19 - The Deity of Jesus Christ, Part 1

Well, welcome to the Striving for Eternity Academy. This is a ministry of Striving for Eternity. You can get information about Striving for Eternity at strivingforeternity .org. I am your instructor today, Andrew Rappaport.

I'm glad to have you with us. If you have gone to the website at Striving for Eternity and picked up a syllabus, now would probably be a good time to take it out. If you have not, well, why waste time?

Go to the website, store .strivingforeternity .org, and order your syllabus. They're $25 each. Not going to break the bank, but they're good to have. You get all the notes, you get the fill in the blanks that we're going to go over, and you get a handy reference so you can quickly go back to your notes and the notes that we give you and follow along, and that way you can have it ready when you need it.

This is a lesson you're going to need. We are in our School of World Religions. In that school, we're specifically in a class on an introduction to the major Western religions. This class, this lesson, will be on lesson number nine, Jesus Christ.

As we talk about the different world religions, we've been looking at different doctrinal things as we've gone through. Now, you know from the first part of this class, we've been doing most of the discussion of the different religions, what they believe in six doctrinal areas.

Their authority, their view of God, their view of Jesus Christ, their view of man's sinfulness, their view of salvation, then lastly, their view of end times. These are all in my book, What Do They Believe?, which you can also get at the website, strivingforeternity .org.

But now what we're doing is giving a defense. Now comes a part of what is, this is part two, of how do we as Christians defend against these. So though we had a lesson on Christianity, what Christians believe, this is really kind of looking at those six doctrines and giving a defense from the scriptures and why we hold to them and how they differ from all of the world religions.

So that's how we're breaking this down. Now, as we look at this lesson, boy, is this an issue that there is lots of conflict over. Now, if you paid attention in the last two classes, when we dealt with the doctrine of the Trinity, the triune God, you know that especially the last class, when we talked about the Trinity, there's a lot of issues.

You have Jehovah Witnesses deny it, Muslims deny it, Jewish people deny it, Mormons confuse it. So you end up having, you know, Roman Catholics, they get it right, just saying. So, you know, but you see with most of those other world religions, when it comes to the Trinity, really messed up, okay?

Now really, when we do look into the definition of the Trinity, where did it start historically? Well, it started on the lesson we're going to look at today. This becomes the big issue, okay? This is why this one's going to be really foundational.

Because when you understand this one, understanding Trinity is a lot easier. See, basically, in the first century, we're going to look at this later on, but in the first century, nobody had any doubt in the first century that Jesus claimed to be God.

What they had trouble with is that He claimed to be a man. And so you end up having this scenario where what we see is that in those early centuries, there started to be some discussion on the nature of Jesus.

Who exactly was He? And so they ended up recognizing they had to give some definition. Once it became clear that Jesus was God, once that became established, and then the Trinity, understanding the Holy Spirit was God, wasn't a difficulty, okay?

So this is where, when we look at the Trinity, this is where we kind of start. We start with this one of where Jesus is God, okay? So we're going to start there and go through this. Now, if you have your syllabus, I have there for you in your notes.

Although it has been difficult for men to understand throughout the ages, the Scriptures teach that Jesus Christ is fully God, that's your first blank, fully God, and fully man. That's your second blank, okay?

And that's really important to understand. The Scriptures teach that He's fully God, fully man. He's got two natures in one indivisible oneness, okay? And so what we have there is, when we're looking at this, is that we see these two natures, one being, okay?

One person. So it is usually that people have difficulty with this doctrine. See, they can't understand this. How could Jesus be fully God and fully man? Even in the first century, they thought it had to be one or the other.

And that's why so much of them, they accepted the deity, they had trouble with the humanity. And nowadays we have trouble with the deity, but have no problems with the humanity. It is usually one of the two natures that are attacked or misunderstood.

Either His humanity or His deity, one of the two usually come under attack. It's important to realize that Jesus Christ has two natures. One fully man, one fully God. Part of the reason for the confusion is that Jesus Himself speaks from His own limitations.

