Need a Savior

“Early one Saturday morning Jesus returned to Nazareth to speak in the synagogue.  His friends and relatives and neighbors gathered in great excitement.  They had watched Him grow to manhood; they knew His parents, Mary and Joseph.  So they were astonished at His air of authority as He strode to the center of the crowded stone room and was handed the book of the prophet Isaiah from the Torah shrine.  He found the passage He wanted, then read the ancient prophecy: “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.  he has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
Jesus handed the Scriptures back to the attendant and stared quietly at the rows of townspeople.  “Today,” He said slowly, “Tis Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”
At first there were gasps, then excited murmurings.  Was Jesus claiming that their hopes were to be realized?  had the long-dreamed-of day of the Lord – the coming of Messiah – arrived?
Jesus knew what they were thinking.  “No prophet,” He said steadily, “Is accepted in his hometown.”  Then He reminded them of two stories they knew well from their heritage: During a great drought, the prophet Elijah had brought water not to the dying widows of Israel, but to a heathen widow. and his successor Elisha had ignored Jewish lepers and cleansed a Syrian instead.
His words were like a dash of cold water in the faces of the crowd.  They expected liberation for the Jews and judgment for all others.  Now this arrogant young man was extending the long-awaited promise of their liberation with one hand and insinuating their own judgment with the other.
The crowd surged forward and dragged Jesus out of the building, shoving Him to the brow of the hill on which the synagogue perched.  But when they reached the edge, they discovered that in the confusion, Jesus had slipped away.
This humble message at the remote Nazareth synagogue was the inaugural address for Jesus’ entire ministry.  Through it He formally announced His messiaship and the rule of God in this world.  As a result, human history was forever altered.
The Kingdom of God had come.

(From Kingdoms in Conflict by Charles Colson)



Matthew 3:17

And a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, and I am fully pleased with him.



John 1:1-18

In the beginning the Word already existed. He was with God, and he was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. 3  He created everything there is. Nothing exists that he didn’t make. 4  Life itself was in him, and this life gives light to everyone. 5The light shines through the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it.
6  God sent John the Baptist 7to tell everyone about the light so that everyone might believe because of his testimony. 8  John himself was not the light; he was only a witness to the light. 9The one who is the true light, who gives light to everyone, was going to come into the world.
10  But although the world was made through him, the world didn’t recognize him when he came. 11Even in his own land and among his own people, he was not accepted. 12  But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. 13They are reborn! This is not a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan—this rebirth comes from God.
14  So the Word became human and lived here on earth among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness.£ And we have seen his glory, the glory of the only Son of the Father.
15John pointed him out to the people. He shouted to the crowds, “This is the one I was talking about when I said, ‘someone is coming who is far greater than I am, for he existed long before I did.’”
16We have all benefited from the rich blessings he brought to us—one gracious blessing after another.£ 17  For the law was given through Moses; God’s unfailing love and faithfulness came through Jesus Christ. 18  No one has ever seen God. But his only Son, who is himself God,£ is near to the Father’s heart; he has told us about him.

What Jesus taught and what he did are tied inseparably to who he is. John shows Jesus as fully human and fully God. Although Jesus took upon himself full humanity and lived as a man, he never ceased to be the eternal God who has always existed, the Creator and Sustainer of all things, and the source of eternal life. This is the truth about Jesus, and the foundation of all truth. If we cannot or do not believe this basic truth, we will not have enough faith to trust our eternal destiny to him. That is why John wrote this Gospel—to build faith and confidence in Jesus Christ so that we may believe that he truly was and is the Son of God (20:30, 31).

John wrote to believers everywhere, both Jews and non-Jews (Gentiles). As one of Jesus’ 12 disciples, John was an eyewitness so his story is accurate. His book is not a biography (like the book of Luke); it is a thematic presentation of Jesus’ life. Many in John’s original audience had a Greek background. Greek culture encouraged worship of many mythological gods, whose supernatural characteristics were as important to Greeks as genealogies were to Jews. John shows that Jesus is not only different from but superior to these gods of mythology.

