EVIDENCE FOR THE DEITY OF CHRIST IS FOUND IN ALL FOUR GOSPELS

Some critics allege that the deity of Christ only appears in the last Gospel (of John). While these references are more explicit in John’s Gospel, they are also present in the other Gospels. Below are some examples of Jesus’ Words from the Gospel according to Matthew:

•    “For the Son of Man is going to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay each person according to what he has done.” (Matthew 16:27)

•    Matthew 13:41–42 “The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all law-breakers, and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

•    “I tell you, something greater than the temple is here. And if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless. For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”(Matthew 12:6-8)

•    “So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven, but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 10:32-33)

The fact that Jesus received the worship due to God alone. from both man and demon, is even more impressive:

•    Matthew 2:11 And when they had come into the house, they saw the young Child with Mary His mother, and fell down and worshiped Him. And when they had opened their treasures, they presented gifts to Him: gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

•    When he had come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed him. And behold, a leper came and bowed the knee worshiped him, saying, "Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean" (Matthew 8:1,2).

•    Matthew 14:33 And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.”

•    Matthew 28:9 And behold, Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him.

•    Matthew 28:16–17 Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted. (Also Matthew 9:18; Matthew 14:33; Matthew 15:25; Matthew 20:20; Matthew 21:9; Mark 11:9-10; Luke 5:8; Luke 23:42)

•    Mark 3:11–12 And whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they fell down before him and cried out, “You are the Son of God.” And he strictly ordered them not to make him known.

•    Mark 5:6–7 And when he saw Jesus from afar, he ran and fell down before him. And crying out with a loud voice, he said, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me.”

•    Luke 4:41 And demons also came out of many, crying, “You are the Son of God!” But he rebuked them and would not allow them to speak, because they knew that he was the Christ.

•    Luke 24:52–53 And they worshiped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple blessing God.

•    John 9:38 He said, 'Lord, I believe,' and he worshipped him."

TRUSTING GOD IS KNOWING GOD

 

 

It has taken me a long time to learn a simple truth. By praising, rejoicing with thankfulness, and by glorifying our God, we grow strong in our faith:

·       Romans 4:20–21 No unbelief made [Abraham] waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.

Our Lord doesn’t require our praise. However, in love, He requires it because we need it. However, there is another factor involved. Abraham had become “fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.” How? Paul explained that we must know Him:

·       2 Corinthians 1:8–10 For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again.

Abraham too had become convinced of God’s love and trustworthiness as God delivered Him from peril on many occasions, as he passed off his beautiful wife as his sister so that it would go well for him as he sojourned among foreigners (Genesis 20). Kings would take Sarah for their harem, but on each occasion, God restored Sarah untouched to the faithless Abraham. However, through the knowledge of God’s love and protection, Abraham began to trust in Him:

·       Psalm 91:14 Because he holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him; I will protect him, because he knows my name.

·       Psalm 9:10 And those who know [You] put their trust in you, for you, O LORD, have not forsaken those who seek you.

Abraham was taught to know Him so well that He trusted God enough to offer his beloved Isaac as a burnt offering (Genesis 22), convinced that God would restore him.

Our Lord has also been teaching me of His love and trustworthiness through His Word. I had suffered from depression for decades, but I always told myself that I could get through whatever life threw in my path. However, the arrival of panic attacks partnered with my depression to utterly devastate me. The suffering was so intense that I lost confidence in Jesus that I could make it from one day to the next. Therefore, I hated myself.

Consequently, I was unable to believe that Jesus really cared about me. Nor could I shake the thought that He might be a sadistic deceiver no matter how hard I tried to reason it away. However, one evening, as I was praying, I realized that He couldn’t possibly be a sadistic deceiver. Such a deceiving god would never have died for me, an incontestable historical fact!

I could now trust in my Savior. I still shed tears of joy because of this glorious truth. Consequently, thankfulness and rejoicing have become my haven and safe-place as they continue to nurture my faith.

Daniel also came to know His God as trustworthy, even as he was given visions of the approaching trials:

·       Daniel 11:32–33 [The anti-Christ] shall seduce with flattery those who violate the covenant, but the people who know their God shall stand firm and take action. And the wise among the people shall make many understand, though for some days they shall stumble by sword and flame…

As we come to know our God and to trust in Him, we too will be enabled to “stand firm and take action.” Therefore, Jesus had prayed:

·       John 17:26 “I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

By knowing His love and faithfulness, we can stand. Without this knowledge, any provocation can send us fleeing.

 

 

WHY REGARD THE BIBLE AS GOD’S WORDS

 

There are many reasons that we regard the Bible is the Words of God:

1. Personal Experience: We have found it to be transformational (even working miraculously in our lives) and its wisdom to be a supreme guide. Besides, the Holy Spirit has taken hold to open our eyes to His Scriptures.

2. Uplifted Nations: Why had the West become great in the eyes of the World? Only one word is enough of an explanation—Jesus! Even as the Christian West has been rejecting their Christian traditions, their institutions and welfare continue to point to God as their benefactor.

3. Miracles of the Bible: Substantiated by even non-Biblical sources. Miracles are also the underpinning of the Gospel narratives. Consequently, without miracles the story line falls apart

4. Fulfilled Prophecies: About the Messiah, Israel, and the world.

5. Internal Consistency: On a deep level, there is harmony throughout despite having been written by many authors across many cultures and time periods. This points to a single designer with a coherent plan.