That's your blank there. His limitations of humanity, even though He was God. We will see this. Let's take a look at some of them, but Luke 22. When we look at Luke 22, verse 43, it says, Notice how He needed strengthening.

That's human, but God doesn't need strengthening. So you see, it talks about His human limitation. John 4, and also John 19. What we see there, if you look at this, John 4, verse 6, and also what we have is John 19, 28.

So let's look at John 4, 6, and you see here, Jacob's well was there, so Jesus wearied as He was from the journey. Sitting beside the well, it was about the sixth hour. He wearied Himself. He was tired, but God doesn't get tired.

But as a man, He does. John 19, 28 says, After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said to fulfill Scripture, I thirst. Again, do you notice how He has this limitation? It's evident that there's a limitation going on.

So, with that, when we look at it, it adds to the confusion. Now, we're going to go through and look today at His deity. I hope to finish this today. We'll look at His deity and then His humanity. We're going to focus most of the time on His deity, but we have to understand that in the first century, Christ's deity was not questioned, but His humanity was.

I mention this several times because this is something we don't understand. In His day and age, with Gnosticism and Platonic thought, they thought anything material, this desk, that's evil. That's bad.

Humans are material. They're bad. Anything spiritual is good. Jesus was good, therefore He couldn't be material. They thought He had the appearance of a man, but was not a man. And that's why so much of the New Testament has to emphasize that Jesus came in the flesh.

He came as a man. Now, think about that. If no one questioned His humanity, why would there be so much focus on Him being the Son of Man, the essence of man, having come in the flesh? Anyone would be like, well, duh.

Of course He came in the flesh. He's a man. Right? That's right. That shows us that what they questioned was His humanity. His deity, they just state as if it's expected. Now, it is mostly His deity in today's day and age that gets questioned, and not His humanity.

And that's the flip. And I think so many groups focus on His humanity because they see so much of the New Testament arguing for His humanity. But the only reason the New Testament would argue for His humanity is if it was in question.

And so what we have to do is not ignore the fact that there is an argument made for His humanity, but His deity is also clear, and that's why we say He's fully God and fully man. It's important to see that the Scriptures clearly teach that Jesus Christ is both God and man, the God-man.

All right? So before we begin looking into this, I want to play a short video just so that you can see. This is actually me on the open-air preaching at a college campus. Someone asked the question of why Jesus must be God.

Why was Jesus God? And so this may give some background to see the importance of why this issue is such a vital issue. So let's give a listen. Why did Jesus Christ have to be God? That's an essential thing of Christianity.

It's what makes Christianity different than every world religion. This is why it's essential. Every single one of us have violated God's law. God says that all liars will have their place in a lake of fire which burns with brimstone, which is called the second death.

There's only one of two ways to pay an eternal fine. We can pay it for all of eternity, or an eternal God can pay it once in time and have it count for all eternity. Why? Because He is an eternal being.

It's because He's eternal that that consequence that He paid counts for eternity. Otherwise, me personally, I don't even know how many lies I've told. So for me to pay for my first one, I'll never finish paying the first one to pay the second one.

That's one of the reasons why I can't pay it for someone else. Maybe one of you would be a perfect person and never violate God's law. And you'd say, well hey, I'm perfect. But you would only be able to pay for one other person's penalty in time because we're not an eternal being.

God being an eternal being can pay an eternal fine that would count for all of time. That's why Jesus Christ had to be God. But He couldn't be just God. He also had to be like you and I. He had to be a man.

We can't go to a judge in a human court and say, Your Honor, I know I got six months in prison. My poodle will do my down time. The judge is going to go, it doesn't work that way. But one of us can pay a fine for someone else.

But we have to be human. Jesus Christ was God Almighty, became a man for one purpose. He did that so that He could die in our place. Being God, He could pay an eternal fine. Being a man, He could pay for you and I.

That is why we can have salvation. That's what makes Christianity different than any world religion. Because every other world religion is based on works that we would do. But our works will work against us.

God will actually judge us by a book. And the name of that book is the book of works. There's two books that God has in heaven. The book of the Lamb's book of life and the book of works. Our name is in one of those two books.

