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6. The Son of Man

The title that Jesus most often used when speaking of Himself, and which therefore appears to have been His favorite title, was, “Son of Man.” This much discussed title, whatever else it may mean, certainly was designed to call attention to the fact that He possessed real humanity. He is the representative man. We can point to Him and say, There is real manhood. In Him human nature is seen at its perfection, functioning as was intended when it left the hands of the Creator. He is the ideal after whom all others should pattern their lives. And since He thus possessed human nature in His own Person, He is vitally related to all other members of the human race and, by Divine appointment, is capable of acting as their representative before God.

The name ‘Son of God’ has its origin in the heavenlies. It harks back to that supersensitive region where the Council of Redemption met. At that Conference, as we know, the several persons of the Holy Trinity met to discuss redemption and to draw up a redemption program. Redemption strategy was determined upon. And since the proposed program of salvation for mortal men required the incarnation of Deity it had to be determined upon which of the three persons this task logically devolved. And for it the Son was indicated. Not the Father, nor the Spirit, but the Son was to be made after the fashion of men. He was to become very man, become such by assuming human nature, by becoming ‘Son of Man’ in a word. And that appellation became the exclusive property of the Son henceforth. This gives us the necessary background to any fair evaluation of the name ‘Son of Man.’ Needless to say, a generation of thinkers that is quite careless concerning the momentous doctrine of Christ's preexistence has by its very bias of unbelief insulated itself against a proper appreciation of the name ‘Son of Man.’
7. The Pre-Existence of Christ

In a rather remarkable series of statements Jesus conveys to our minds the idea that His existence did not merely begin when He was born in Bethlehem, but that He “came” or “descended” from heaven to earth, or that He was “sent” by the Father. Furthermore, Jesus teaches not only that He existed before coming into the world, but that He has existed from eternity. “And now, Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was,” John 17:5. “For thou (Father) lovedst me before the foundation of the world,” John 17:24. “Before Abraham was born, I am,” John 8:58, - a statement which infers that the ground of His existence is within himself, and which also is reminiscent of the “I Am That I am,” the name by which Jehovah announced Himself to Moses in the wilderness as the self-existent, eternal God. In fact, Jesus here applies to Himself the name which since the time of Moses had been known as the name of the eternal God.

And in the book of Revelation the risen and glorified Christ says of Himself, “I an the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end,” 22:13. Thus in explicit terms Jesus teaches not only His pre-existence but His eternal pre-existence. The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today, yea and for ever,” 13:2. And Isaiah described the promised Messiah not only as the “Wonderful Counsellor” and “Prince of Peace,” but as the “Mighty God” and as the “Everlasting Father,” 9:6.

In all the history of the world Jesus emerges as the only “expected” person. It is quite evident that the doctrine of the pre-existence of Christ is a vital factor in any proper understanding of His Person. In our study of Jesus Christ it is of the utmost importance that we interpret His life in the light of His pre-existence. It is important, in the first place, in order that we may keep constantly before us the fact that the Incarnation was not simply the birth of a great man but rather the entering into human conditions of the only-begotten Son of God, and hence that we may ever realize that in Jesus Christ we are face to face with the God-man. It is important, in the second place, in or that we may adequately appreciate the service He has rendered for us. It is simply impossible adequately to appreciate what Jesus has done for us unless we remember that the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto but to minister and give His life a ransom for many.

8. The Attributes of Deity Are Ascribed to Christ

Throughout the New Testament we find that the attributes of Deity are repeatedly ascribed to Christ, and that not merely in a secondary sense such as might be predicated of a creature but in such a sense as is applicable to God alone.

