Scripture: Topics: Jesus is God
Jesus is God according to the Holy Scriptures. This is part one of our study. This is going to be a lot of fun. I am Michael Pearl. You are at The Door located in Louisville, Tennessee. No Greater Joy Ministries nogreaterjoy.org. The Bible tells us even from everlasting to everlasting thou art God. God is uncreate. He's unmade. He's eternal without beginning without end. He's the first cause. The prime mover, the author of all that is.
The Bible tells us that Jesus is God, creator of heaven and earth. Sorry, Glenn Beck, all the Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses. Jesus is God. Yet he sought to conceal his identity. That's why some people have difficulty with it because Jesus spent his life avoiding being crucified until the right time for his death.
Matthew 16:20 “Then charged He his disciples that they should tell no man that he was Jesus the Christ.”
So he wanted to keep it secret. That term, “Jesus the Christ” is a reference to the Old Testament Messiah. It's the same word. It was the prophesied coming Son of God, the Messiah, the Savior of the world. He made it clear to his disciples that's who he was, but he kept it a secret from everyone else because he didn't want to be crucified early.
John 7:7-8 “The world cannot hate you;” He said, "but me it hateth, because I testify of it, that the works thereof are evil. Go ye up unto the feast: I go not up yet under this feast; for my time is not yet full come."
Because when he went up to the feast, it resulted in his crucifixion. Just a few days later.
Now I'm going to go through more than 100 passages that tell us that Jesus is God in the New Testament won't go through them all now. Over 500 verses on the Deity of Jesus Christ.
There is only one God according to the word of God.
Deuteronomy 6:4 “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord.” There are not three gods just one God. 6:34"Unto thee It was showed that thou might know that the Lord, he is God; There is none else beside him.” So Jehovah the word Lord Jehovah, he is God. There's none else beside him. So nothing else in the world that's called God is God except Jehovah. Now you might call him by different name, just as in Hebrew it was called Jehovah. And in English we say, God, you might call in by different name. But when you refer to the one creator of the universe by whatever name that is the God and there's none beside him.
Isaiah 43:10 "Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord that my servant whom I've chosen that you may know and believe me and understand that I am He." This is God speaking. 700 years before Jesus came. “Before me, there was no God formed neither shall there be after me.”
Now, according to this passage, there's no such thing as a created God. As the Mormons teach that Jesus is a created God, that he was Adam, come to this planet, that Eve was his wife and Satan was his brother. That Satan was a created God because the Bible calls him the God of this world. There's no such thing as a created God. All that's created is a creation and a creature and not God. So Jesus Christ is not a creation of God. He's not some figure that emanated from God. He's not something that God in some point in time conjured up. Jesus Christ is eternal God because there's no God formed neither shall there be after me. “I even I am the Lord; and beside me there is no Savior.” So there's just one savior and that is the Lord God, which is Jesus Christ.
Yet Jesus is called God in many passages, John 1:1-3 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” I love the profoundness of that. I love the way that it defies our logic and understanding.
If something is with something else, there are definitely two objects. Something is with something else, definitely two objects. But when that thing that is with something else is the other thing, then it's one.
So if I said, "Go get the papers and bring them to me, the papers are the book,” then you would expect to come back with one object, a book made of papers. So Jesus Christ is with the Father, but he is the Father at the same time. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him without Him was not anything made that was made.
Now this trinity is a mystery. It is impossible for us to find an analogy because to define something is to create limitations, to speak of its size. It's this big and no bigger or its number, it's this number and no more. It's weight. It's color. It is to place limitations upon it with words so that it's this way and not some other way. That's a definition. It's impossible to define God. You can't say that God is like me, a father, a preacher and an artist, one person functioning in three different modes.