Either we have been forgiven by God because He's made the payment of sin for us. And our name is in the Lamb's book of life. Or our name is in the book of works. And it's those very works that we're going to be judged by.

We often think our works are going to count for good. But here's a way of thinking of it. If you had a father who takes his son fishing. And his father says to him, hey, I don't want you to go to the lower part of the jetty.

Because it's dangerous down there. But the son, being a typical son, doesn't believe dad. He says, you know what, I really want to get some fish for dinner. I want to be able to provide for my family.

I'm going to go to the lower part of the jetty. When he gets down there, an alligator whips its tail and knocks the kid in the water. The kid doesn't know how to swim all that well. Dad dives in the water.

He grabs the son. He starts swimming up to shore. And all of a sudden, the alligator rips both the father's legs off. But with all of the father's energy, with everything he has left, as he's sitting there bleeding, he grabs his son to shore.

And his son says, hey, thanks, dad, but I really want to make sure I have some fish for dinner. I'm going to go back to the jetty. That would be disrespectful. Why? Because the father just gave his life to save the son.

And the son's saying, but look at the works I'm doing. That's what we're like when we stand before God and say, but God, look at my works. I know you're God Almighty, and it took your death to pay the punishment for us.

But in doing that, we sit there and say we want to add our works to it. We diminish what he has done. That's why Jesus Christ had to be both God and man. So in that clip that you saw there, there was an argument for why Jesus had to be both God and man.

Both parts. This was an issue in the early centuries the early church fathers argued over. If Jesus Christ was not God, then we couldn't pay the eternal fine. If he was not man, he can't pay a fine for men.

This is what makes Jesus unique, as I said in there. You see, he was fully God and fully man and had to be. So let's take a look at this first lesson, or this first part of this lesson, which is the deity of Christ.

The deity of Christ. Now, as we look at the deity of Christ, in the first centuries after Christ, people did not question the deity of Christ, like I mentioned. However, after the Christianization of the Roman Empire, there became a struggle.

And this struggle ensued basically because what you had was you had a man, Constantine, who just declared the whole Roman Empire Christian. And that's not how people become Christians. And since that time, many cults have arisen that have questioned the deity of Christ.

Why? Because, you know what? The enemy doesn't have to get everything wrong for you to not be saved. Just one thing. If you don't believe in the deity of Christ, hey, you have a wrong Jesus. You're not trusting in the right Jesus.

You're not trusting in a God who can actually save you. So, with that, the Scriptures explicitly prove that Jesus Christ is God by His names, He has titles of God, His works, and His attributes. And we're going to look at that.

Now, I'm working on a book that's going to go into way more detail than we have in this class. Next class, I'll probably play a little clip that just goes a quick one-minute overview. But we have several classes.

If you are doubting that the Scriptures are clear on this, please go to our systematic theology classes. And in those classes, go through the lessons where we talk about the deity of Jesus Christ. And you're going to see where we have three classes that go into detail on this to show the importance.

So, it is a very important subject. It literally is the difference of eternal life or death. So, let us start with the names of Christ. The names of Christ. Does Jesus have the names of God? Alright? So, this is the idea that we have to keep in mind.

Names had significance back then. So, when I'm saying a name, I'm really saying a name or a title, like a nickname, an attribute. Names had more significance than they do, at least in America today. So, if you look in your syllabus, when the Scriptures refer to someone by name, it indicates much more about the person than how to refer to them.

It's more of a title sometimes. And it indicates their position, their personality, their character, things like that. When comparing the Old and New Testament, there's many names given to Jesus Christ.

And these names display His deity. The Old Testament names for Jesus Christ. Let's look at those. The first one that we can look at, and we can look at many that we're familiar with, you see in the Old Testament, Isaiah 9, 6.

He's called the Mighty God, Everlasting Father. Which I understand some people get confused because, wait a minute, how is Jesus the Everlasting Father if God the Father is the Father? Yeah, we may not understand all of that, but clearly that passage is referring to Jesus and He's called Mighty God.