What does John mean by “the Word”? The Word was a term used by theologians and philosophers, both Jews and Greeks, in many different ways. In Hebrew Scripture, the Word was an agent of creation (Psalm 33:6), the source of God’s message to his people through the prophets (Hosea 4:1), and God’s law, his standard of holiness (Psalm 119:11). In Greek philosophy, the Word was the principle of reason that governed the world, or the thought still in the mind, while in Hebrew thought, the Word was another expression for God. John’s description shows clearly that he is speaking of Jesus (see especially 1:14)—a human being he knew and loved, but at the same time the Creator of the universe, the ultimate revelation of God, the living picture of God’s holiness, the one who “holds all creation together” (Colossians 1:17). To Jewish readers, to say this man Jesus “was God” was blasphemous. To Greek readers, “the Word became human” (1:14) was unthinkable. To John, this new understanding of the Word was the Good News of Jesus Christ.

When God created, he made something from nothing. Because we are created beings, we have no basis for pride. Remember that you exist only because God made you, and you have special gifts only because God gave them to you. With God you are something valuable and unique; apart from God you are nothing, and if you try to live without him, you will be abandoning the purpose for which you were made.

Do you ever feel that your life is too complex for God to understand? Remember, God created the entire universe, and nothing is too difficult for him. God created you; he is alive today, and his love is bigger than any problem you may face.

“The darkness can never extinguish it” means the darkness of evil never has and never will overcome God’s light. Jesus Christ is the Creator of life, and his life brings light to humankind. In his light, we see ourselves as we really are (sinners in need of a Savior). When we follow Jesus, the true Light, we can avoid walking blindly and falling into sin. He lights the path ahead of us so we can see how to live. He removes the darkness of sin from our lives. Have you allowed the light of Christ to shine into your life? Let Christ guide your life, and you’ll never need to stumble in darkness.
We, like John the Baptist, are not the source of God’s light; we merely reflect that light. Jesus Christ is the true Light; he helps us see our way to God and shows us how to walk along that way. But Christ has chosen to reflect his light through his followers to an unbelieving world, perhaps because unbelievers are not able to bear the full blazing glory of his light firsthand. The word witness indicates our role as reflectors of Christ’s light. We are never to present ourselves as the light to others, but are always to point them to Christ, the Light.

All who welcome Jesus Christ as Lord of their lives are reborn spiritually, receiving new life from God. Through faith in Christ, this new birth changes us from the inside out—rearranging our attitudes, desires, and motives. Being born makes you physically alive and places you in your parents’ family (1:13). Being born of God makes you spiritually alive and puts you in God’s family (1:12). Have you asked Christ to make you a new person? This fresh start in life is available to all who believe in Christ.

“The Word became human.” By doing so, Christ became (1) the perfect teacher—in Jesus’ life we see how God thinks and therefore how we should think (Philippians 2:5-11); (2) the perfect example—as a model of what we are to become, he shows us how to live and gives us the power to live that way (1 Peter 2:21); (3) the perfect sacrifice—Jesus came as a sacrifice for all sins, and his death satisfied God’s requirements for the removal of sin (Colossians 1:15-23).

“The only Son of the Father” means Jesus is God’s only and unique Son. The emphasis is on unique. Jesus is one of a kind and enjoys a relationship with God. He is unlike all believers, who are called “children of God.”

When Jesus was born, God became a man. He was not part man and part God; he was completely human and completely divine (Colossians 2:9). Before Christ came, people could know God partially. After Christ came, people could know God fully because he became visible and tangible in Christ. Christ is the perfect expression of God in human form. The two most common errors people make about Jesus are to minimize his humanity or to minimize his divinity. Jesus is both God and man.

Law and grace (“God’s unfailing love and faithfulness”) are both aspects of God’s nature that he uses in dealing with us. Moses emphasized God’s law and justice, while Jesus Christ came to highlight God’s mercy, love, faithfulness, and forgiveness. Moses could only be the giver of the law, while Christ came to fulfill the law (Matthew 5:17). The nature and will of God were revealed in the law; now the nature and will of God are revealed in Jesus Christ. Rather than coming through cold stone tablets, God’s revelation now comes through a person’s life. As we get to know Christ better, our understanding of God will increase.

God communicated through various people in the Old Testament, usually prophets who were told to give specific messages. But no one ever saw God. Jesus is both God and the Father’s unique Son. In Christ, God revealed his nature and essence in a way that could be seen and touched. In Christ, God became a man who lived on earth.



John 10:30

The Father and I are one.”

This is the clearest statement of Jesus’ divinity he ever made. Jesus and his Father are not the same person, but they are one in essence and nature. Thus, Jesus is not merely a good teacher—he is God. His claim to be God was unmistakable. The religious leaders wanted to kill him because their laws said that anyone claiming to be God should die. Nothing could persuade them that Jesus’ claim was true.



