A friend of mine once said that in his life he knows two things beyond any doubt:
- There is a God, and
- It's not him.
He's right on both counts. There is a God and His name is Jesus Christ. Yet, despite the evidence, there are millions and millions of people - intelligent people among them - who flatly deny that Jesus is Lord. Many say that He was a great man, a great teacher, etc., but not God.
This standpoint is refuted by CS Lewis in Mere Christianity: "I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronising nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to. ... Now it seems to me obvious that He was neither a lunatic nor a fiend: and consequently, however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that He was and is God."
This is the choice that Jesus left us: Lunatic, Liar or Lord.
For people who claim that Jesus is not God, I have this question: How is it possible that a Man who
- was an ordinary carpenter with no exceptional education,
- had a public ministry that lasted about three years,
- died a shameful and horrible death on a Roman cross, and
- left twelve uneducated followers who were willing to die for Him
turned out to be the most influential person in recorded history?
Well?
It's simple. He is God. Rom 14:11 - As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to Me, and every tongue shall confess to God.
great question! so true! And I also always wondered about all the persecuted Christians in the world. If Jesus wasn't God, what's the reason for persecution?
ReplyDeleteGreetings Andre
ReplyDeleteFor people who claim that Jesus is not God, I have this question: How is it possible that a Man who ... turned out to be the most influential person in recorded history? ...
In answer to your question, the simple answer is because the Man Jesus of Nazareth is truly who he claimed to be! - i.e.
the Messiah [John 4.25-26],
the Son of GOD [John 10.36]
For example:
John 4:22-42
Ye worship ye know not what: we know what we worship: for salvation is of the Jews. 23 But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. 24 God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. 25 The woman saith unto him, I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things. 26 Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he. ... 29 Come, see a man, which told me all things that ever I did: is not this the Christ? ... 39 And many of the Samaritans of that city believed on him for the saying of the woman, which testified, He told me all that ever I did. 40 So when the Samaritans were come unto him, they besought him that he would tarry with them: and he abode there two days. 41 And many more believed because of his own word; 42 And said unto the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying: for we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world.
Did the Samaritans believe that Jesus was Almighty GOD? NO! Rather, based on Deut. 18.15-19, the Samaritan woman as well as the rest of the Samaritans, believed that Jesus of Nazareth was:
'That promised Prophet' through whom the ONE GOD, the Father, would put His words in that prophet's mouth; and that prophet would speak unto them all that the ONE GOD would command him.!
That is who the man Jesus is!
And being in total obedience to the ONE GOD, his Father, Jesus did not speak of himself but rather spoke the things which his Father gave him to speak!
[John 12.48-50]
Jesus is indeed the Christ OF GOD
[Luke 9.20];
and as such was given authority by his Father to do the Father's will.
[John 5.27, 17.2, etc]
Jesus therefore being totally obedient to his GOD and Father [John 20.17], even to the death of the cross;
God raised him from the dead, glorified him
and made him 'Lord' [Acts 2.36] to His (God the Father's) glory. [Phil 2.11]
Because he did his God's will, Jesus is today, the most influential person in recorded history; to the glory of GOD his Father. Amen!
Jesus is neither Liar nor Lunatic.
He is the Lord Messiah
[Col 3.24, Luke 2.11]
because GOD Almighty the Father made him so!
[Acts 2.36]
Jesus identified his Father as the only true GOD and the only GOD
[John 17.3, 5.44]
Thus:
(1 Tim 2:5) For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men,
the man Christ Jesus;
That is who the man Jesus is! The one mediator between the ONE GOD and mankind!
It's simple.
ReplyDeleteJesus is the Lord Messiah, the Son of GOD.
Phil. 2:11 And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
So there are two more things beyond any doubt! :-
1) There is solely ONE GOD
2) and He is not the Lord Jesus Christ!
But rather the Father!
1 Thess. 1:9-10 ... how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God; 10 And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, ...
(John 20:17) ... I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.
(Rev 3:12) Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out: and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God: and I will write upon him my new name.
Therefore, Andre,
for more info on who Jesus truly is,
I recommend this video:
The Human Jesus
Take a couple of hours to watch it; and prayerfully it will aid you in your quest for truth.
Yours In Messiah
Adam Pastor