12.11.07
Jesus is… God
Before the start of the Fall quarter, we had trouble scheduling speakers for Real Life and I wrote out a talk for the first week. Luckily, we were able to schedule someone last minute and I never spoke but I still have my notes from that talk. The notes from that talk are below.
Welcome! Hello. My name is Perry Poteet. I am a fourth year biology major here at Wright State. I am also one of the leaders for Campus Crusade for Christ. How was your guy’s summer? How many people here are freshmen? Great! Thanks for coming, we are glad to have you and hope we can get to know many of you better. Some of you might be here because you heard we were going to be serving ice cream. Don’t worry, this is not a church and I am not a pastor. I will keep my talk short, 45 minutes or so.
Here at Real Life we are starting a ten week series on who Jesus is. Jesus is the most important figure in all of history. There have been more books written about Him, paintings painted for Him, and songs written for Him that any other figure in history. Our calendars are divided by his life (BC and AD). As such, there are an endless number of opinions on who Jesus is. We will be using these next few weeks to see what the Bible says about who Jesus is and what this means for your personally.
This first week, we will be looking at Jesus as the eternal God. I wanted to start out by looking at four verses that speak to the truth of Jesus as being the one and only eternal God. If you have a Bible you can follow along. If you don’t, you can follow along on the overhead.
- John 1:1, 14
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
This is probably the verse most people think of when thinking of Biblical verses that speak of Jesus as God. Jesus is given many titles in the Bible; one of which is “the Word”. In fact, we will be looking at this more specifically week 7. John writes that the Word, Jesus, was eternally with God because Jesus is God. He goes on to define the Word as Jesus by saying that He came to earth in the form of a man who is Christ incarnate. So, the Bible says clearly that Jesus is God. I want to take a few more minutes to build a case that this is taught emphatically throughout the scriptures.
Let’s look at an additional verse that speaks of Jesus as being God a few chapters later in the Gospel of John:
- John 20:27-28
Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.” Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!”
Whenever someone is doubtful they are spoken of as being a “doubting Thomas”. Thomas was a disciple of Christ who was with Jesus throughout His entire earthly ministry. After Jesus was resurrected, Thomas was the only disciple who doubted that Jesus had been resurrected. Jesus came to Thomas and had Thomas feel the scars of his crucifixion to prove that He had been resurrected from the dead. Upon realizing the reality of Jesus’ resurrection, Thomas proclaimed Him as “My Lord and my God!” Jesus took this praise and didn’t rebuke Thomas for his proclamation. As one who never sinned, Jesus’ accepting of such praise showed Himself to be God.
So far we have looked at two verses that speak of Jesus as being eternal God but these are what other people say about Jesus. With the many opinions out there, it is only fair to allow Jesus to speak for Himself.
- John 8:48, 52, 58
The Jews answered him, “Are we not right in saying that you are a Samaritan and have a demon?” The Jews said to him, “Now we know that you have a demon! Abraham died, as did the prophets, yet you say, ‘If anyone keeps my word, he will never taste death.’ “I tell you the truth,” Jesus answered, “before Abraham was born, I am!”
This is one of the most profound verses of the entire Bible. To understand its significance you need at least a little bit of background in the Bible. In the Old Testament God appeared to the prophet Moses in the form of a burning bush. God commanded Moses to free His people, Israel, from captivity in Egypt.
Moses, not knowing who he was speaking to, asked the voice from the bush who he should say sent Him. The response is recorded in the book of Exodus:
- Exodus 3:13, 14
Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple.
The name “I AM” is the chief and most holy name of God. It translates as Yahweh (YHWH). This name was so holy the Jews of the Old Testament refused to write or speak it for fear of blaspheming God’s sacred name. When Jesus called Himself “I AM” He was calling Himself Yahweh, the eternal God. Why do you think the Jews wanted to stone Him to death? Claiming to be God was seen as blasphemy and was punishable by death. The Jews knew that Jesus was claiming to be God and tried to kill Him for it.
