Christ's Superior Nature

Grace To You.org ^ | 1993 | John MacArthur, Grace Community Church

[metmom]

"Of the angels He says, 'Who makes His angels winds, and His ministers a flame of fire.' But of the Son He says, 'Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever'" (Heb. 1:7-8).

Jesus Christ is God, and He created the angels.

People today who claim that Jesus was just a man, an angel, a prophet, or some inferior god are in error and bring upon themselves the curse of God. The Bible, and especially the writer of Hebrews, are clear about who Christ is.

First, the writer deals with the nature of angels when he says, "Who makes His angels winds, and His ministers a flame of fire." "Makes" simply means "to create." The antecedent of "who" is Christ. Therefore it is obvious that Christ created the angels.

They are also His possession: "His angels." They are His created servants, who do not operate on their own initiative, but on the direction of Christ.

But the greatest difference between the nature of angels and Christ is that He is the eternal God. The Father says to the Son, "Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever." That is one of the most powerful, clear, emphatic, and irrefutable proofs of the deity of Christ in Scripture.

Jesus throughout His ministry claimed equality with God. He said, "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30). The apostle John closed his first epistle by saying, "We know that the Son of God has come, and has given us understanding, in order that we might know Him who is true, and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life" (1 John 5:20).

God the Son came to help us understand that God is truth and that Christ Himself is the true God. Our faith is based on the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Suggestion for Prayer

Ask God to give you a greater understanding of the reality that Jesus is in fact God.

For Further Study

Read John 1:1-18 and mark the verses that define Christ's relationship to God. If an unbeliever were to ask you what that passage means, how would you answer him or her?

[metmom]

Studying God’s Word ping

[Ezekiel]

God the Son came to help us understand that God is truth and that Christ Himself is the true God. Our faith is based on the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Suggestion for Prayer

Ask God to give you a greater understanding of the reality that Jesus is in fact God.

Wow. If laying the same 'deity' cornerstone over and over and over weren't a red flag, here's an open admission that the desire is to make the evidence fit the pre-determined belief, when it should be the other way around.

How about just asking God to show the Truth, whatever that ends up being, no matter what settled doctrine it might upend.

Most fear doing that because of teachings like this:

People today who claim that Jesus was just a man, an angel, a prophet, or some inferior god are in error and bring upon themselves the curse of God. The Bible, and especially the writer of Hebrews, are clear about who Christ is.

The Messiah is not 'just a man', as if men are worthless nothings. If he were, he would not be accomplishing all that he does, day and night.

Yet it's the usual case of embrace the Established trinity doctrine, or be cursed by God. Many people believe that the Word of God requires professional processing by these scholarly types just to understand the basics. And if the basics require blind faith (because the doctrines make no normal sense), how would they ever learn of deeper things, save for all the experts?

It's like when the government steps in to solve a problem. The 'answer' is always more government, and people become dependent and conditioned to look to government to save them, the same government that generates the difficulties and confusion in the first place. The Establishment lives to perpetuate itself, to make itself more established. A classic tactic is to convince people that they can't function without its divine wisdom and power to save.

Rogue entities get the treatment, lest others might get 'wrong ideas'. If people get wrong ideas the Establishment knows it has a real problem on its hands.

Moses saw a bush that was on fire but was not burning up. Now that made no sense according to the usual order of the physical world. But there it was. He was looking right at it in plain sight. It was a simple open reality, not a cleverly devised fable that was being marketed as reality. Nobody has needed to write a bazillion words of commentary and explanation over thousands of years to prove the existence of that burning bush. The Torah already states its existence. One either believes the Word of God, or not.

Exodus 3

1 Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb.
2 And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.
3 And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.
4 And when the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.

What Moses didn't do:

pray for a greater understanding of the reality that bushes don't do that.

Moses went over to see. When God saw him do that, God spoke to him.

People can desire the truth, or desire to validate their predetermined realities (which for some reason requires perpetual validation). One of those choices will get God talking, the other isn't going to waste His time.

The religious establishment of Jesus' day had decided that he was not only violating the Torah and breaking the Sabbath, but also that he was claiming to be God. Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.

Suggestion for Prayer (for anyone interested):

Ask God to show you the truth for real, not to validate settled doctrine. Watch what happens if you're serious.

Just don't be surprised if you get hit with the usual snippet about 'private interpretation'.

2 Peter 1:20-21 Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. 21 For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

The prophets were the reviled 'lone nuts' of their day. The Establishment, in contrast, travels in large, roving packs in order to impose the will of man. Odd that for having hundreds of millions or a billion or more followers, it sure seems disproportionately concerned about what a small minority of outlying trinity 'deniers' might say.