1. Holiness: “Thou art the Holy one of God,” John 6:69. Peter affirms that he “did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth,” I Peter 2:22. Even the demons bore witness that he was “the Holy one of God,” Luke 4:34.
2. Eternity: “In the beginning was the Word,” John 1:1. “Before Abraham was born, I am,” John 8:58. “The glory which I had with thee (the Father) before the world was,” John 17:5. “Thou (Father) lovedst me before the foundation of the world,” John 17:24.
3. Life: “In Him was life,” John 1:4. “I am the way, and the truth, and the life: no one cometh unto the Father, but by me,” John 14:6. “I am the resurrection, and the life,” John 11:25.
4. Immutability: “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today, yea and for ever,” Heb. 13:8.
5. Omnipotence: “All authority has been given unto me in heaven and on earth,” Matt. 28:18. “All things have been delivered unto me of my Father,” Matt. 11:27.
6. Omniscience: John 16:30, Mat. 9:4. John 2:24. John 6:64.
7. Omnipresence: John 1:18, Matt. 28:20, Eph. 1:23.
8. Creation: John 1:3, Col. 1:16,17 ; Heb. 1:8,10 ; I Cor. 8:6.
9. Authority to Forgive: Mark 2:5-12, Matt. 26:28, Luke 24:47, John 1:29, Acts 10:43, Col. 1:14, I John 1:7.
10. The Author of Salvation; The Object of Faith: John 3:16, Acts 16:31, John 14:1, John 3:16,18; John 11:26, John 12:44,45; John 6:28-40, John 15:5,6; John 10:9, John 10:27,28; Rev. 2:10, Acts 4:12, Matt. 10:32, John 8:24, Matt. 1:21, John 20:31.
11. Prayer and Worship are Ascribed to Jesus: John 14:13, John 16:23,24; Matt. 2:11, Matt. 14:33, John 9:38, John 20:28, Matt. 28:17, Luke 24:51,52; John 5:23, Acts 7:59, Acts 16:31, Rom. 10:13, Phil. 2:10,11, II Peter 3:8, Rev. 5:12,13; II Cor. 13:14.
12. Judgment of All Men: John 5:22-29, Matt. 7:21-23, Acts 10:42, II Cor. 5:10.

 

 

Omniscience:
“Christ, in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge hidden,” Col. 2:3. “No one knoweth the Son, save the Father; neither doth any know the Father, save the Son,” Matt. 11:27, - a declaration in which Jesus Himself implies that the personality or being of the Son is so great that only God can fully comprehend it, and that the knowledge of the Son is so unlimited that he can know God to perfection; in other words, a declaration that His knowledge is infinite. Certainly the Gospels present Jesus as endowed with absolute and unlimited knowledge and foresight. Concerning this general theme Dr. J. Ritchie Smith has said: “How well He read the heart is illustrated in the case of Nathanael, of the woman of Samaria, of Judas, and of Peter. He foresaw the future, foretold His death, His resurrection, His return. The map of history was unrolled before Him, and He traced the unfoldings of the old economy, the mighty works to be wrought by His disciples, the overthrow of Satan, the triumph of the kingdom of God. Earth and heaven, time and eternity, God and man lay open to His view.”

 

Omnipresence:
“The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father,” John 1:18. Here John declares that although Christ became incarnate and lived on earth His communion with the Father nevertheless continues in the most infinite and unmodified form. he not merely “was” with God, but still “is” with Him, in the fullest sense of the eternal relationship intimated in John 1:1. “No one hath ascended into heaven, but He that descended out of heaven, even the Son of man, who is in heaven,” John 3:13. Calvin has remarked concerning this verse that He was “incarnate, but not incarcerated;” and then he adds: “The Son of God miraculously descended from heaven, yet in such a manner that He never left heaven; He chose to be miraculously born of the virgin, to live on the earth, and to be suspended from the cross; and yet He never ceased to fill the universe, in the same manner as from the beginning.” Christ Himself set forth His omnipresence when he said, “Where tow or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them,” Matt. 18:20; and again, “Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world,” Matt. 28:20. Assembled with His disciples on the Mount of Olives after His resurrection, He assured them of His continued presence and power and declared that His influence with them would be, not that of a dead teacher, but of a living presence. Being thus everywhere present, He is always accessible, able to guard and comfort His people so that no affliction or suffering but such as He sees to be for their own good can come upon them. And a remarkable fact which appears as we read the New Testament is that after His resurrection His living presence was more real to His disciples than His bodily presence ever had been before His death, their conviction concerning Him then became a conquering power whereas before His death their estimate of Him was always wavering and doubtful. Paul teaches the omnipresence of Christ when he refers to “the fullness of Him that filleth all in all,” Eph. 1:23.

