IS THE BELIEF IN THE DEITY OF CHRIST NECESSARY FOR A ROBUST CHRISTIAN LIFE?

In the official Watchtower publication, Should You Believe in the Trinity, Jehovah’s Witnesses proclaim that:

·       Jesus had an existence in heaven before coming to the earth…the Bible plainly states that in his pre-human existence, Jesus was a created spirit being, just as the angels were spirit beings created by God.

Nevertheless, they believe that Jesus died for our sins and that we have to place our trust in Him. In light of this, is His deity worth fighting over? Doesn’t doctrine divide and create acrimony? Isn’t it enough to believe that Jesus was, at least, a form of deity?

Hopefully, without any acrimony, I’d like to try to explain why this is such a critical doctrine, one that profoundly impacts our lives.

For one thing, God requires that we know, love and worship Him as He truly is. Jesus claimed that this knowledge was essential:

·       “I told you that you would die in your sins; if you do not believe that I am the one I claim to be, you will indeed die in your sins." (John 8:24)

According to Jesus, faith and salvation were a matter of believing what He taught about Himself. In contrast, many today believe that a relationship with God isn’t about believing a set of teachings or doctrines about God, but rather about experiencing Him. Oprah asserted this very thing:

·       “God is about a feeling experience, not a believing experience…A mistake we humans make is believing that there is only one way…There are many paths to what you call God…There couldn’t possibly be just one way…Do you think that if you never heard the name of Jesus but lived with a loving heart…you wouldn’t get to heaven?...Does God care about the heart or if you call His Son ‘Jesus?’” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwGLNbiw1gk

According to Oprah, a relationship with God is a matter of both experience and the quality of our heart. However, we all fail the heart test:

·       As it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” (Romans 3:10-12)

This is why salvation must be by grace and not by our merit or the quality of our heart. Otherwise, we’d our “spiritual superiority” would go to our heads and make us utterly contemptible (Ephesians 2:8-9; 1 Cor. 1:26-29)

Understanding God correctly is not optional. God had been angry at Job’s three friends because they failed to understand and speak rightly of Him:

·       After the LORD had said these things to Job, he said to Eliphaz the Temanite, "I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has. (Job 42:7)

Jesus reaffirmed the fact that we have to approach God bearing a correct understanding. He contrasted a true understanding with the understanding of the Samaritans:

·       “You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the [revelation to the] Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth." (John 4:22-24)

Perhaps we can best understand this connection between truth and worship/relationship if we examine our own relationships. We tend to value those friends who appreciate us for who we really are, rather than people who might appreciate us but for the wrong reasons.

Correct theology really matters. This is why Paul was so intolerant of false gospels:

·       But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed. (Galatians 1:8-9)

The importance of what we belief is inscribed throughout Scripture:

·       Thus says the LORD: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.” (Jeremiah 9:23-24)

If we are to boast about anyone, we should boast about what is of supreme importance – that we know and understand God. Why is God so insistent about truth and correct knowledge? It sounds so arbitrary that God would save us according to faith (including correct beliefs) rather than according to the quality of our lives.

It sounds this way because we fail to see the connection between the new heart and spirit which God grants us and the knowledge (faith) that arises once our heart is regenerated.

Knowing of Christ’s Deity also endears us to our Triune God. Scripture reveals that the cross was a monumental demonstration of God’s love for us:

·       God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. (Romans 5:8-10)

I desperately needed to be convinced of God’s love for me. I had experienced decades of the severest depression and then panic attacks, even into my Christian life. It often felt that God was a cosmic sadist, eating popcorn as He delighted in the freak-show He was observing below.

Even though I wanted to believe otherwise, my feelings allowed no other interpretation. One night as I walked with head to the ground, crying my eyes out, I suddenly realized that this wasn’t a freak-show, and that Christ suffered on the cross for me and even suffered for me now (Heb. 4:15).

However, how could the cross demonstrate God’s love for me? God could have created 50,000 Christs in one second, at absolutely no cost to Himself. However, if Jesus is God and not a created being, this was totally another matter. God actually loved me so much that He Himself died for me! He didn’t send a mere created being to take my place, which would have cost Him nothing. Instead, it was God Himself who had suffered and died for me. This truth alone was able to penetrate my depression with His embrace.

Jehovah’s Witnesses isn’t the only group that obscures the truth of Christ’s Triunity and His love for us. The modalists do the same thing but in a different way. For instance, the United Pentecostal Church claims that Jesus was no more than an appearance of deity, a manifestation – smoke and mirrors. Consequently, God didn’t die for us but rather an appearance of God “died” – hardly a token of God’s love.

