Jesus never said, I am God.
You may have heard this statement from a Muslim friend, religious skeptic,
or family member at dinner.
Are they right?
Well, kind of yes and kind of no.
Let's take a few moments to unravel what Jesus really said about himself in the
Bible.
In John chapter 5, Jesus says, My Father is always at work to this very
day, and I too am working.
After stating this, the Jewish leaders tried to kill him, because in calling God
his own Father, Jesus was making himself equal with God.
He was claiming to be the unique Son of God.
In the New Testament, Jesus uses the term, My Father, as a direct and unmistakable
declaration of his Sonship.
In verse 23, he claims that the Son and the Father receive the same type of honor,
stating, So that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father.
Three verses later, he claims to possess life as the Father does, just as the
Father has life in himself, so also he gave to his Son the possession of life in
himself.
Moving to the Gospel of Matthew, in chapter 11, Jesus claims a direct
relationship to God the Father, saying, No one knows the Son except the
Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son, asserting the shared knowledge he
has with the Father.
When in chapter 16, Peter states, You are Christ, the Son of the living God.
Jesus not only accepts the titles but calls Peter blessed because his
declaration had been revealed to him by My Father who is in heaven.
Jesus claims eternal existence in John chapter 8, verse 58, when he says,
Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am.
Here Jesus has echoed the language of deity, the same words by which God
revealed himself to Moses from the burning bush in Exodus 3, verse 14.
To the Jews, this was clearly blasphemy, for they knew that in doing so Jesus was
again claiming to be God.
Later, in John 10, verse 30 to 33, Jesus explicitly told the Jews,
I and the Father are one.
Again the Jews picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus said to them, I have shown
you many great miracles from the Father.
For which of these do you stone me?
We are not stoning you for any of these, replied the Jews, but for blasphemy
because you, a mere man, claim to be God.
In the Sanhedrin trial of Jesus recorded in Mark 14, Caiaphas the high priest asked
him, Are you the Christ, the Son of the blessed one?
I am, said Jesus.
And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and
coming on the clouds of heaven.
Those unfamiliar with the Old Testament writings might miss the importance of that
statement, but Caiaphas and the council clearly knew that in saying he was the Son
of Man, who would come on the clouds of heaven, Jesus was delivering a clear
reference to the Son of Man in Daniel's prophecy in Daniel 7.
He was not only claiming to be the pre-existent sovereign of the universe,
but also foretelling that he would prove his claim by judging the very court that
was now condemning him.
Further, in combining Daniel's prophecy with David's proclamation in Psalm 110,
Jesus was claiming that he would sit upon the throne of Israel's God and share God's
very glory.
This was an unmistakable claim to deity.
This was the height of blasphemy and so they all condemned him as worthy of death,
as recorded in Mark 14, 64 and 65.
Throughout the Gospels, Jesus also declared his deity through his claims of
authority.
He announced, I am the Good Shepherd, a title the Old Testament assigned to God.
He claimed to be the judge of all people, a task only God performs.
He called himself the Bridegroom, a role God played with Israel.
He forgave sins, but only God can forgive sins.
He assumed equal authority with God and even encouraged prayer in his name.
He also invited people to believe in him for salvation.
None of the great leaders, teachers or prophets in the history of Israel ever
offered salvation in their own name.
Appearing blasphemous, it was only Jesus who made this appeal of faith,
because he was claiming to be God.
In reading through the rest of the New Testament, one can see that the title of
God is certainly connected to Jesus.
In many places, the authors refer to Jesus in ways that can only apply to God,
calling him Eternal, even though there is only one Eternal God.
The Creator of all things, though there is only one Creator.
Present everywhere, though there is only one Omnipresent God.
And receives worship from people and angels, even though the Old Testament
prohibits worshipping anyone other than God.
Because each of these characteristics can only be said of God, then clearly the
authors of the New Testament also believed Jesus was God.
Christians believe that at the heart of the doctrine of Christ's deity is God's
loving self-sacrifice for us.
That salvation rests not in a man like us, but in a God who became like us in order
to redeem us from our sins.
So while Jesus never explicitly uses the phrase, I am God, He is consistently
portrayed in all of the Gospels as one who speaks and acts as God.
And if such is the case, then we are all faced with C.S.
Lewis' famous imperative in mere Christianity.
You must make a choice.
Either this man was and is the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse.
After Jesus asked, who do people say that I am?
He asked an even more significant question, but who do you say that I am?
The answer to this question each person must decide for themself.