Christ on the throne
By Michael Bell
This is Part 11, of a multi-part series looking at the deity of Christ. Here are the links to the Introduction and Table of Contents.
Why is it so important that we believe that Jesus is God? Does it make a difference? The answer comes when we look at what it means to have our sins forgiven. This is I believe the most important article in the whole series.
The Forgiveness of Sins
Twice in the Bible Jesus makes the direct claim to forgive sins.
Luke 7:48 (NIV) – Then Jesus said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.”
Mark 2:5-7 (NIV) – “When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” Now some of the teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, “Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming? Who can forgive sins but God alone?”
Why did the Jews believe that only God can forgive sins? It can be explained like this: A sin is an offense which is committed against God. An offense can only be forgiven by the person against whom it is committed. Therefore a sin can only be forgiven by God. since sinning is the action which sparates us from God (Romans 3:23), and God is the only one who can forgive sins, we must conclude that it can only take an action of God to bridge this gulf between each one of us and God. If it was some mere man or angel who was crucified what would that prove? It would show that God was unjust, making a third party suffer for a two party transaction. But God is not unjust and thus we must conclude that God took human form, to die, and to bridge the gap between human beings and himself.
In fact, Acts 20:28 tells us that it was God himself who shed his blood on the cross.
Acts 20:28 (NIV) – … Be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood.
The church has been established through God shedding his blood on the cross for us, while in the person of Jesus Christ.
There is a further consequence to all of this. If it takes an action of God to bridge the gulf between human beings and God, and we say that Jesus is not God, then whether we intend to or not, we are saying that the gulf between God and ourselves has never been bridged! Jesus himself says:
John 8:24 (NIV) – “I told you that you would die in your sins if you do not believe that I am (the one who I claim to be), you will indeed die in your sings.
Jesus was claiming to be God through his use of the “I AM” statement. “I AM” is of course the name of God identified and expressed in Deuteronomy 3:14-15.
Jesus re-emphasizes the “I AM” statement just a few verses later in John 8:58-59:
John 8:58-59 (NIV) – “I tell you the truth,” Jesus answered, “before Abraham was born, I am!” At this they picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself slipping away from the temple grounds.
When Jesus begins a sentence with the statement “I tell you the truth”, it is his way of saying that what is to follow is very, very important. (See John 3 for some other examples.) What he actually says has two important components: 1. He is more than just a man because he existed before Abraham, the founder of the Jewish race, was born. 2. He is making the claim to be God by his use of the “I AM” statement. The Jews recognized the claims that Jesus was making, and that is why they they tried to stone him to death.
Jesus the Saviour
We have seen the interconnectedness in this post of how Jesus forgiveness of sins is tied into his identity as God, and belief in that identity is necessary for the forgiveness of sins. This is why over and over in the New Testament Jesus is called “Saviour” (Canadian spelling!). It is clear even from before the beginning of Jesus’ time on earth he had come to be saviour of the world. Matthew opens with the story of how an angel of the Lord told Joseph to name the child Jesus.
Matthew 1:21 (NIV) – “She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”
Note the interesting parallel happening in this first. Jesus literally means “God saves”. So the Angel is saying, you will call his name “God saves” because “he will save“. Right from the beginning Jesus is being equated with God. Sure lots of other people of the day were called Jesus, but because “God saves”, not because they would be the agents of salvation.
The idea that Jesus would save people from their sins is reinforced throughout the New Testament. After Jesus talks to the woman at the well in Samaria we get the following statement:
John 4:42 (NIV) – They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you have said, now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the saviour of the world.”
The Apostle Peter confirms this:
Acts 4:10,12 (NIV) – “It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you completely healed… Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.”
Notice that not only is Christ called the saviour of the world, but he is the only one who is saviour. One can call on no other name except the name of Jesus for salvation. Now consider this:
Isaiah 43:3,11 (NIV) – “For I am the LORD, your God, the Holy one of Israel, your saviour… I, even I, amd the LORD, and apart from me there is no saviour.”
If Christ is the only name under heaven by which we can be saved, and there is no saviour apart from God, then there can be only one logical conclusion. God took on human form in the person of Jesus Christ, and sacrificed himself, so that we could have forgiveness of sins.
As usual your thoughts and comments are welcome.
Michael Bell
Joshua Hearne
Tim Melton
Joel Black
Good to see another in the series. Reading your website has launched a new direction in my research.