I continue to find other evidences of this “big bang” of self-sacrifice that has changed this world. Jesus talked often of His coming moment of glory. How could anyone imagine that this moment would entail His time of pain and humiliation?

·       Jesus replied, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.” (John 12:23-24; 7:39; 13:31)

What love! He so desperately longed to show us His glory, and we thought that this had been fulfilled on the Mount of Transfiguration. However, He was pointing to something even more glorious - His torture and His death, the spit and the naked humiliation – the greatest tokens of His love.

It also served as an example for us of what our own self-sacrifice should look like. (Lord, help us!) Paul argues that if Jesus, God Himself, had humbled Himself to die on the cross, so should we do likewise for others (Phil. 2:3-8).

However, if Jesus isn’t God but rather a created, non-priceless being who was created for the very purpose of dying, this fails to both demonstrate God’s love and glory. It also fails to impress us into self-sacrificial living.

Furthermore, the death of a mere created being fails to humble us by showing us the depths of our sins. In fact, they were so weighty that the blood of animals couldn’t begin to atone for them:

·       Because it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said: "Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me; with burnt offerings and sin offerings you were not pleased. Then I said, 'Here I am--it is written about me in the scroll--I have come to do your will, O God.' " (Hebrews 10:4-7 quoting Psalm 40)

If our sins could have been atoned for in a less costly way, our Savior would have done it that way. However, nothing short of the death of the Savior would suffice! This humbles us more profoundly than would the crucifixion of a created being.

It also gives us great confidence. It demonstrates to us that if God loved us so much while we were still His enemies, how much more will He keep and protect us now that He has already paid the price and has converted us into a band of friends and worshippers (Romans 5:8-10).

Even beyond this, the cross of Christ our God communicates that we are rich beyond reckoning. Paul argued that if we have Christ, we have everything. Why? Because in Christ is everything – all Deity (Col. 2:9-10). Before making this life-altering assertion, Paul set forth the Deity of Christ – “the image of the invisible God…by Him all things were created…and hold together…all [God’s] fullness dwells in Him” (Col. 1:13-21). Therefore, we really do have everything, along with the assurance that we are co-heirs with Christ (Rom. 8:17).

Because of these surpassing riches, we should never be tempted to think that we lack anything. We need to know that we are safe and beloved as we venture forth every morning into the discouragements of this life. The fact that God Himself died for us while we were still sinners can give us this assurance, especially as we drink deeply from the truth of our own unworthiness (Luke 17:10).

Theology – the truths of God – deeply matter. They also transform.

OPRAH, INTERFAITH CONNECTEDNESS, AND ONE WORLD RELIGION

There is a great push to unite the people of the world through a shared spirituality. Barbranda Lumpkins Walls interviewed Oprah Winfrey who narrates the Belief film series:

• …which she said is an effort to “connect the dots of every heart’s yearning for something greater than ourselves.” (AARP Bulletin, Oct.2015)

However, Oprah doesn’t simply want to connect dots but also to connect people:

• “I set out to really build this universe of interfaith connectedness, where people could see that other people in different parts of the world are very much like them. Although they might have a different word for the yearning of the heart and the yearning of the spirit that is looking for what I call “God,” it still is the same thing. It is the heart’s yearning to know the origin of its mystery. It’s a heart’s yearning to know the power of the divine in each of our lives. It’s a heart’s yearning to be connected to that.” (“condensed” by AARP)

While Oprah’s idealism is admirable, it requires some examination. We humans already have many things that we share and that should provide common ground. We are born; we die. We have families, and we sacrifice for them. We suffer and find solace in others. We respond to caring concern. We share the same needs for love, appreciation, and significance. Why then must we find a way to meld our religious beliefs or experiences together in light of all the other things we share?

Writing for the Washington Post, author Diana Butler Bass argues that Oprah’s Belief series is a breath of fresh air:

• At a time when many people in Western countries criticize religion as hypocritical, divisive or dangerous, and while large numbers are rejecting religion altogether, Winfrey’s project is a worthy reminder to viewers that religion can heal, restore and transform — and not only fracture. For this reason alone, the show “Belief” deserves respectful attention as it provides a much-needed alternative narrative to the increasing public disdain of faith.