Colossians 1:15-20

Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. He existed before God made anything at all and is supreme over all creation.£ 16  Christ is the one through whom God created everything in heaven and earth. He made the things we can see and the things we can’t see—kings, kingdoms, rulers, and authorities. Everything has been created through him and for him. 17  He existed before everything else began, and he holds all creation together.
18  Christ is the head of the church, which is his body. He is the first of all who will rise from the dead,£ so he is first in everything. 19  For God in all his fullness was pleased to live in Christ, 20  and by him God reconciled everything to himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of his blood on the cross.

This is one of the strongest statements about the divine nature of Christ found anywhere in the Bible. Jesus is not only equal to God (Philippians 2:6), he is God (John 10:30, 38; 12:45; 14:1-11); as the visible image of the invisible God, he is the exact representation of God. He not only reflects God, but he reveals God to us (John 1:18; 14:9); as supreme over all creation, he has all the priority and authority. He came from heaven, not from the dust of the earth (1 Corinthians 15:47), and he is Lord of all (Romans 9:5; 10:11-13; Revelation 1:5; 17:14). He is completely holy (Hebrews 7:26-28; 1 Peter 1:19; 2:22; 1 John 3:5), and he has authority to judge the world (Romans 2:16; 2 Corinthians 5:10; 2 Timothy 4:1). Therefore, Christ is supreme over all creation, including the spirit world. We, like the Colossian believers, must believe in the deity of Jesus Christ (that Jesus is God) or our Christian faith is hollow, misdirected, and meaningless. This is a central truth of Christianity. We must oppose those who say that Jesus was merely a prophet or a good teacher.

In the Colossian church there were several misconceptions about Christ that Paul directly refuted: (1) Believing that matter is evil, false teachers argued that God would not have come to earth as a true human being in bodily form. Paul stated that Christ is the image—the exact likeness—of God and is himself God, and yet he died on the cross as a human being. (2) They believed that God did not create the world because he would not have created evil. Paul proclaimed that Jesus Christ, who was also God in the flesh, is the Creator of both heaven and earth. (3) They said that Christ was not the unique Son of God but rather one of many intermediaries between God and people. Paul explained that Christ existed before anything else and is the firstborn of those resurrected. (4) They refused to see Christ as the source of salvation, insisting that people could find God only through special and secret knowledge. In contrast, Paul openly proclaimed the way of salvation to be through Christ alone. Paul continued to bring the argument back to Christ. When we share the Good News, we, too, must keep the focus on Christ.

Because the false teachers believed that the physical world was evil, they thought that God himself could not have created it. If Christ were God, they reasoned, he would be in charge only of the spiritual world. But Paul explained that all the kings, kingdoms, rulers, and authorities of both the spiritual and physical worlds were created by and are under the authority of Christ himself. This includes not only the government but also the spiritual world that the heretics were so concerned about. Christ has no equal and no rival. He is the Lord of all.

God is not only the creator of the world but he is also its sustainer. In him, everything is held together, protected, and prevented from disintegrating into chaos. Because Christ is the sustainer of all life, none of us is independent from him. We are all his servants who must daily trust him to protect us, care for us, and sustain us.

Christ is the “first of all who will rise from the dead.” Jesus was raised from death, and his resurrection proves his lordship over the material world. All who trust in Christ will also defeat death and rise again to live eternally with him (1 Corinthians 15:20; 1 Thessalonians 4:14). Because of Christ’s death on the cross, he has been exalted and elevated to the status that was rightfully his (see Philippians 2:5-11). Because Christ is spiritually supreme in the universe, surely we should give him first place in all our thoughts and activities. See the second note on Luke 24:6, 7 for more about the significance of Christ’s resurrection.

By this statement, Paul was refuting the Greek idea that Jesus could not be human and divine at the same time. Christ was fully human; he was also fully divine. Christ has always been God and always will be God. When we have Christ, we have all of God in human form. Don’t diminish any aspect of Christ—either his humanity or his divinity.

Christ’s death provided a way for all people to come to God. It cleared away the sin that keeps us from having a right relationship with our creator. This does not mean that everyone has been saved but that the way has been cleared for anyone who will trust Christ to be saved. We can have peace with God and be reconciled to him by accepting Christ, who died in our place. Is there a distance between you and the Creator? Be reconciled to God. Come to him through Christ.

Ramblings

Who is Jesus?  Don’t try to squeeze him into your own mold of a Savior.  The Bible gives a clear picture.  Study the Word of God and discover the real Jesus: God in the flesh who wants to change lives.