That's the way some people try to describe the Trinity. That's not so. There are other attempts made like light. Light shines, it's pure white light. It goes through prism and it makes three primary colors and then the mixture between them, red, yellow, and blue. And so some people say that's the way God is He in his facet. He breaks down into father's Son and Holy Spirit. Again, that's totally inadequate because when you isolate the red from the other colors, the yellow is not present and the blue is not present. But Jesus said, "If you've seen me, you've seen the Father I and the Father one."( John 14:9) Jesus was all God and there was no more God than him.
And yet he spoke to the Father in heaven who was all God and there was no more God than him. And he and the Father were one while he spoke to the Father. And the Father spoke to him while the Father knew everything and he did not know everything in his humanity, yet He was one with the Father. Not a oneness in unity of spirit, but a oneness in essence, a oneness in presence. A oneness in reality. Again, there's no analogy for that. It's just a reality that we understand.
If the Bible explained to the Trinity, the Godhead in a way that was understandable, I'd know it was wrong because it would be making God small, only because it explains him in such a way that if you were setting out to make people believe something, you'd do a lot better job of defining it than what the Bible does. You'd make it to where it fit somebody's analogy rather than defies all explanation.
John 1:18 “No man has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father.” Jesus was on earth walking, sweating, sleeping and getting tired, and he was at that moment in the bosom of the Father. Like your heart is in your bosom, like your breath is in your bosom. Jesus was in the bosom of the Father and never was out. He has declared him.
John 20:28 “And Thomas answered and said unto him, "My Lord and my God."” Jesus encouraged that and accepted the worship of Thomas when Thomas called him, "My God,".
Do you realize if Thomas was wrong, if Jesus were not his God, then Thomas was blaspheming. You know why Jesus was crucified? One reason he claimed to be God, He made himself out to be God. That's why they crucified him. That's why they put him to death. That was a capital offense.
If Jesus were not God, then he was the biggest fraud, the biggest liar and dangerously reckless with his religious beliefs to allow people to treat him as God believe he was God, and to die in silence with an accusation of being God and obligation to say, "Please excuse me, you have a misunderstanding." Rather, he died with a profession of being one with the Father. Thomas recognized that.
Proverbs 30:4 Here's an interesting passage. There's a New Testament passage that quotes this. So let's look at this in light of the New Testament passage. Proverbs 30, “Who hath,” as this is about a thousand years before Christ, “who hath ascended up into heaven, or descended?” Recognized it already from the Book of Ephesians, “who hath gathered the wind in his fists? Who hath bound the waters in a garment? Who hath established all the ends of the earth? What is his name? He's God, right? What is his name and what is his son's name, if thou canst tell?”
The Old Testament tells us that God, who the Creator of heaven and earth has a son and his son has a name, just one son. What is his son's name? No one knew. We're told later his name shall be called Emmanuel, which being interpreted is God with us. I like that. I like that a whole lot.
So let's look at the New Testament passage that goes with it.
Ephesians 4:9-10 “Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth?” He's talking about Jesus descent into paradise, into hell. During the three days of his death prior to his resurrection, when he led many of the captive Old Testament saints out and they appeared with him in the city of Jerusalem and he led them into heaven. “He that descended” into the grave, into death, into hell “is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens that he might fill all things.”
So that passage that we read is interpreted for us in Proverbs that it's Jesus Christ to which it refers who is linked with the Creator, eternal God.
Now, in our next lesson, we'll see a number of those Old Testament, New Testament passages laid parallel.
1 Timothy 3:16 “God was manifest in the flesh.” Wait a minute, what does that say?
1 Timothy 3:16 Like John 3:16, You can remember it that way. God was manifest in the flesh. He was God before he was born a baby. He told Mary that holy thing which is conceived in you is Emmanuel God with us, “God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up in the glory.” Now, those conditions fit whom Jesus and Him alone. God was manifest in the flesh. So God became flesh.
“In the beginning was the Word. The Word would with God. The Word was God. He came in his own, His own received him not.” John 1:1
Titus 2:13 “Looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ.” Now we're looking for the blessed hope with appearing of the great God who is our Savior Jesus Christ.
