Who is Jesus?

There was a question that Jesus asked in Mathew that we also need to ask again today. Let's look at a brief yet telling piece of Scripture in Mathew 16:13-16.

The setting was that Jesus had already walked on water, fed the five thousand and healed many people. In other words, everyone had heard of the miracles and should have known who Jesus was because He had plainly said who he was. So, as the disciples were gathered together, in verse 13 Jesus asks His disciples "Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?" So they said, "Some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets."

Think about that response. It is the same response that people give today. Some will say that Jesus was a prophet, or a great teacher. I like what C.S. Lewis wrote: "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 a 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 up with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to."

That is a great response by C.S. Lewis.

Then Jesus asked His disciples the question that we must also ask today. Verse 15 says "He said to them, But who do you say that I am?" There it is. That is the question of the ages. Who do you say that Jesus is? You can't answer that question for me, nor can I answer it for you. This I can tell you; we will all have to give an answer to that question. I can tell you the answer that I will give. The same answer that Peter gave in verse 16, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."

Finally, let me leave you with this Scripture in Philippians 2:10,11 to consider. It says, "That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

Who do you say that Jesus is? Think about your answer. God bless.