Who Is Jesus?
Friday May 24, 2013
When Jesus started His ministry the leaders of the Jews and the people were unsure who He was. Some believed He was from God because of the miracles He performed but others, because of His words, believed he was raving mad because of the claims He made. The leaders of the Jews questioned him repeatedly about His teaching, His miracles and His claim to have come from God. They did not believe that Jesus was from God. They knew He was not born into a royal family and that He was brought up in Nazareth. Other facts about Him they did not know and were not prepared to find out. To some of their questions Jesus replied: “My teaching is not my own. It comes from the one who sent me. Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. On hearing his words, some of the people said, “Surely this man is the Prophet.” Others said, “He is the Messiah.” Still others asked, “How can the Messiah come from Galilee? Does not Scripture say that the Messiah will come from David’s descendants and from Bethlehem, the town where David lived?” Thus the people were divided because of Jesus. Some wanted to seize him, but no one laid a hand on him. (John 7: 16-17; 40-44 NIV)
When the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask John the Baptist who he was John clearly told them that he was not the Messiah. He pointed to another who was currently among them and whose sandals he was not worthy to tie. These leaders also questioned John about why he was baptizing if he was not the Messiah. John, like Jesus, knew who he was and what his purpose was.
John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’” “I baptize with water,” John replied, “but among you stands one you do not know. He is the one who comes after me, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.” (John 1:23; 26 NIV)
The day after this conversation with the Jewish leaders John saw Jesus coming towards him and said: “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is the one I meant when I said, ‘A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’ I myself did not know him, but the reason I came baptizing with water was that he might be revealed to Israel.” Then John gave this testimony: “I saw the Spirit come down from heaven as a dove and remain on him. And I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water told me, ‘The man on whom you see the Spirit come down and remain is the one who will baptize with the Holy Spirit.’ I have seen and I testify that this is God’s Chosen One.” (John 1:29b-34 NIV)
Jesus claimed to be the fulfillment of the Old Testament scriptures, the one who Moses spoke of and the one of whom the Psalms, Isaiah and other prophets prophesied about. When He spoke to the Samaritan woman, whom He had asked for a drink of water, and told her all about her life she was amazed and considered Him to be a prophet. Even more revealing than what He knew about her, are the following words He spoke to her.
The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.” (John 4:25-26 NIV)
Concerning Jesus, C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity, offers a challenge to each of us to consider the claims of Jesus and who we believe Him to be. “I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”
For you know that God paid a ransom to save you from the empty life you inherited from your ancestors. And the ransom he paid was not mere gold or silver. It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless, spotless Lamb of God. God chose him as your ransom long before the world began, but he has now revealed him to you in these last days. Through Christ you have come to trust in God. And you have placed your faith and hope in God because he raised Christ from the dead and gave him great glory. (1 Peter 1:18-21 NLT)
Have you searched the scriptures to know for sure who Jesus is? If you take the time to do so, He will reveal Himself to you.
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