I think in the sense that they're showing unity between Him being the Mighty God and Father, being united there and one, in a sense. In Psalm 110, 1, He's called Lord. He's referred to as Lord being Jehovah Lord.

That's a name that's used specifically for God, not just a name that's used for it could mean Master. There's three different names in the Old Testament that we would say God or Lord. Yahweh or Jehovah, and that's only used of God, and Jesus in Psalm 110, 1 is referred to that way.

You have Adonai, which could mean Master, and we see that translated as Lord. And then we have Elohim, which, except for maybe one passage, always refers to God. We see in Isaiah 7, 4, He's called Emmanuel, which is translated God with us.

So He was going to be called God with us. Then we have an interesting passage, one I want you to remember. I want you to remember this because this is the one when the Jehovah Witnesses come knocking on your door.

This is the passage to turn to. Let's turn to Jeremiah 23, 5. And I encourage you, if you could even have them turn in their translation and say, could you read to me Jeremiah 23, verse 5? And they turn to it and they read this.

Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will rise up for David a branch. And he shall reign as king and deal wisely and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. Now stop right there and say, OK, who is that speaking about?

And they will say, oh, that's speaking about Jesus. He's the branch of Jesse. He is the one, this king that we're looking for. Really, what's his name? Keep reading in the next verse. Oh, look at this.

In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name by which he will be called the LORD our righteousness. See how LORD is in all caps in this translation? That means this is Jehovah.

And actually, if you take the Jehovah Witness Bible, it actually says Jehovah our righteousness. Yahweh sikhenu. That's the idea here. So he's going to be called God our righteousness. Divine God our righteousness.

Jehovah our righteousness. Not once, but twice. You go 10 chapters later. Go to Jeremiah 33. So you add a 10 to the chapter number. Add a 10 to the verse number. Verses 15 and 16. You will get this same exact phrasing.

Two spots, both in Jeremiah. Jeremiah 23, 5, and 6. Jeremiah 33, 15, and 16. All right? Those are the places to turn to because they just go, ahum, ahum, ahum, ahum. Oh, that's just his name. That would be blasphemy to call him Jehovah.

It would be blasphemy. So they have themselves a little bit of a dilemma. All right. These names all point to the fact that the future Jewish Messiah would be God himself. The reference to Jehovah in Jeremiah 35, in 23, 5, is one of the ones I really encourage you to give.

And I have in your handout there in your syllabus. The name where it says the Jehovah our righteousness or the Lord our righteousness. I encourage you to write Jehovah there because that's to give you an indication.

Write that in so when the Jehovah Witnesses come and you flip in through this manual and you go to your syllabus, it's like, ah, there it is, there it is, and you'll quickly know where the verse is. Okay?

It's not a proper name but a description. That's the thing. Some will argue. I had one person try to argue, well, that's just a proper name. No, this isn't a proper name. It's a description of how he as king will reign.

So it's a title, not a name, as we think of a name. All right? His name's in the New Testament. We got some names given to Jesus in the New Testament that reveal his deity. We're going to spend more of the time here.

So in the New Testament, the names of Jesus Christ are explicitly of the Christ, Christ itself, the title Christ. As we see, the Old Testament said that this future anointed one, this Messiah, would be God.

Therefore, the term Christ, Christ means Messiah. Christ is Greek for anointed one, which in Hebrew would be Messiah. So it's the same one. It's the Messiah, the Christ, the anointed one. Old Testament said that person would be God.

So when you see Jesus referred to as the Christ, that itself is deity. Okay? This is in the way we have to think. Okay? We have to understand the way these words are meant. So the definite article before Christ itself means that he is the anointed one, the one that had been waited for, the Messiah, that had been prophesied throughout all the Old Testament.

Now, what are some names we see for him? Well, we see him called God, John 1 .1, John 20 verses 24 to 29, 1 Timothy 1 .1, 1 Timothy 4 .10, Titus 1 .3 and 4, Titus 2 .10, Titus 2 .13, Titus 3 .4, Titus 3 .6.

