Wednesday, April 8, 2015

Is Jesus God? (Part 2)

Jesus being God is the foundation of today's Christianity. If this key element is that important, shouldn't Jesus have expressed that himself without any uncertainty?
Shouldn't there be verses where Jesus states "I am God and you should worship me. I have come to die for your sins, so that you will be eternally forgiven"? or at least something along those lines?
Wouldn't his closest disciples understood this to the fullest?

If Jesus is God, why is it that Jesus prayed to God? This would indicate that they are separate, not one.
God has no need to pray to himself. And the argument that Jesus was setting an example isn't logical since many of the below references are Jesus going off by himself and praying.
Mark 1:35Mark 6:46Mark 14:32-41Mark 15:34
Matthew 11:25-27Matthew 14:23Matthew 26:36-46Matthew 27:46
Luke 3:21Luke 5:16Luke 6:12Luke 9:18 , Luke 9:28-29Luke 10:21 ,
Luke 11:1-4Luke 22:31-32Luke 22:39-46Luke 23:34Luke 23:46
John 11:41-42  , John 12:28 , John 17:1-26 , John 19:30
Jesus prays quite a bit, he prays for himself, his disciples, and even the people who condemn him. He even prays to God to dismiss himself from his upcoming death.

So did Jesus actually claim divinity?
Let us look what Jesus actually said according to the Gospels.

According to the Gospels Jesus himself clearly states he is not God...
Mark 10:17-18 - "“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone.""
He denies being good and says only God is good. This is pretty profound, considering even as a human God that is considered Holy, he states he is not good.

John 5:30 "By myself I can do nothing..."
Jesus says he can't do anything by himself. later in the verse he states he seeks to please the one who sent him. Not only does he not have the full power of God alone, he acknowledges that it is God who sent him and that he didn't send himself. \

John 5:19 "Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by himself..."
Same as the previous example. Jesus again saying he can't do anything by himself.

Mark 5:25-34 This passage clearly shows that Jesus was not in control of his power and that it was God who healed people through Jesus.
A woman who had a rare bleeding disorder came to touch Jesus' cloak while he was teaching in a crowd. Once she touched it.... "Jesus realized that power had gone out from him." Jesus turns around and asks who had touched him. This in itself shows that he he didn't purposely heal the women on his own, it was God who had healed her because of her faith. After some time trying to figure out who had touched him... he found her and said “Daughter, your faith has healed you." Not "I" have healed you ... your faith.

John 14:28 "...for the Father is greater than I."
Again Jesus explicitly states he is not God and actually God is greater than Jesus... If Jesus is God and is equal to him.. why would Jesus say he was not equal?

Matthew 24:36 "But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son,[a] but only the Father." 
Another statement from Jesus separating himself from God. Only the Father knows the Day... not Jesus, not man, not the angels, not the Holy Spirit, only the Father.

John 7:16 "“My teaching is not my own. It comes from the one who sent me."" 
John 12:49 "For I did not speak on my own, but the Father who sent me commanded me to say all that I have spoken."
John 8:26 ""But he who sent me is trustworthy, and what I have heard from Him I tell the world.”"
John 14:24 "These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me."
God taught Jesus, God sent Jesus.

John 20:17 "I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God."
Jesus claims he has a God and it is the same God as your God. Also if you notice God is our Father the same as he is Jesus' Father.

Some say Jesus is divine and that he claimed it because many times the priests tried to stone Jesus.  
 Jesus spoke in many parables and his teaching weren't always understood by his disciples let alone some priests that were already biased toward him looking for any little reason to put Jesus to death.

John 10:6 "Jesus used this figure of speech, but the Pharisees did not understand what he was telling them."
Mark 8:21 "He said to them, “Do you still not understand?”"
Matthew 13:34-35 "he did not say anything to them without using a parable."
Jesus spoke in parables and people did not understand.

Luke 18:31-34  "The disciples did not understand any of this. Its meaning was hidden from them, and they did not know what he was talking about."
Jesus describes to the twelve disciples in detail what was about to happen to him, and they didn't understand at all.

John 20:3-10 "They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead."
Even after death they still had no clue.

Acts 19:1-2 "They answered, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.”"
Long after Jesus' death there was no knowledge of Jesus as a triune god by his disciples.

If Jesus claimed to be God and his words were proof of this, why couldn't they convict him of this in his trial even with false witnesses?
Matthew 26:59-60 "...they did not find any, though many false witnesses came forward."
Mark 14:55-56 "The chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin were looking for evidence against Jesus so that they could put him to death, but they did not find any. 56 Many testified falsely against him, but their statements did not agree."

So all the evidence and even false evidence couldn't convict Jesus of blasphemy. Where were all the priests who took up the stones who believed Jesus to claim divinity?
Under Jewish laws at the time, claiming to be God was blasphemy and punishable by death(stoning). Under Jewish law at the time there were many things that you could be put to death for. One example in the Bible is the attempted stoning of the adulterous woman(John 8:1-11). After all the evidence and even people who falsely accused Jesus, the priests were still unable to justify stoning Jesus to death. So they had to take him to the Romans and concocted a scheme for the Romans to put him to death for claiming Kingship equal to the current Caesar.(Jesus considered and admitted to the title "King of the Jews").


Summary of the Facts:
1) Jesus prayed to God. God doesn't need to pray to himself.
2) Jesus referred to God as a separate being from himself and clearly expressed that God was greater than him and that all the knowledge and power he had was given to him by God.
3) Jesus was never convicted for claiming divinity even with false testimony.

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