 

 

Authority to Forgive Sins:In instituting the Lord's Supper Jesus made it plain that the “remission of sins” was to be accomplished through His shed blood, Matt. 26:28. After His resurrection He declared to the disciples that “repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name unto all the nations,” Luke 24:47. John the Baptist bore witness to Him as “the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world.” John 1:29. Peter declares that “every one that believeth on Him shall receive remission of sins,” Acts 10:43. Paul refers to Him as “the Son of His love; in whom we have our redemption, the forgiveness of our sins,” Col. 1:14. And John declares that “the blood of Jesus His Son cleanseth us from all sin,” I John 1:7.

To assume the authority to forgive sins is to assume one of the prerogatives of God. And to assume that authority unjustly is, of course, a very heinous offense. This, Paul tells us, is the offense of “the man of sin,” “the son of perdition,” who, he adds, “opposeth and exalteth himself against all that is called God or that is worshipped; so that he sitteth in the temple of God, setting himself forth as God,” II Thess. 2:3,4. But Christ claims this authority, and in doing so very definitely sets Himself forth as God. It is interesting to note just here that the Unitarians, who place a disproportionate emphasis on Christ's example to the detriment of His saviourhood, refuse to follow His example when He sets himself over against His disciples and all others as the one who forgives sins.

The Author of Salvation; The Object of Faith:
Faith in Christ is involved in, and in fact is declared to be identical with, faith in God: "And Jesus cried and said, he that believeth on me, believeth not n me but on Him that sent me. And He that beholdeth me beholdeth Him that sent me," John 12:44,45. "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: and I give unto them eternal life," John 10:27,28. "And this is life eternal, that they should know thee the only true God, and Him whom thou didst send, even Jesus Christ," John 17:3. "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest," Matt. 11:28. "Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee the crown of life," Rev. 2:10. Even the name "Jesus" is not of human but of divine origin, and is the equivalent of the Hebrew "Joshua," meaning "Savior." "These (things) are written that ye may believe that jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye may have life in His name," John 20:31.
These are indeed exceedingly great and precious promises. Certainly they make clear that faith in Christ is necessary for salvation, and that apart from Him there is no salvation. It is impossible for any one to make more stupendous claims than Jesus makes concerning His own Person and His influence over the lives of others. As Dr. Charles Hodge has said, "It is obvious that the infinite God Himself can neither promise nor give anything greater of higher than Christ gives to His people. To Him they are taught to look as the source of all blessing, the giver of every good and perfect gift. There is no more comprehensive prayer in the New Testament than that with which Paul closes his epistle to the Galatians: 'The grace of our Lord jesus Christ be with your spirit,' His favor is our life, which it could not be if he were not our God."

 

Prayer and Worship are Ascribed to Jesus:

It is universally acknowledged that God alone can hear and answer prayer, and that the worship of anything less than Deity is idolatry. Yet Jesus repeatedly sets Himself forth not only as the Revealer of God but as the object of worship. “Whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do,” John 14:13. We read that on numerous occasions Jesus did receive worship while on earth. The Wise-men, having been divinely guided to the Christ-child, when they saw Him, “fell down and worshipped Him,” Matt. 2:11. When confronted with the visible proof of Christ's resurrection, “Thomas answered and said unto Him, My Lord and my God,” John 20:28, - a direct ascription of Deity to Christ, and since it went unrebuked it was the equivalent of an assertion of Deity on His part.

“He parted from them, and was carried up into heaven. And they worshipped Him,” Luke 24:51,52. It is not His teachings nor the principles that He set forth, but He Himself that is the object of faith in religion. on numerous occasions Jesus accepted such worship as perfectly proper. Never did He reject it as improper or as misdirected. Promising that He will hear and answer prayer, that where tow or three are gathered together in His name there He will be in the midst of them, and that He will be with His people always, even unto the end of the world, He laid direct claim to Deity and set Himself forth as the adequate supply of all the spiritual needs of those who trust in Him. In the book of Revelation we read, “Worthy is the Lamb that hath been slain to receive the power, and riches, and wisdom, and might, and honor, and glory, and blessing . . . Unto Him that sitteth on the throne, and unto the Lamb, be the blessing, and the honor, and the glory, and the dominion, for ever and ever,” 5:12, 13.