Now, I don't like to resort to Greek. The English is sufficient here. If the great God in Jesus Christ were two different personalities, it would read this way appearing of the great God and of the Lord, our Savior Jesus Christ. It's not two personalities, it's one.
Now, this comes directly out of Sharp's rule of Greek exegesis, which states that:
“When two nouns, which are not proper nouns are connected by the word kai, which is a Greek word and, if the article ho the proceeds the first but not the second, they refer to the same person.”
Sharp's rule of Greek Exegesis
This is a reference to one person, the great God and the Savior. He is God and he is Savior. That Greek grammar construction appears again here.
2 Peter 1:1 “Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Savior Jesus Christ.” Again, that's one person, God and Savior, he is God and he's Savior. In fact, we read in the Old Testament, he said, "There's just one Savior and that's me." And so this is the Savior, God and our Savior Jesus Christ, he's called God. I've had people say, "The Bible doesn't call Jesus God." You're watched too much television, don't read enough Bibles what your problem is.
Isaiah 9:6 “Whose are the fathers and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came who is overall, God blessed forever.”
Isn't that something? Jesus Christ came who is overall, God blessed forever. Amen. Got to say Amen to that too. So Jesus Christ is called God in the King James Bible.
Now, later I'm going to go to some of the modern versions and show you that they delete many of these verses on the deity of Christ. They're just not in their bibles. They're scared of them, they're afraid of them, they remove them.
Romans 9:5 “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given and the government shall be upon his shoulders and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God.” Actually that's not Romans 9, that's in Micah 5:2. “His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.”
Now look at the passage. “A child is born and a son is given.” Why? Because the Son of God preexisted the child Jesus. So the Son is given, the child is born, the government shall be up on his shoulders. That'll happen during the millennium.
His name shall be called. This is the name of the one to be born. “His name shall be called Wonderful,” That's a good name for Jesus, isn't it? Wonderful.
His name shall be called Counselor. He alone, The mighty God is what Jesus will be called. He is the mighty God.
Now this is a good one. The everlasting Father, Jesus is the everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace so that the child that's born is called mighty God, everlasting Father, I like it.
Hebrews 1:8 “But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever, a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated iniquity. Therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning laid the foundation of the earth; and the heavens of the works of thine hands” this is a New Testament passage.
Matthew 1:21-23 “And she shall bring forth a son, thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. Now, all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, "Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son” this is Isaiah 9:6 “and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, "God with us." “ I quoted that several times already. So Jesus is God with us. He is God.
Isaiah 9:6-7 This is the passage. “Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. The government shall be upon his shoulders. His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. And of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order and to establish it forever. And with judgment and with justice from henceforth even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.” A prophecy in Isaiah, 700 years before Christ in the Book of Hebrews takes it up and references it to Jesus Christ.
1 Timothy 4:10 “We trust in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially those that believe.”
Jesus Christ is the living God. You don't have to believe the Bible, but if you claim to believe the Bible, you look mighty foolish, not believing that Jesus is God. So Glenn Beck, you need to start reading your Bible.
Acts 20:28 “Feed the church of God, which he purchased with his blood.” Whose blood? God's blood. He tells him to feed the church of God, which he God purchased with his blood. The bloodshed on the cross was the blood of God.
1 John 5:20 “And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.” That says, "Jesus is the true God." You know what it says, if you can read English, no sentence construction grammar, then that's exactly what it says.
Now, I'm going to be going through about 140 verses in several different messages here, 440 passages, some on the passage of eight to 10, 12 verses long, and that's not all of them in the Bible. So when you tell me Bible doesn't teach Jesus as God, look out, I can write you a book of verses that teach Jesus is God.
