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Transcript 521A — Was Jesus God?
HC: Good evening. Welcome to Open Forum.
CALLER: Good evening. I heard a liberal pastor talk, and he said that Jesus was not God because He prayed in the Garden, "Not my will but thine be done," which showed that He was separate from God, and that when He prayed in John 17, "that they may be one as we are one," which showed that they were separate. And he said when they asked Jesus why He came, He said He came that they might have life and have it more abundantly, so that He was more concerned about teaching for this life rather than eternal life. And I wonder if you could give me some scriptures where Jesus Himself said that He was God, and why He came.
HC: The question is, was Jesus a man or was Jesus God? The fact is, of course, that God very clearly indicates that Jesus was not God the Father. Jesus was the Son of God. Christ repeatedly spoke of Himself as the Son of God, as well as the Son of Man. And yet from everything we read in the Bible we know that He was God in every sense.
Let me use the verse of John 8. We read in verse 58, as Jesus is talking to the Jews: "Verily, verily I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am." "I am." Now that was a very astounding thing for Him to say, because if we go back to Exodus 3, when Moses is being addressed by God, Moses says, "Who shall I say sent me?" and God says, "You tell them that I AM has sent you." That's in Exodus 3:14. "And God said unto Moses, I AM that I AM. And He said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM has sent me unto you."
Now when Jesus said in John 8:58, "Before Abraham was I AM," he was saying that He is Eternal God, because you see, He is using the same language as Exodus 3. He's not only saying that He already existed when Abraham was, which is of course characteristic of God, but He's also taking on the name of God, I AM. "And for this reason they took up stones to cast at Him," because they realized that He was making Himself as God.
Not only that, but He forgave sins of different individuals. And only God can forgive sins. Now of course the whole Bible is the Word of God, and there are many many passages that say very clearly that Jesus is God. I was trying to find a statement that came from His lips. But for example, in Titus, a little book just before the Book of Hebrews we find there in Chapter 2, verse 13, where God declares: "Looking for that blessed hope and glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works," a very straight statement, you see, that He is God.
Hebrews 1:8, God declares: "But unto the Son He saith, Thy throne, oh God, is forever and ever, A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Thy Kingdom." In the Gospel of John we find that God introduces this particular Gospel with the statement that "The Word was God and the Word was with God. And the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God." And then we read in verse 14 of John 1, "And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth."
Then in John 17, notice this language, where Jesus is saying in verse 5: (notice this language) "And now, oh Father (He's praying), glorify Thou Me With Thine own self, with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was." You see, Jesus is indicating that He had the same glory as the Father from before the foundations of the earth. This is from the lips of Jesus.
I hope this will help a little bit.
CALLER: Thank you very much.
HC: Thank you for calling. Good night.