 

At the beginning of each of Paul's letters we find a prayer in which he couples together on a plane of complete equality the names “God our Father” and “the Lord Jesus Christ” as the common source from which the gifts of grace and peace are sought. Yet to Paul there were not tow objects of worship, nor two sources of blessing, but one. In I Cor. 8:4-6 he calls attention to the fact that we know that “there is on God but one.” Thus throughout the New Testament Christ is everywhere set forth as the proper object of prayer and worship. The relation which He sustains to His people is that which God alone can sustain to rational creatures. As Dr. Warfield has well said, “To the writers of the New Testament the recognition of Jesus as Lord was the mark of a Christian; and all their religious emotions turned on Him . . . To the heathen observers of the early Christians, their most distinguishing characteristic, which differentiated them from all others, was that they sang praises to Christ as God.” And Dr. Hodge says: “Christ is the God of the Apostles and early Christians, in the sense that He is the object of all their religious affections. They regarded Him as the person to whom they specially belonged; to whom they were responsible for their moral conduct; to whom they had to account for their sins; for the use of their time and talents; who was ever present with them, dwelling in them, controlling their inward, as well as their outward life; whose love was the animating principle of their being; in whom they rejoiced as their present joy and as their everlasting portion. True religion in their view consists not in the love or reverence of God, merely as the infinite Spirit, the Creator and Preserver of all things, but in the knowledge and love of Christ.”

Thus we find that throughout the whole range of His activity Jesus does not hesitate to lay His hands on the highest prerogatives of Deity. He claims for Himself, and others readily ascribe to Him, all of the essential attributes of Deity: holiness, eternity, life, immutability, omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, creation, authority to forgive sins, the power to save the souls of men, the right to receive prayer and worship, and the authority to pass final judgement on all men. He promises to be to men all that God can be, and to do for them all that God can do, and so to be God in a more ultimate sense than He is man. To the Unitarians and Modernists who deny the Deity of Christ but who claim to accept Him as a moral teacher it should be perfectly evident that His authority as an ethical teacher stands or falls with His claims to possess the attributes of Deity and to be the object of worship. For if as a mere man He asked and received worship from other men and so led them into idolatry, how can He be considered an authority in teaching men the way to please God? How can we eulogize Him as proclaimer of the Beatitudes and the Golden Rule and at the same time condemn Him for usurping the prerogatives which belong to God alone? It is utterly impossible to accept Christ as a great teacher and yet deny His Deity. We can feel nothing but indignation toward those so-called leaders in the Church who, while rendering lip service to Christ, reject His Deity and criticize irreverently the inspired records of His Person and work. The alternative is clear: Either Jesus is God, or He is not good. Either He is supernatural or sub-normal. Either He was the Messiah as He claimed to be, or He was the greatest imposter that ever walked this earth. Either He possessed and still possesses power to save men, or He has succeeded in perpetuating a fraud which through the ages has victimized innumerably more people than has any other false system.

It is superabundantly clear that a merely human Jesus such as is imagined by the Unitarians and Modernists - a mere man who mistakenly thought of himself as the Messiah possessed of supernatural power, rising from the dead, and sitting as judge over all peoples and nations - could never have made the impression on his followers that the historical Jesus made, and could never have become the source of the stream of religious influence which we call Christianity. The assumption that a deluded fanatic or a deliberate imposter could have given the world what is incomparably the loftiest moral and spiritual system that it ever received is simply ridiculous. “Who is the liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ?”