Seems like there's quite a number of them, huh? Yeah. He's often referred to as God. Let's take, you know, we could take a look at some of those. So there's John 1 .1. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was, look at that, was with God.

And then what does it say? The Word was God. Now, I understand that some Jehovah Witnesses will argue that this is not really a definitive article because this one's not saying that he's the God. And then all of a sudden they got themselves a little bit of a problem because what they're dealing with now is they're believing or arguing for two gods.

1 Timothy 4 .10 says,. To this end we will toil and strive because we have our hope set on the living God who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe. And then Titus 2 .13 says,. You see how Jesus is referred to as God and Savior?

So in each of those you see that. We can look at, he's called Lord. We can look at this. This is Luke 6 .46. Why do you call me Lord, Lord and not do the things I tell you? Now, the emphasis of Lord, Lord is to emphasize that he wasn't just saying you're God, you're master.

Lord, Lord gives a greater emphasis. That would be that he's calling him God. But it's even clearer in Luke 24 .34 saying, The Lord has risen indeed and has appeared to Simon. We'll see in Acts 10 .36,.

For as the word that he sent to Israel preaching good news of peace through Jesus Christ, he is Lord of all. Okay, he's Lord of all, not just master. He's God because that would be who's Lord of all. Acts 26 .15,.

And I said, Who are you, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus of whom you're persecuting. Now, the interest of that is that's Paul on the Damascus Road. He's not saying, Oh, master, when he's hearing a voice come out of nowhere.

He thinks that's God speaking to him. And it's the voice that he hears is Jesus. We can see this, one that ties Lord and God together is with Thomas. When he sees Jesus after the resurrection, he says, My Lord and my God.

Alright, we see he's called in the book of Revelation, the first and the last. We see this in Revelation 1 .11, 1 .17, and 22 .13. I'm not going to read those if that's alright. But those all refer to him.

He's called the Word. We see that in John 1 .1, John 1 .14. In John 1 .14, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we have seen his glory as the glory of the only begotten Son of the Father, full of grace and truth.

Being the Son of the Father would be an acclaim of deity. Also, you can see Revelation 19 .13. There's some others in your syllabus. He's also called, we're going to look at this passage a couple of times in this lesson, but he's also called the I Am.

Remember in Exodus 3 when Moses says, Who should I say? What's your name, God, that I go back to Egypt? Who do I say sent me? And he says, Tell them I Am that I Am. And here we have in John 58 -59, Jesus said to them, Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I Am.

So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out. Now how do I know that that's a claim of deity? Because two chapters later he's going to make another statement. He's going to say that the Father and I are one, and it's going to say again they pick up stones to stone him.

And he's going to ask him why, and they're going to say because you claim to be God. The context helps us understand what the Jewish people understood by that. Now he's called the Savior. That we already saw, that the Savior was tied to God.

The Savior in the Old Testament was going to be God. So Titus 3 chapter 1 verses 3 and 4 says,. And at the proper time manifested in his word through the preaching with which I have been entrusted by the command of God our Savior to Titus, my true child, in common faith, grace and peace from God the Father and Jesus Christ our Savior.

Titus 3 verses 4 to 6 says this,. But when the goodness and lovingkindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, but because of works, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior.

So he's called the Savior. One more title that most people don't understand. The phrase Son of God, I don't know how many times I have been corrected when I'm out on the street and I say that Jesus is God.

And someone will come up and say, no, no, no, he's the Son of God as if it's different. It's only different because you don't understand the language of the time when it was written. Son of God is often misunderstood because people do not take the time to understand sonship in the times and culture of Christ.

The word Son, while it can mean offspring, that's your first blank, while it can mean offspring, most often is used to refer to one who partakes of or is identified, that's your next blank, identified with one who has, whom is his son.

So it's not as much referring to offspring as much as it is identity. Your identity as a son of someone, you're identified with your father. So it's not focusing on the offspring as much as the identity.

Where do we see this? Where I make this argument, can I prove it? Well, sure. Let's look at first Mark chapter 3. James, the son of Zebedee, now notice we have son of Zebedee. We know who his father is, right?

