First Congregational United Church of Christ – Eugene, Oregon

CHRISTIAN BEGINNINGS A Youth/Adult Education Class May, 2018

III The Divinity of Jesus

Christianity arose in the Roman Empire immediately following the death of Jesus around the year 30 C.E. His early followers were all Jews and might therefore be regarded as the first “Jews for Jesus” in human history. But of greater importance is why some of these monotheistic Jews and their successors eventually came to see and worship him as God. At the heart of the Jewish law was the commandment to worship the God of Israel and him alone. How, then, could they reconcile so central a precept of their sacred law with the acknowledgement of Jesus as another divine being? Bart Ehrman, in his provocative book How Jesus Became God, points out that even within Judaism there was a continuum of divine beings and divine power that was compar- able in many ways to that which could be found in paganism. Jews may have believed that there was only one Supreme Being who could be called God Almighty but it was widely held that there were other divine beings—angels, cherubim, seraphim, principalities, powers—who could be worshiped. Throughout the Old Testament, one can find references to angelic visitors and messengers, such as in Job 2 where the “heavenly beings,” some of whom are ranked higher or lower than others, present themselves before the Lord at the heavenly council. In Matthew and Luke’s birth stories, angels are the divine intermediators between God and humans like Mary and Joseph. Some Jewish texts talk about humans becoming angels at death and being worthy of worship. So, if men could be angels, and angels could be gods, then, in the minds of first century people, gods could also be humans. But did Jesus think he was God? It is worthy of note that Jesus is hardly, if ever, explicitly called “God” in the New Testament and that the only sayings of Jesus in which he claimed to be God are found in the —the most theological of the four Gospels. If Jesus went around calling himself God, wouldn’t the other Gospels and writers of the New Testament at least mention the fact? Or did they just decide to skip over that part? Rather than thinking of himself as God, Jesus seemed far more interested in teaching and preaching about the coming kingdom of God. The burden of his message, like that of before him, was an apocalyptic proclamation of the approaching end of the present age and the coming of the Son of Man on the clouds of heaven to rule over the earth. The real question, then, is not whether Jesus thought of himself as God but what both he and his earliest followers thought his role would be in that coming kingdom? There are good reasons for thinking that both Jesus and some of his followers thought of him, not as God, but as the Messiah—the anointed of God. The single most common descriptive title that was applied to Jesus in the early years of the Christian movement was the term Christ—which is the Greek translation of the Hebrew word for messiah. Jesus had no last name, but when the title “Christ” is added to his name, such as in Jesus Christ, it was the same as saying Jesus is the messiah—the anointed of God.

First Congregational United Church of Christ – Eugene, Oregon

It is the conclusion of many scholars that, during his life, Jesus had raised the hopes and expectations of many that he might be the messiah. The most wide-spread understanding of “messiah” during Jesus’ time was that a king would arise from within Israel who would be of the house and lineage of King David. He would be a mighty warrior and skilled politician, who would overthrow the oppressors who had taken over the Promised Land and reestablish both the Davidic monarchy and the nation. It would be a glorious time. While these Jews saw him in political terms, other Jews of a more apocalyptic bent anticipated that this future event would be a more miraculous event in which God would intervene in the course of history to make Israel once more a kingdom ruled through his messiah. The latter believed that this future kingdom would be no ordinary run-of-the mill political system with all its bureaucracies and corruption, but would in fact be the kingdom of God on earth, a utopian state in which there would be no evil, pain, or suffering of any kind. It is believed by some scholars that Jesus, himself, was of this latter persuasion and that he may have thought of himself as the one anointed to rule over this heavenly kingdom on earth. But then both visions were dashed when Jesus was arrested by the authorities, hauled before the Roman procurator, and summarily executed for sedition—and God had done nothing to stop it. That was not how it was supposed to play out in the expectation of either group, and probably not in the mind of Jesus. Rather than destroying the enemy, Jesus was destroyed by the enemy. For all practical purposes, the movement begun in Jesus’ name was just as dead he was. The disciples, it is said, ran away and hid, eventually returning to their homes to resume their former way of life. So if Jesus never spoke of himself as being divine during his own lifetime, and neither did his closest disciples, and if even the messianic hope that he was the anointed of God sent to restore Israel’s temporal glory had crashed and burned—what caused members of his dispirited band and later generations in the church that bore his name to proclaim him “Lord” and to exalt him to equality with the living God as expressed in the boldly audacious claim contained in the letter to the church at Philippi?

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross. Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of . (Philippians 2:5-11)

First Congregational United Church of Christ – Eugene, Oregon

Question for Discussion

1. What do you think it means for Christians to profess that Jesus is the “Son of God?”

2. When do you think Jesus acquired this “divine status?” a) From the very beginning with God as stated in the prologue of John. b) At the time of his , cf. Mark 1:11: “You are my Son the Beloved.” c) Following his post-resurrection “ascension” into heaven where he is seated at the right hand of God (Acts 1:6-11 & Hebrews 12: 2b).

3. If Jesus was not “divine,” but human being like you and me, how do we account for the Bible’s attestations to his healing acts, miracles and resurrection from the dead?

4. If Jesus was not God in human form, then why do you suppose people came to believe that he was, so that today over three billion people identify themselves as believers in and followers of this Risen Christ?

5. What about this topic troubles you or gives you reassurance in your faith?

Next Week “The Savior of the World”