9. Jesus' Life the Fulfillment of a Divine Plan

As we study the portrait of Jesus as it is presented in the four Gospels there is impressed upon us the teaching that He came to earth on a specific mission, and that His whole life was lived and His work of redemption was accomplished in accordance with a divinely predetermined plan. At least from the outset of the public ministry that plan lay before His mind in clear outline. He had no time to lose, yet He was never in a hurry. He was never the victim but alway the master of circumstance. Unswerved by the opposition of men, He went unflinchingly forward with the work that had been ordained for Him in the counsels of eternity. His whole life was governed by a divine “must” or “necessity.” “I must preach the good tidings of the kingdom of God to the other cities also : for therefore was I sent,” Luke 4:43, said He early in His ministry.
In discussing His preexistence we have already cited verses which teach that he “came” or “was sent” to perform a specific mission. His final journey to Jerusalem, His rejection by the chief priests and elders, Judas' betrayal, His arrest, sufferings, death by crucifixion, and His resurrection on the third day, were not merely predicted but were presented as necessary in the fulfillment of His mission. For a Divine Person to undertake such a mission involved humiliation at every point. Not only was there humiliation in the poverty, weariness and hunger which He endured, in the persistent opposition which was carried on by His opponents, in the public rejection of Him by the rulers in Church and State, and in His final suffering, death and burial. In the first place it involved deep humiliation for a Divine Person to submit Himself to human birth, to exist as a helpless babe, and to experience for a period of thirty-three years the whole series of limitations and weaknesses to which human nature is subject. Every suggestion of escape from it, whether by the use of His supernatural powers for personal gratification, or of evading or lessening His suffering, was treated by Him as a temptation from the Devil.

 

 

There can be no doubt but that in His teaching Jesus presented Himself not as one needing salvation but as the Saviour of men, not as a member of the Church but as the head of the Church, not as the example but as the object of faith, not merely as a suppliant praying to God but as the one to whom prayer is to be made, not merely as a teacher of men but as their sovereign Lord. If Jesus was only a man, not essentially different from the rest of us, then, of course, there would be no reason why we should accept His statements as binding on our conscience. In that case we would be warranted in classing Him along with Socrates, Plato, Confucius, etc., as one of the world's wisest and most influential teachers. But if He as the Person He claimed to be, Deity incarnate, he has the fullest right to speak to us in this authoritative tone and we do but show ordinary common sense when we heed His voice as the voice of God.

 

 

10. The Miracles of Jesus

Another special proof of the Deity of Christ is that afforded by His miracles. A miracle may be defined as an event in the external credit a message or a messenger. The miracles wrought by Jesus differed from those wrought by the prophets or the apostles in that they were wrought by His own inherent power rather than by power delegated to Him. When Jesus healed the sick, or cast out demons, or raised the dead, or calmed the raging sea, it was by exercise of His own limitless power. “The works that I do in my Father's name, these bear witness of me,” said He to the Jews in Jerusalem, John 10:25. “If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. But if I do them, though ye believe not me, believe the works; that ye may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father,” John 10:37,38.

Since the laws of nature have been ordained of God they can be changed or suspended only by Him. And in every instance where Jesus exercised that power He manifested His glory and thus gave visible proof of His Deity to those who had eyes to see. But more important, of course, than the miracles wrought by Jesus was His teaching, which in its insight and its foresight was as supernatural as were His miracles and manifested His Deity as clearly as did they. Moreover, it was with authority, very much unlike that of the scribes and Pharisees. That the miracles of Jesus were designed to prove His Deity and to inspire faith on the part of the people, and that they did have exactly that effect on unprejudiced minds, is clearly stated in the Gospel records(John 2:11). The man whose eyes were opened after he washed in the pool of Siloam rebuked the unbelief of the Pharisees(John 9:30-33).

Thomas, the most skeptical of all the disciples, when confronted with the resurrection body of Jesus, was fully convinced and cried out, “My Lord and my God,” John 20:28. Certainly nothing less than this conclusion, as also the conclusion to which Peter came, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,” Mat. 16:16, can explain the miracles of the New Testament. Jesus Himself marvelled that any people could see these mighty works which so wonderfully displayed the limitless power and wisdom and love of God and still not believe (Mark 6:1-6), and in burning language He foretold the judgments which were to be visited on the cities that rejected these signs (Matt.. 10:1-5 ; Luke 10:1-15).