The show delves “into spiritual experience by telling the stories of people within various religious communities.” Notice, it is not about beliefs but experiences. Why only this perspective? It is argued that our differing beliefs have created an impassable chasm, which only bullets can bridge. Instead, both Bass and Oprah hope that our common experiences can bridge the chasm and provide the needed road to inclusiveness:

• In all the world’s religions, older forms of remote and hierarchical authority — not to mention the very idea of a distant and monarch-like God — are being challenged by ordinary people as they pray, worship, walk pilgrimages and seek the divine in nature and neighborhoods…The age of top-down religion is over. That age is being replaced by an age in which even people who faithfully maintain distinctive religious identities are engaging in do-it-yourself spiritual journeys that often lead in remarkably similar directions of love, healing and justice toward a God (or gods) close at hand.

However, “top-down religion” has created community. What makes Bass suppose that this move towards the New Age of the subjective and experiential will provide a better glue? For one thing, Bass thinks that with the move away from doctrine and religious authorities, a “spiritual democracy” will arise, based on everyone’s private experiences.

• As people remake religion for themselves today, they are replacing adherence to fixed doctrine with the personal power of spiritual experience to transform their lives.

But how does this move transform their lives in a positive way? How does it bring world harmony and inclusion?

• The shift amounts to a storming of heaven and dragging the holy here, to earth. All around the world, people are discovering that God — or the gods, or the Goddess, or the spirit of awe — is nearer than has often been taught and that the divine can be accessed by anyone anywhere. Indeed, every person has a responsibility for his or her own spiritual life.

How do we know that we can connect with God through these experiences alone? Perhaps instead, this “storming of heaven,” is actually a storming of the demonic. Sadly, New Age thinking seems to be unwilling to consider this possibility.

Bass seems to assume that, if the old dogma set put aside, we will share common spiritual experiences and will be able to achieve world peace based upon this. However, it is questionable that, as we assume “responsibility for his or her own spiritual life,” we will be drawn together rather than drift apart in our own subjective, idiosyncratic worlds, linked only by the lotus position.

• Ultimately, “Belief” is about the relocation of religious authority and the return to an experiential definition of “belief.” It reveals that ours is an age of spiritual uprising: In every faith tradition, in every corner of the globe, men and women are discovering that faith is an encounter of love and that human beings can trust themselves to find God and grace wherever the sacred might be discerned. 

When experience reigns, the pursuit truth has to be set aside. How do we know when we are discerning the sacred? Well, we are just supposed to focus on the experience itself. However, Bass is giving her own interpretation of the experience as “sacred” but without any rationale. She is imposing her own theology but without any attempt to justify it.

Although there are many common elements in our experiences, is there any reason to believe that this will contribute to human connectedness? It reminds me of the various communist attempts to create a paradise. They built towns where everyone lived in the same apartments and performed the same work. The apartments were purposely constructed with thin walls to bring people together and remove the inevitable barriers. However, this unsustainable system bred alienation, suspicion, and distrust and, of course, the extermination of 100,000,000 in a very short time.

Idealism can have a high price tag. In this case, Oprah’s Belief series is not merely at attempt to find more commonalities but to eliminate the differences. This can be costly. It is also intolerant.

But some destructive differences should be exposed and not tolerated. Some religions promote peace through their shared beliefs, while others teach murder and conquest to achieve their goal of world domination. Wisdom requires us to discriminate among these vastly different religions and not to indiscriminately lump them together under the category of “religion.” Such an unwillingness to appreciate their differences is an unwillingness to understand and to exercise the very justice that will lead to peace.

Why are Bass and Oprah unwilling to make these critical distinctions? It seems instead that they would rather re-invent the wheel and to radically create a new religion characterized by the “relocation of religious authority and the return to an experiential definition of ‘belief’.”

Wouldn’t it instead be better to merely tolerate those religions that seek peace and the well-being of others? Why must they demonize these religions as Bass does:

• “Belief” narrates this often-ignored but startling story: The age of top-down religion is over. That age is being replaced by an age in which even people who faithfully maintain distinctive religious identities are engaging in do-it-yourself spiritual journeys that often lead in remarkably similar directions of love, healing and justice toward a God (or gods) close at hand. 

Are all of these religions “top-down?” Do some also promote “love, healing and justice?” Bass implies that they don’t, throwing them together into the same coffin.

