IS JESUS CHRIST REALLY GOD?
Yes. Jesus is equal with the Father and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one God.
While God’s church is carrying out the commission to preach the gospel to the whole world, Satan is trying to damage the work of the Kingdom by raising up and encouraging false teachers and churches. They claim to be Christian but they are not. These are called pseudo-Christian cults. Many use the Bible but so did Satan. The difference is they use isolated verses and parts of passages to support their ideas. They will use half-truths which are concepts that are only partially true and therefore, very dangerous.
Jesus warned us that in the last days there would be many false prophets and false teachers who will be very clever. They will seem to be Christian. However, their purpose is to damage the Christian faith, to dilute and pollute the true church.
One Biblical test for the validity of a teacher or a religious group is their response to the deity of Christ. Most cults accept Jesus as a man and even as a great prophet from God. But true Christians worship Jesus as very God, the creator, as well as our risen Savior and Lord. Jesus did not begin life 2000 years ago; He simply became incarnated and took on humanity to become our “kinsmen redeemer” (Ruth 3,4) and the Lamb of God. From eternity past Jesus was with God. (St. John 1:1-2)
John warned of false teachers too, and said,“Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God.” (I John 4:2)
Note that he said to test their spirit, not just their words. True Christians believe that Jesus Christ, the Savior, the anointed one from God, came in the flesh and that deity became humanity. False teachers will recognize a historical Jesus who came in the flesh but they will reject His deity.
When someone attempted to worship an angel in the Bible, the angel would stop the person and say, “No. Do not worship me. Only God is to be worshipped.” But Jesus often received worship, because He was also deity. Thomas bowed to Him and said, “My Lord and my God,” (St. John 20:28) and Jesus accepted that.
Indeed, the reason the Jews tried to kill Him is that,“…he not only had broken the Sabbath, but said also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God.” (St. John 5:18)
Jesus said, “ … he that has seen Me has seen the Fathe,….” (St. John 14:9) Jesus was not saying that He is the Father, but that He is the revelation of what the Father is like. He is the physical expression of the Trinity, the “fullness of the Godhead bodily.” (Colossians 2:9)
In Revelation 3:14, Jesus is called “the beginning of the creation of God.” The word “beginning” is the Greek word “arche,” which is the source of our word “architect.” Jesus was not created but rather, He was the “architect of creation.”
A man came to Jesus and called Him “Good Master.” Jesus replied,
“Why callest thou me good? There is none good but one,…God.”
(Matthew 19:17)
He did not say, “I’m not good,” as some might think. He was saying in essence, “how can you recognize my godly character and attributes—goodness—and still not recognize that I am God? If I were not God, I could not be perfectly good.” Jesus is very God, and very man.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (St. John 1:1)
“And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us…”
(St. John 1:14) |
