The Deity Of Christ - The Bible Is Very Clear

Allah Akbar is the chant. But is it really true or is it just wishful thinking? The way to fight against lies is using the weapon of truth. But I don't think we know how important it is to be defending the truth.

  I think in America today, we are lulled to sleep. It is more fun to watch a Harry Potter movie than it is to spend time doing spiritual warfare. What is more, we don't even see that we are in a battle. Or, maybe its just that we don't really care.

   Well, the Muslims care about what they believe in, but what they believe in is false. They believe a lie. So, we can look at what the Bible says about who God is.

  What does the Bible say about God? Is Jesus God? Is Allah God? Both the Old and New Testaments have a lot to say about this.

  Both the Old Testament and New Testament are about God being one. There is only one God, but He is Triune. The first clue of this is in Genesis 1:26 where it quotes God as saying, 'Let us create man in Our image."There are also references in the Old Testament of the Holy Spirit.

        God is so complex that our minds cannot fathom Him. Take for example, the fact that God is uncreated. He never had a beginning. Any point in eternity past, God goes beyond. Think about God also not having a limit. He has no boundaries. We are finite and we have a top and bottom part to us. But God doesn't have a top where He is stopped at. Any boundary where you think God's presence stops at, He goes beyond that point.

  But there are some interesting verses in the New Testament as well. Did you know that Jesus was the One who actually created everything? According to Colossians 1:16, He created all things that are in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, thrones and dominions, principalities and powers. All these things were created by Him and for Him. He also holds all things together. We also see this in John 1.

  In John 8:58, Jesus was talking to the Jewish people who were arguing with Him. He had just broken the loaves of bread and multiplied the fish for the people to eat, and they followed Him around because they were hungry. Everything was fine until Jesus started teaching them who He was. Then they started arguing. They weren't ready to hear this news, nor were they willing to change their way of thinking. Toward the end of the conversation in the Bible, Jesus tells them that He was before Abraham. They struggled with that as well. But then Jesus laid something very heavy on them, that they really couldn't handle. He said, "Before Abraham was, I am." Now that sounds like a strange sentence unless you understand Jewish history.

    In the book of Exodus, God was raising Moses up to lead the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt. Moses asked God what he should call Him. God responded by saying that His name was "I am". So, one of God's special names was 'I am". When Jesus said that before Abraham was, I am, the people understood what He was saying. He was basically calling Himself God. Of course, this was too much for the Jewish people to handle and they were ready to stone Jesus, but He got away.

   After God created Adam and Eve, the devil came into the Garden and wanted them to sin against God. If he was successful, then, in a sense, they would be under the rulership of the devil. So, the devil came in and tempted Eve first. God has told them that they were to eat anything in the Garden except the fruit from one of the trees called, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. The devil lied and told them that they really wouldn't die if they ate this fruit and they would become wise like God. Eve fell for the lie and then Adam comes along and she gives him some of the fruit. God came after them and provided them with a covering because they now were sinners and needed an atonement. But God made a special promise to them. Actually, the promise was made to the devil and God was going to send someone who would give the devil a death blow. This is promised in Genesis 3:15 and it came to pass when Jesus died on the Cross. When He died, death was defeated, and all the powers of darkness were disarmed. Of course, the greatest act in History was when Jesus arose from the dead. He came out of the grave and was seen by many people.

  In the Old Testament, in the book of Isaiah, God says that there is no one like Him. There is only one God and nothing matches Him, or even comes close. All the idols in the world do not even compare to the true and living God. Jesus lived on earth for about 33 years, and He lived a perfect life without ever giving into temptation to sin. No human being has ever done that and never will because sin has tainted all of us and it is impossible for us not to sin. The Bible says that Jesus was tempted like us, but without sin. That is the reason why He could die for our sins. If He sinned, He would never have been able to die for our sins. But He is without sin, and He will always be our Advocate because we are sinners and need Someone to plead for us before God's throne.

   In the Old Testament, we read about the first Passover. How it came about was when the Israelites were in the land of Egypt, they were made slaves and were treated harshly. God was giving direction to Moses on leaving the land. Every time they started to leave the land, the Pharaoh would pull them back. Then God would send a plague to punish the Egyptians. The last plague was one in which a Death Angel was going to pass over the land and kill every firstborn son in each household. The Israelites were instructed to take a lamb, take the blood and place it on the door posts of the house. It had to be a lamb without blemish. When the Death Angel passed over the houses, he would see the houses which had the blood on the door posts, and would pass over those houses. That is where the word 'Passover' comes from. Because the Israelites obeyed God, they were protected, but the Egyptians were not protected and each household had someone who died. The wailing of the Egyptians that night was loud.

  It doesn't take too much thinking to see the connection of this event to an event in the New Testament. First of all, in the Gospel of John, John the Baptist was talking about Jesus in the first chapter. John the Baptist and Jesus were actually cousins, yet, John the Baptist was so honored and humbled by Jesus presence that he made some good statements. One of them was, 'I am not worthy to tie His shoelaces". One other thing he said was, 'Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world". Now, Jesus is the Lamb of God. I wonder if John the Baptist knew that Jesus was going to die for our sins.