Zechariah 13:6 “And one shall say unto him,” I love this passage. “What are these wounds in thine hands? Then he shall answer.” By the way, Zechariah was 500 - 600 years before Christ, he'll answer, “Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.” Someone has asked Jesus, "What are those wounds?" He said, "The wounds with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.”
Zechariah 13:7 “Awake, O sword, against my shepherd and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts, smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered, and I'll turn my hand upon the little ones." That's a prophecy of Jesus Christ with wounded hands.
1 John 5:7 “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one.”
Now, if you don't have a King James Bible, I bet you that verse is not in your Bible. Those of you watching this, go get your Bible right now. Look up 1 John 5:7. Now you'll have a 1 John 5:7, but they will split verse six into two parts and call it seven. But you look for that phrase right there, “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, Word, and the Holy Ghost. And these three are one.” That is the premier prime verse on the Trinity the Godhead in the Bible.
And you'll hear scholars say, "But it's not in the original Greek," it's not in their original Greek, but it is in the original Greek, which the church has used from the first century down to the present. And you can find it scattered throughout history. It has been taken out by people who did not believe it, did not want to accept it, found it offensive, but God has kept it in his words down to the present. So here it is in your Holy King James Bible. There are these three are one. Jesus is one, he's God.
How did Jesus contemporaries understand him? When they heard him speak, heard the things he said, How did they interpret it? Certainly they understood the language, the culture better than we do. So what was their response to his statements?
John 10:33 “The Jews answered him saying, "For a good work we stone thee knot, but for blasphemy, because thou, being a man, makest thyself God." This was in anticipation of them killing him. “Thou being a man make us thyself God.” That's what they understood Jesus to be saying. He never contradicted their interpretation of his words.
I like this passage.
Philippians 2:6 Speaking of Jesus that said, "Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:" Anybody that will tell you what that's saying is, "Jesus existed as God in godly form in the manifestation of deity existed," but he didn't think it would be an act of robbery to remain equal with God. In other words, here he is on the throne in his deity, and now the opportunity comes to go to earth and become a flesh human being. He didn't feel like he would be out of order to refuse to go and become a man.
He didn't feel like he'd be cheating anybody. It was his right to stay on the throne in the form of God and not take the form of man. He was not obligated. There was no duty to do so. He was not attempting to redeem some former act or prove some point. He had a right.
Philippians 2:6-11 “He thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made himself” nonetheless. “He made himself of no reputation and took up on him the form of a servant.” He was in the form of God. He took on him the form of a servant, “and was made in the likeness of men.” So he preexisted his birth and being found in fashion as a man. “He humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things in earth, and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Amen. Hallelujah. I wish I could sing. I would sing that thing. I mean, that'd make some good singing right there. Need some drums in there and a couple trumpets and I mean that's ready for singing right there.
Now to see Jesus is to see God." That's what he said. "If you seen me, you've seen the Father.”( John 14:9) To worship Jesus is to worship God. To praise Jesus is to praise God. To know Jesus is to know God. To love Jesus is to love God. To deny Jesus is to deny God." All these things he said of himself. "To miss Jesus is to miss God."
If you try to come to God some other way than through him. He said, "You're a thief and a robber." ( John 10:1) He said, "I'm the door. By me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved." (John 10:9) There is no other door, there is no other way.
The name of this building is the door because Jesus is the door in the eternal life.
Jesus said, "If you believe not that I'm he, you shall die in your sins." (John 8:24) It's imperative that you believe what he said of himself. What his enemy set of him, what the apostle said of him, what John the Baptist said of him. What Paul, the apostle said of him and John on the Isle of Patmos said to him, All of them spoke of him as God, the eternal one creator of heaven in earth, the Savior of all mankind. “The only God, Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and last, and there is none beside me," he said.( Revelation 22:13)
So we're we're going to go next time into a long list of Old Testament Scripture and New Testament passages on the deity of Christ linking them together. You've been listening to Michael Pearl at The Door. No Greater Joy Ministries nogreaterjoy.org. Next time.