Instead, New Age thought would have us believe that if everyone finds their own corner to meditate to seek their own subjective experiences, the barriers that separate us will suddenly come crashing down. For them, our common experience represents the ultimate model of tolerance and acceptance. Ironically, they too are unwilling to accept those religions that make definite truth claims. However, a close reading of Bass or any New Age thinker reflects the fact that they have their own set of truth claims.

Eckhart Tolle, Oprah Winfrey’s New Age spiritual advisor, degrades ideology (theology), but uses his own ideology to do so:

• If you go deep enough in your religion, then you all get to the same place It’s a question of going deeper, so there’s no conflict here. The important thing is that religion doesn’t become an ideology…the moment you say 'only my belief' or 'our belief' is true, and you deny other people’s beliefs, then you’ve adopted an ideology. And then religion becomes a closed door.

This entire statement is ideological. It is a statement truth, albeit Tolle’s own brand of truth. Tolle complains that ideology creates a “closed door,” but he has just closed the door on many who believe differently.

Do these proponents offer any historical analysis to prove the superiority of experience-based religions? Is there any reason to believe that experiences will promote harmony while believes and certitude about the pursuit of love and justice will not? No!

Instead, in the vacuum created by a religion that demeans objective and universal truth, other ideas and beliefs will inevitably fill this vacuum. We have minds, and they will be thinking thoughts. We can either be proactive, self-reflective, and systematic about our thinking and believing or we can passively and uncritically absorb our thoughts.

Where will these thoughts come from? From society and also from our selfish, self-centered, and arrogant impulses! However, maturity requires that we exercise some degree of self-control over our impulses. Where would this self-control come from after our beliefs about objective love and justice have been disparaged? Well, if experience is the ultimate goal, let’s just act out what we feel!

In contrast to the New Age, it is the teachings of the Bible that have led so many to say “no” to drugs, adultery, hatred, cheating, lying, stealing, and hurting others. These teachings continue to encourage us to overcome our selfish impulses and to put the needs of others before our own.

To Love is to Speak about Sin

It is not fashionable to confront others about their sins. It can even be dangerous as two street preachers recently learned as they preached sin at a gay pride event in Seattle.

Consequently, many want to keep the message positive – sanitized of anything negative. Sin is negative, but sin is inseparable from the Gospel. The Gospel of salvation is not complete without mention of what we have been saved from! Without an understanding of sin and punishment, the Gospel will seem meaningless, perhaps even foolish. Grace has no meaning apart from an awareness of our need for grace. Besides, if we don’t see our need for forgiveness, the idea that God will forgive us is offensive.

When the church was most Spirit-empowered, there was no hesitation to confront the sinner with his sin. In his first evangelistic sermon, Peter pulled no punches:

• “Therefore let all Israel be assured [in light of the miraculous and biblical attestation] and of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.”

Why didn’t Peter keep the message positive? Why did he have to mention “Jesus, whom you crucified?” That would only turn off his audience or even send them into a violent rage, wouldn’t it? No! Instead, they were convicted of their sin, as Peter’s next words indicate:

• When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.” With many other words he warned them; and he pleaded with them, “Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.” Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.

I think that we have a distorted view of love. Perhaps instead of enabling, the most loving thing we can do is to “cut [them] to the heart?” The results argue in favor of this.

Peter also informed his “cut” audience that they had to “Repent and be baptized.” However, people tend to think that they are good and deserving. Therefore, they think that there is nothing they need to repent from. Oprah claims:

• A mistake we humans make is believing that there is only one way…There are many paths to what you call God…There couldn’t possibly be just one way…Do you think that if you never heard the name of Jesus but lived with a loving heart…you wouldn’t get to heaven?...Does God care about the heart or if you call His Son ‘Jesus?’”  

Oprah, as do many other Western gurus, believes that God knows that we are basically good people who possess a “loving heart.” Result – the loving heart enters heaven!

Therefore, our preaching has to first demonstrate that we are not entitled by our allegedly “loving heart” to any of God’s blessings. As long as we think we are entitled, grace can no longer be grace but a payment that we deserve from God by virtue of our goodness (Rom. 4:1-12).

In his next sermon, Peter once again pounds his listeners about their sin:

• The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus. You handed him over to be killed, and you disowned him before Pilate, though he had decided to let him go.  You disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you.  You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. (Acts 3:13-15)

Quite a heavy indictment! We don’t know the fruitage of this sermon, because Peter was immediately whisked away to court. However, before he was grabbed, he preached the only solution for their sin and guilt:

• Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord. (Acts 3:19)

Peter understood faith (3:16). However, it seems that he wanted to emphasize the flip side of the faith coin – repentance. Faith and repentance are inseparable. In order to turn to the Savior – our new life - in faith, we automatically turn from the old life of sin. It is impossible to turn to God without also turning away from something else at the same time! Peter understood that in order to turn to the light, it was imperative to turn from the darkness, and the Jewish people needed to know that they were in darkness, even though they were children of the covenant.