   Just before Jesus died on the Cross, He celebrated the Passover with His disciples. He took some bread and referred to it as His body. He took the wine also, which represented His blood that was going to be shed for the sins of many. Jesus became our Passover Lamb. His blood protects us from the Angel of Death. It protects us from the Judgment of God.

  Something to take note of while Jesus was dying for us: In the Old Testament, God gave instructions on building a Tabernacle, then later, a Temple for worship. There was a special room set aside for the priests to enter once a year. Inside this room was the Ark of the Covenant, Aaron's rod, and a jar of manna. The Ark of the Covenant was significant because God's Presence was on the Ark. No one could see God and live. If people touched the Ark of the Covenant, they would die. Even the priests who went into the Holy of Holies, which was the special room they went into once a year to offer the sacrifice, were at risk of dying while bringing the offering in, so a rope was attached to their legs, in case they had to be pulled out of this room, for no one could go in this room and live. But, while Jesus was dying on the Cross, the curtain that separated this room from everything else, was torn in half, from top to bottom. Jesus' death was powerful enough to end the separation between God and man because of sin. Now human beings could come into God's presence without being killed, if the person is covered in the blood of Christ. (A person who is covered in the blood of Christ is one who trusts in Jesus as his or her Savior from sin).

   You might be asking yourself, 'If Jesus is God, then why didn't He know when the end of the world was?'. There is a section in Philippians which tells of Jesus humbling Himself and laying His power as God, down. He was still God, but in order to serve us by living on earth and dying for us, He had to lay His glory aside. He would have it back again, but for that time period, He laid His glory down. He operated as a man like us, but lived in the power of the Holy Spirit.

  Jesus healed people and raised them up from the dead. He healed deaf people. He healed lepers. He changed water into wine and cast out demons. Most of all, He became the Ultimate Sacrifice we needed to have in order to take our sins away and to set us free from sin, and from sin's hold on our lives.

    There are many prophecies in the Old Testament about Jesus coming, which He fulfilled. Isaiah 53 gives a vivid description of what He was going to be going through. It also tells us that He was going to take the burden of our sin upon Himself. One other verse says that it pleased God to crush Him.

   The One who created us also died for us. And He also rose from the dead, something that had never happened before, nor has it happened since. This kind of resurrection is different than the ones where Jesus prayed over someone who was dead and they came back to life. Those people did not receive new bodies yet, and eventually they died. But Jesus has a new body, and one day, people will too.

   Why is the deity of Christ important, you might be asking?  If Jesus is truly God in the flesh, then other religious belief systems are invalid. If Jesus is God in the flesh, then Allah is not God at all. Jesus did not have a Father called Allah. Allah never sent His Son to earth to die for people's sins. There is only one true God. It is either the God of the Bible, or it is not. If Jesus is God, then Mohammed is not God's prophet. Nor is Joseph Smith. If Jesus is truly God in the flesh, then Mormonism and Jehovah's Witnesses are wrong. They do not believe in the deity of Christ and they have a works mentality of salvation. If Jesus is truly God in the flesh, then there is no work we can do to be saved or to add to our salvation.

   Either the Bible is entirely correct, or it isn't. The Bible is actually one continuous story, of a God who created human beings who fell into the slavery of sin, and how the God who created them worked a plan throughout the whole Bible to redeem mankind from sin.

  You have to understand that sin is not something we are entitled to. We live in a generation where we feel like we are entitled to have whatever we want or think we need. When it comes to selfishness and the pleasures of sin, we feel entitled to those as well. Instead of seeing the danger of sin, and sin as our enemy that we need to be freed from, we see it as an asset, although we know it will keep us out of heaven. We devise ways to think that somehow Jesus died to take the penalty for our sins, but that we can still hold onto our precious sins. Nothing could be further than the truth.

   All religions have a form or method that is held by them, that they believe will get people into heaven or will get people right with God. Every one of them has some kind of work involved. Mormons believe that a person needs to believe in Jesus, but after that it is his or her responsibility to do good works. The belief in Jesus opens the door for salvation, but the person is responsible for continuing to do good works. In Islam, there are 5 pillars to follow. Even then, no one knows if Allah will allow them into heaven. Jehovah's Witnesses believe in good works as well. They will quote verses like, 'Faith without works is dead' to mean that we also must work to have faith. Even many 'Christian' groups, although possibly unaware, believe in good works adding or providing salvation. But the Bible is very clear that it is not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saves us. Not by works, but by faith alone are we saved. Yes, works will accompany our new life in Christ, but they are not what saves us. Only One lived a perfect life, and we get in on His score, not ours.

  One last thing to cover on this is that, according to the Bible, Jesus is the only way to heaven. There is no other name given to men, whereby we must be saved. Jesus said He is the only way to the Father, and in another place it says that there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 2:5). If the Bible is a book that makes perfect sense from beginning to the end, and if it is truly God's love letter to us, then we need to look into it and know what it says to us. The Bible is not a bunch of hit or miss quotes or stories. It is a continuous story of God reaching fallen human beings and providing redemption for them. No one has to work to try to reach God any more. God has reached out to us by sending His Son to us. God sent His Son, not just to set an example for us to live by, but to provide the sacrifice we needed to have to cover over our sins, and to provide a death that would give a final blow to the Enemy of our souls. None of that is provided for in the Q'ran or the book of Mormon. There is no God reaching down to His people in those books.