgiven thee’ (Mark 2:5). He also claimed power to raise the dead; you will find that mentioned several times in John 6:39–44, ‘I will raise him up,’ he said, ‘at the last day.’ The apostle Paul claims that He also has power to transform our bodies: ‘Who shall change our vile body [or this body of our humiliation], that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself’ (Phil. 3:21).
Judgment, too, is committed to Him; read John 5:22–3: ‘For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son.’ Again, Paul makes that claim in Acts 17:31, and you also find it in 2 Timothy 4:1: ‘The Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead.’ So the power of judgment is given to Him, and also the power of bestowing eternal life: ‘And I give unto them eternal life’ (John 10:28). John 17:2 says the same thing: ‘… that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him’.
The fourth piece of evidence for His deity is this: statements in the Old Testament which are made distinctly of Jehovah are, in the New Testament, ascribed to the Lord Jesus Christ and are definitions of Him. I shall not give you the words in full but I will give you the texts so that you can look them up for yourself: Psalm 102:24–7 (compare Hebrews 1:10–12); Isaiah 40:3–4 (compare Matthew 3:3; Luke 1:76); Isaiah 6:1, 3, 10 (compare John 12:37–8); Isaiah 8:13–14 (compare 1 Peter 2:7–8).
Now we can sum up all that by putting it like this: in the Old Testament the term ‘Lord’ is always used of God, except when the context makes it perfectly clear that it is used of a man in the sense of ‘Sir’. In exactly the same way when the term ‘Lord’ is used in the New Testament, it is always used of the lordship of Jesus Christ—that is, His deity—except when the context makes it quite plain that ‘Sir’ is intended. So we have this tremendous fact that these specific terms which are used directly of Jehovah are also used of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Then the fifth piece of evidence is the way in which the names of God the Father and Jesus Christ the Son are coupled together. There are several examples of this. Christ Himself said, ‘Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost’ (Matt. 28:19). Romans 1:7 speaks of ‘God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ’. In 2 Corinthians 13:14, in the so-called ‘apostolic benediction’, we read, ‘The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all.’ 1 Thessalonians 3:11 says, ‘Now God himself and our Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, direct our way unto you.’ And, indeed, you will find it in James 1:1, ‘James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ …’
That brings us to the sixth bit of evidence: divine worship is ascribed to the Lord Jesus Christ. He accepted such worship from men and women when He was on earth. You will find that in Matthew 28:9 and in Luke 24:52. But you get it also by way of exhortation in 1 Corinthians 1:2 where Paul refers to ‘all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord…’ That is worship. In 2 Corinthians 12:8–9 Paul tells us, ‘For this thing I besought the Lord thrice…’—it is the Lord Jesus Christ, that is quite clear from the context. In Acts 7:59 we read of Stephen, as he was being stoned: ‘And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.’ Indeed, our Lord Himself already prepared us for all this when He said, ‘That all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent him’ (John 5:23). There are other instances, also, of worship ascribed to Him, and the claim in Philippians 2:10 is that a time is coming when ‘at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth.’
And that brings me to the seventh point, which is our Lord’s own self-consciousness and His own specific claims to deity. I shall simply give you some of the references which I regard as most important, though there are many others. The first is found in Luke 2, in the incident described in verses 41–52, when He said that He must be about His Father’s business or, ‘about the things of my Father’—a most remarkable claim made when he was but a twelve-year-old boy. You get exactly the same thing at His baptism. When He went to John to be baptised, John remonstrated with Him and said, ‘I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?’ Now our Lord did not reject that statement, but simply replied, ‘Suffer it to be so now’ (Matt. 3:14–15). In other words, He accepted John’s words, and thereby acknowledged His superiority to John. And in this connection we notice again the voice from heaven that attested His deity (v. 17).
Then you find much the same kind of thing in the account of His temptation. The devil tempted Him like this each time—‘If thou be the Son of God …’—and He never said He was not. He accepted the devil’s statement and proved to Him that He is the Son of God. Thus by accepting the statement He asserted and claimed His own deity. And He did so, of course, in many other ways. In the calling of the Twelve, for instance, He was clearly asserting it, and in giving power to them, in giving them the message and the power to cast out devils, He was, again, claiming this uniqueness. And you also get it in the fact that He specifically said of believers in Him that, ‘In my name shall they cast out devils’ (Mark 16:17).
We find, too, that He made this unique claim of deity for Himself in the Sermon on the Mount. He did it by contrasting what they had heard from ‘them of old time’ with what He Himself said, (Matt. 5:21, 27, 33). And then there is the specific claim in John 8:58: ‘Before Abraham was, I am.’ Once more also I would refer you to that statement in Matthew 11:27 where He claimed unique knowledge of the Father. But in many ways the most important section of Scripture under this heading is to be found in John chapters 14–17. As you study them at your leisure, notice His claim to and His consciousness of His unique deity.
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