His father is Zebedee and John his brother, which means his father is also Zebedee. So here we know his father, but it says James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, the brother of James, to whom he gave them the name Borgianus, that is sons of thunder.

Now how many of you think that like two lightning bolts got together, boom, crack, they both cracked at the same time, that thunder noise just boom, that thunder noise produced James and John. No, they're not the offspring of thunder.

They are loud and bolsterous, good open air preachers, they're loud and bolsterous and because of that they are out there and being called sons of thunder because of their loudness and their brashness.

Their father is named in the same passage. So clearly it is not saying that son of is only offspring. We have the son of perdition. In John 17, 12, it says, I kept them in your name with which you have given me.

I've guarded them and not one of them has been lost except the son of destruction. And that description might be fulfilled, son of destruction or son of perdition. No one thinks that destruction gave birth.

You see it's also in 2 Thessalonians 2, 3. Let no one deceive you in any way for that day will not come unless the rebellion comes first and the man of lawlessness is revealed the son of destruction or perdition.

So what you have there is clearly it's not the thought that destruction gives birth. It's a descriptive, it's identity. We also have in Acts 4, 36, Joseph who was also called by the apostles Barnabas which means son of encouragement, a Levi, a native of Cyprus.

So we are very familiar with Barnabas but we often we see him throughout Acts but we often don't realize that that wasn't his birth name. That was the name he got because he was such an encourager that he became identified as a son of encouragement because he encouraged people so much that that became his name.

That's what people called him as a nickname. And so it shows the identity not the offspring. So also note that sonship in relation to Christ is always in connection to his incarnation. Jesus calls himself the son of man.

Think about this just for a moment. If you had to keep being reminded that someone is a man, wouldn't at some point you be going, dude, I could tell you're a man? Who do you think you are? If I had to keep reminding you I'm human, I'm human, I'm human, I'm human, at what point do you come to me and say, Andrew, who in the world do you think you are?

God? Exactly. That's exactly what him claiming to be son of man, he's identifying as a man because they knew he was God. He needed to remind them he was a man. All right? So when Jesus uses the name I am, however, it's an explicit reference to the deity of Christ.

And we saw that in the John 8 passage. The Greek phrase for I am is ego I me. It is the same as used in Exodus 3, 14, in the Greek spittuogen, that's the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament.

It's the same thing, ego I me. So it's the same wording that we use for Jehovah or Yahweh. And the Jews at the time of Christ understood that because they wanted to pick up stones to stone him. They wanted him dead.

Okay? Because they understood what he was saying when he was saying that he was I am. In John 10, 33, it says the Jews pick up stones to stone him for blasphemy. They were very clear in the reason on why they wanted to stone him.

All right? So, let's take a look at, what do we have? We looked at that. So, the works. Let's look at the works of Christ. The works of his deity. Now, so we have the titles of his deity. He's given the names of deity.

And I'm not sure I'm going to be able to get through all of this today. But, you know, when we get through this, the thing to focus on is he said, Jesus said that his works would testify to who he was.

He said it was a witness. There's several things that witness to his deity. One is the very words he says. When Jesus Christ spoke, he said, as in John 8, 58 and 59, in John 10, he said he was God very explicitly.

But, not only that, he said his works would be a witness to who he was. Another way to know as far as what's a witness is the way people spoke of him. We're not going to look at that in here. We're going to look at his attributes, which is another testimony to it, another witness.

But, you know, one of the things to do is look at how much the demons claimed he was God. His enemies, the Jewish leaders, called him God. Okay? Not just his disciples. The reason that becomes important is because if you want to see what's being said of a person, you look at those that would be on the enemies, those that are kind of trying to disprove him.

What is it that they were claiming he was saying? They were saying he was claiming to be God. And that's how you know that the claim was true. It wasn't that his disciples were trying to make him out to be God.

This is a thing that in, there's a guy, Bart Ehrman, who wrote a book, How Jesus Became God, thinking that throughout time he eventually morphed the disciples, made him into a God. The problem with that is his enemies, even in Jewish writings, they state that he's God.