Even before the Sanhedrin, he confronted the leadership with their sin:

• “It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed. Jesus is ‘the stone you builders rejected, which has become the cornerstone (Psalm 118:22).’” (Acts 4:10-11)

Peter was filled with the Holy Spirit. Consequently, he feared God and not men. I think that we need to always pray and examine ourselves. We need to ask God to reveal to us whether we are unduly concerned about the opinions of others at the expense of the opinions of our Lord. Peter brought this message home on his next visit to the Sanhedrin:

• “We must obey God rather than human beings!  The God of our ancestors raised Jesus from the dead—whom you killed by hanging him on a cross.  God exalted him to his own right hand as Prince and Savior that he might bring Israel to repentance and forgive their sins. (Acts 5:29-31)

According to Peter, even the Sanhedrin had to repent in order to receive the mercy of God. One pastor told me that Israel had their own covenant and therefore didn’t need Jesus. However, the entire New Testament demises such a notion. According to Peter, Jesus’ death and resurrection are essential to the forgiveness of all sins, not simply Gentile sins!

Stephen was also filled with the Spirit, but this didn’t lead him to preach a kinder and gentler gospel. He devoted a lengthy sermon (Acts 6 and 7) to show his self-righteous opposition what great sinners they were:

• “You stiff-necked people! Your hearts and ears are still uncircumcised. You are just like your ancestors: You always resist the Holy Spirit! Was there ever a prophet your ancestors did not persecute? They even killed those who predicted the coming of the Righteous One. And now you have betrayed and murdered him— you who have received the law that was given through angels but have not obeyed it.” (Acts 7:51-53)

In order to make his point, Stephen rehearsed the rebellious history of Israel, made plain by Scripture. With this he was preaching to the choir and the choir was listening. He was building a bridge to his ultimate point – that his protagonists were “just like your ancestors!”

All of this doesn’t mean I’m ready to wade into the midst of a gay pride event with a bullhorn. However, it does mean that preaching sin cannot be separated from the Gospel. Stephen’s sermon also suggests that it might be difficult to preach sin and repentance without first having established a beachhead – areas of agreement.

Peter’s and Stephen’s listeners all shared the same Scriptures. This made the accusation of sin easier than it would be at the gay pride rally. I think that this means that we must be in prayer about how and when we speak about sin, but not whether we will speak about it.

The Deity of Christ and why this Matters

 In the official Watchtower publication, Should You Believe in the Trinity, Jehovah’s Witnesses proclaim that:

·        Jesus had an existence in heaven before coming to the earth…the Bible plainly states that in his pre-human existence, Jesus was a created spirit being, just as the angels were spirit beings created by God.

Nevertheless, they believe that Jesus died for our sins and that we have to place our trust in Him. In light of this, is His deity worth fighting over? Doesn’t doctrine divide and create acrimony? Isn’t it enough to believe that Jesus was, at least, a form of deity?

Hopefully, without any acrimony, I’d like to try to explain why this is such a critical doctrine, one that profoundly impacts our lives.

For one thing, God requires that we know, love and worship Him as He truly is. Jesus claimed that this knowledge was essential:

·        “I told you that you would die in your sins; if you do not believe that I am the one I claim to be, you will indeed die in your sins." (John 8:24)

According to Jesus, faith and salvation were a matter of believing what He taught about Himself. In contrast, many today believe that a relationship with God isn’t about believing a set of teachings or doctrines about God, but rather in experiencing Him. Oprah asserted this very thing:

·        “God is about a feeling experience, not a believing experience…A mistake we humans make is believing that there is only one way…There are many paths to what you call God…There couldn’t possibly be just one way…Do you think that if you never heard the name of Jesus but lived with a loving heart…you wouldn’t get to heaven?...Does God care about the heart or if you call His Son ‘Jesus?’”  

According to Oprah, a relationship with God is a matter of both experience and the quality of our heart. However, we all fail the heart test (Rom. 3:10-18; 23). That’s why salvation must be by grace and not by our merit.