I hope you are convinced from the truth of scripture that Jesus is the eternal God. But what does this mean to you personally? If you walk away from here only with head knowledge that Jesus is God, you have not been benefited in any way. There are two things you must know to make the knowledge of Jesus as eternal God relevant to your life. First, every person in this room is a sinner and second, you are all going to die. Pleasant, huh? Let’s take a few minutes then to discuss these two points and why Jesus as God relates to these two points.
First, everyone in this room is going to die. It is the only assurance in this life. As if that wasn’t bleak enough, no one known when they will die. You could graduate from college, get married, have kids, a house and a career and a long life before you die or you could leave this meeting tonight and die in a car accident. Either way, you will die.
Second, sin effects what happens after we die. The Bible says that everyone “has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). Additionally, the Bible says that “if we say we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:8). If we say we haven’t sinned then we are lying which is a sin which confirms what we were denying in the first place. Additionally, the Bible says that the punishment for sin is Hell. It has become unpopular to talk about Hell and that is frankly unfortunate. Imagine I knew that you were going to leave here and get into a fatal car accident but didn’t tell you because it was unloving to do so. How much more unloving would it be for me to not tell you?
As Christians, we believe that every person who is living in their sin is on a path to Hell, a place of eternal unending pain and torment. This is bad news! Luckily, there is also good news. Jesus has provided a way to escape our seemingly inevitable destination.
This is how knowing Jesus as God relates to you personally. The punishment for sin is death and death in sin leads to eternity in Hell. Jesus Christ is God! Meditate on what that means for a minute. As God, Jesus has existed before time and will continue to exist beyond. The Bible says that everything that was and ever will be created was created by Jesus and for Jesus. This God, humbled himself in a way we can never fathom. Picture Jesus enthroned in Heaven, lording over all the universe from the stars in distant galaxies to the thoughts of every man.
This God humbled Himself to take on the flesh of a human. He was born to a teenage girl in a poor back country barn. He lived a life of seclusion working a blue collar job of swinging a hammer in a carpentry shop. He began His earthly ministry at the age of thirty and went around healing the sick and teaching about Himself as the Messiah, the savior of sinners for three years. He lived a perfect life free from sin. He never committed any error or fault. The Bible says He was tempted in every way we are but never sinned, no adulterous thought, no disobedience to His parents, no fault in any way. He was killed by the religious leaders of His day for saying that He was God.
The good news is that when Jesus died his death freed us from our own death. When we die, we are guilty of our own sin. Jesus though never sinned. Jesus was crucified on a Roman cross and died as a sinless man. The Bible says because He never sinned that He did not have to pay the penalty for His own sin. Instead, the death of Christ as a perfect sinless sacrifice paid the debt owned for our own sin. Three days later Jesus rose from the dead. As eternal God, He rose from the grave and defeated death.
Guys, see this truth. As God, Jesus was able to live the perfect sinless life that we were unable to do ourselves. Jesus Christ is the eternal God. He knows every hair on your head, he knows the number of pieces on sand on the beach, He holds the universe in its place and He so loves you that that laid that aside to come to earth and die in your place. The Bible says that if you turn away from your sin, called repentance, you can be saved from your sin and eternal punishment in Hell. You must place your faith in Jesus as trust Him as your Lord and Savior. I don’t know what your sin is: alcohol, lying, sexual. Have you taken advantage of a girl? Stolen? Cheated? It doesn’t matter. Unless you turn from your sin and trust Jesus as your Savior in faith then you will remain in your sin which inevitably ends in Hell.
Jesus says that He is “the way, the truth, and the life”. I ask that tonight you turn from your sins and trust Jesus as your redeemer from your sins. He is the risen Lord who reigns in Heaven. He will be returning to judge the living and the dead. What will you say when you stand before Him in judgment? Will you say that you were a good person, that you did good things, that you refused to humble yourself before Him? To all of these responses the Bible says that Jesus will say “depart from me to the place of weeping and gnashing of teeth”. In contrast, the Bible says that for those people who trust Him as Lord and savior Jesus will say “well done good and faithful servant, come into the joy of your master”. What will Jesus say to you on that day? We are dealing with matters of eternal consequence, do not allow time to pass on such serious matters.