6. External Consistency: The Bible coheres with external and accepted knowledge like that of archeology, history, psychology, and science. How could this be possible for a book written over two millennium! Ordinarily, we shouldn’t expect that such an ancient book could provide up an accurate roadmap for our lives in the same way that a buggy whip might enable us to drive a Lexis

7. Consistent Biblical Acknowledgment by its authors that they had been inspired by the Holy Spirit.

8. The Non-Human Nature of the Bible: It criticizes all that we humans find praiseworthy, even the Apostles and the Israelites, while it lauds what we might not find praiseworthy like suffering, neediness, and the broken-hearted.

Each one of these points requires extensive elaboration.

ARE THERE NOW NEW APOSTLES AND NEW REVELATIONS?

The New Apostolic Reformation (NAR), influenced by the Prosperity Ministry, claims to be restoring apostles and prophets to the church. And they call it a reformation, because they say it will completely change the way church is done, and that it will be greater than the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation. Consequently, they
expect absolute submission:

•    If you submit to their leadership, then you too will work mighty miracles. You’ll become part of a great end-time army that will bring about a world revival and cleanse the earth of evil by calling down hailstones, fire, and the other judgments of God described in the New Testament book of Revelation. If you do not submit to their leadership then, at the very least, you will miss out on God’s end-time plans. And if you actively oppose the apostles and prophets, then brace yourself for the fallout. Others must be warned that you are the pawn of a powerful demon, known as the “spirit of religion.” (God’s Super-Apostles; Holly Pivec and Douglas Geivett)

However, their demand for absolute submission isn’t Biblical:

•    “So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed: shepherd the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion, but willingly, as God would have you; not for shameful gain, but eagerly; not domineering over those in your charge, but being examples to the flock. (1 Peter‬ ‭5‬:‭1‬-‭3‬)

As a result, the NAR domination of their followers has often proved destructive:

•    I have personally witnessed the devastation of the many wounded people left in its wake. I’ve watched unsuspecting Christians who are hungry for revival become swept up in a movement that promises unity, renewal, and even miracles only to deliver confusion, empty promises, and manipulation.” (Introduction, Counterfeit Kingdom: The Dangers of New Revelation, New Prophets, and New Age Practices in the Church, Holly Pivec, R. Douglas Geivett)

They also cite the late Apostle C. Peter Wagner, one of the most influential founders:

•     “The responsibility of pastors is to care for, nurture and comfort the flock. Very few pastors have either the gifts or the temperament to mobilize an army for war. Apostles, on the other hand, do.”

The influence of these Apostles invites abuse and the degrading of the “ordinary” brethren, but they also constitute the “royal priesthood”:

•    But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. (1 Peter 2:9)

However, Wagner claimed:

•    “They are convinced that they would not be able to reach their full destiny in serving God apart from the spiritual covering of the apostle.”

However, according to the Scriptures, we all have a special place in building the body of Christ:

•    On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body. (1 Corinthians 12:22–25)

However, according to the NAR, the NAR CEOs are the greater:

•    [Jesus] said to them, “Whoever receives this child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me. For he who is least among you all is the one who is great.”  (Luke 9:48)

According to Wagner and the NAR, the greatest are the all-powerful and authoritative Apostles, who spell the success or failure of the Church.

However, Jesus taught that the least, the servant, was the greatest:

•    And he sat down and called the twelve. And he said to them, “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.” (Mark 9:35)

However, Geivett and Pivec wrote:

Failure to submit to an apostle is seen as defiance against God. They cite prophet-apostle Bill Hamon:

•    “It is almost impossible for individuals to humble themselves under God without humbling themselves in submission and relationship to Christ’s delegated representatives of Him [the Apostles] to His Church.”

Therefore, these new Apostles are just one step beneath God. However, the Bible teaches that , instead, we are servants of the Word and not these alleged Apostles:

•    The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves. ‭‭(Romans‬ ‭14‬:‭22‬)

Consequently, our only intermediary is the Word of God and not any ecclesiastical authority. Therefore, loving God is matter of abiding in His Word rather than in a human authority:

•    “If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love.” (John‬ ‭15‬:‭7‬-‭10‬)

As the highest authorities, these Apostles are not accountable to anyone but to the Apostles who appoint them. In contrast, the 12 had been appointed by Jesus. Consequently, the NT lists qualifications for the appointment of elders and deacons but never for Apostles. Evidently, it was because there was no further need for more Apostles who had been commissioned to lay the foundation for the Church—the books of the NT:

•    So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone. (Ephesians 2:19–20)

From where does the authority of these new Apostles arise if not directly from Jesus or even from the Scriptures? Seemingly, they appropriate this authority from alleged miracles, charisma, motivational speaking, and from the resulting testimonies.

EVANGELICALISM: DECLINE DOESN’T ALWAYS IMPLY FAULT

 

 

One author argued that evangelicalism is dying because of its rigidity and certainty. I responded:

“You are correct in your assessment of the rigidity of evangelicalism. However, there are many things that require rigidity like our commitment to:

1.               Truth

2.               Love

3.               Justice

4.               Honesty

5.               Integrity

6.               And our families and neighbors.

There is also the need for certainty that:

1.               There is a right and wrong, like genocide and rape are wrong.

2.               Without certainty, we cannot stand against oppression, put our lives on the line, and even resist falsehoods as you are certain you are doing.

It is certainty that prods us evangelicals out of our comfort zones to live sacrificially and to love the unlovable. It is the rejection of certainty that narrows our lives to merely immediate gratification, pleasures, and distractions.

Truth should not be decided by vote or by popular consent. If evangelism is dying, it doesn’t mean that we are at fault, no more than Jesus’ death meant that He had done something deserving of death.”