On Mark 2:5-7 (NIV) – “When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” Now some of the teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, “Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming? Who can forgive sins but God alone?”
It follows with 2:10 “But I want you to know the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”(TNIV) In the book of Enoch, a work that Jude, presumably Jesus’ brother, feels is is worth of quoting as true (Jude 1:14-15), the Son of Man judges the world at the end of the age.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Son_of_man#In_the_Apocrypha_and_Pseudepigrapha
thus Jesus could be implying here that as the Son of Man, and judge of mankind, he can essentially grant pardons. Enoch doesn’t seem to take the position that the Son of Man is God, and neither do the Essenes, who make a lot of use of Son of Man doctrines and Enoch too.
Beyond that though I have given thought to what seem like a few round about assertions to Jesus’ divinity in Mark. along with the one we just mentioned, there is Mark 10:18 “why call me good? no one is good-except God alone” and the “who’s son is the Messiah” line from Mark 12:35-37. On the surface it seems the meanings are the Son of Man can also forgive sins, Jesus isn’t as good as God, and the Messiah is not the son (decedent) of David.
That there is a hidden meaning to the sayings seems very possible to me. Mark is fond of having Jesus tell people to keep his messiah hood a secret, and has Jesus say that the secret of the Kingdom of God is given to you but to every one else it is a parable(Mark 4:11 paraphrased). Further more Mark leaves us with no appearance of Jesus after his resurrection. Why? surely he had stories of his resurrection appearances. While I said earlier that I didn’t like the idea of secret teachings of Jesus, It may well be that mark intended his book for one audience but had additional material for more advanced disciples.
This leads to that research I mentioned earlier. One of your other post mentioned a puzzle about Paul giving some cats the Holy Spirit and they start speaking in tongues. it got me thinking about how the Holy Spirit was expressed in the New Testament vs. now. I looked at some video clips of Pentecostal services and I felt I got an insight into Paul’s churches. I feel when I read the New Testament I have to keep in mind these are people who say they see spirits and go to heaven(whether in body or in spirit they don’t know) I don’t know anybody who makes these claims and I don’t read books by people who make these kinds of claims. but this sort of thing has to affect you thinking, their rational is not my rational.
Looking Foward to the next instalment,
Mike W
Mike,
I read the Mark 10 passage in quite a different way, almost like a series of rhetorical question. Why do you call me good? Do you realize that only God is good? Do you understand what you have just called me?
They do have the feel of rhetorical questions, but Mark doesn’t supply the answer. So it is an odd way to lay out a rhetorical question. Were these “inside jokes” for a congregation that knew the real answers? there only implicet rhetorical questions for us because we have other writtings that explain “Jesus is God”. We don’t know what the people that read Mark were also reading. We don’t know what was preached to them. So it’s not completly clear how they interpeted these lines or how we should. They seem intentionally evasive. Why do you think that is?
On another note, concerinig Jesus’ attonning death, the Essenes (From the Dead Sea Scrolls, Qumran in Perspective by Geza Vermes, it’s shamefull the amount of thought I’ve put into Jesus without even going though the works he would have read or heard!)thought their extream purity would make them living sacrifices to replace the ones at the temple that they thought were now impure. It gave me insight on what Jesus may have meant by “To give his(the Son of Man’s)life as a ransom for many.”
I’m still having a problem with how Jesus of Nazareth could be God in a way that everyone else is not also God. If God died who was minding the store? Can God be both dead and alive at the same time? Does that take away from really being dead? I’ll re-read the previous articles to see if theres something I missed.
Mike W
Hi Mike,
As to your last questions, I will try and tackle them in a future post, when I look at one of Jesus’ utterances while on the cross…
Have to hold you in suspense for a bit.
Mike Bell
The necessity of believing that Jesus is God is my husbands stumbling block to salvation. Tony can believe that Jesus was amazing. And he can believe that his teaching changed the entire course of history. But it ends there. To admit that Jesus was God come to earth is also to admit that our guilt is what brought Him to this destiny. Jesus deity is the first question to be settled. How I long for the day that Tony gets it! When we can discuss Christ as our mutual friend. Thank you Mike for thinking so deeply about things. I love coming here to see whats next! Have a blessed weekend (Loved the “Canadian spelling” comment lol)