Understanding God is not optional. God had been angry at Job’s three friends because they failed to understand and speak rightly of Him:

·        After the LORD had said these things to Job, he said to Eliphaz the Temanite, "I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has. (Job 42:7)

Jesus reaffirmed the fact that we have to approach God bearing a correct understanding. He contrasted a true understanding with the understanding of the Samaritans:

·        “You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the [doctrines of the] Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth." (John 4:22-24)

Why is God so insistent about being worshipped according to the truth of who He is? Perhaps we can best understand this if we examine our own relationships. We tend to value those friends who appreciate us according to who we really are, rather than people who might appreciate us but for the wrong reasons.

An accurate knowledge of God is so valuable that this is the one thing we can boast about (Jer. 9:23-24). For one thing, knowing that when we confess, He forgives our sins is so freeing. It also endears us to Him.

However, knowing of Christ’s Deity also endears us to our Triune God. Scripture reveals that the cross was a monumental demonstration of God’s love for us (Romans 5:8-10). I had experienced decades of the severest depression and panic attacks, even into my Christian life. It often felt that God was a cosmic sadist, eating popcorn as He delighted in the freak-show below.

Even though I wanted to believe otherwise, my feelings allowed no other interpretation. One night as I walked with head to the ground, crying my eyes out, I suddenly realized that this wasn’t a freak-show, and that Christ suffered on the cross for me and even suffered for me now (Heb. 4:15).

However, how could the cross demonstrate God’s love for me? God could have created 50,000 Christs in one second, at absolutely no cost to Himself. However, if Jesus is God and not a created being, this was totally another matter. God actually loved me so much that He Himself died for me! He didn’t send a mere created being to take my place.

Jehovah’s Witnesses isn’t the only groups that obscures the truth of Christ’s Triunity and His love for us. The modalists do the same thing but in a different way. For instance, the United Pentecostal Church claims that Jesus was no more than an appearance of deity, a manifestation – smoke and mirrors. Consequently, God didn’t die for us but rather an appearance of God “died” – hardly a token of God’s love.

I continue to find evidences of this atomic explosion of self-sacrifice that has changed this world. Jesus talked often of His coming moment of glory. How could anyone imagine that this moment would entail His time of pain and humiliation?

·        Jesus replied, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.” (John 12:23-24; 7:39; 13:31)

What love! He so desperately longed to show us His glory, and we thought that this had been fulfilled on the Mount of Transfiguration. However, He was pointing to something even more glorious - His torture and His death, the spit and the naked humiliation – the greatest tokens of His love.

It also served as an example for us of what our own self-sacrifice should look like. (Lord, help us!) Paul argues that if Jesus, God Himself, had humbled Himself to die on the cross, so should we do likewise for others (Phil. 2:3-8).

However, if Jesus isn’t God but rather a created, non-priceless being who was created for the very purpose of dying, this fails to both demonstrate God’s love and glory. It also fails to impress us into self-sacrificial living.

Furthermore, the death of a mere created being fails to humble us by showing us the depths of our sins. In fact, they were so weighty that the blood of animals couldn’t begin to atone for them:

·        Because it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said: "Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me; with burnt offerings and sin offerings you were not pleased. Then I said, 'Here I am--it is written about me in the scroll--I have come to do your will, O God.' " (Hebrews 10:4-7 quoting Psalm 40)

If our sins could have been atoned for in a less costly way, our Savior would have done it that way. However, nothing short of the death of the Savior would suffice! This humbles us more profoundly than would the crucifixion of a created being.

It also gives us great confidence. It demonstrates to us that if God loved us so much while we were still His enemies, how much more will He keep and protect us now that He has already paid the price and has converted us into a band of friends and worshippers (Romans 5:8-10).

Even beyond this, the cross of Christ our God communicates that we are rich beyond reckoning. Paul argues that if we have Christ, we have everything. Why? Because in Christ is everything – all Deity (Col. 2:9-10). Before making this life-altering assertion, Paul set forth the Deity of Christ – “the image of the invisible God…by Him all things were created…and hold together…all [God’s] fullness dwells in Him” (Col. 1:13-21). Therefore, we really do have everything, along with the assurance that we are co-heirs with Christ (Rom. 8:17).

Because of these surpassing riches, we should never be tempted to think that we lack anything. We need to know that we are safe and beloved as we venture forth every morning into the discouragements of this life. The fact that God Himself died for us while we were still sinners can give us this assurance, especially as we drink deeply from the truth of our own unworthiness.