by Jeff Spencer "WHO DO MEN SAY THAT I AM?"
Nearly two-thousand years have passed since the day Jesus questioned His disciples about the thoughts of men concerning His identity. On the road with His disciples that day, Jesus found out that there was already a wide range of opinions concerning who He really was. The fundamental pattern that He discovered was that the men of the world had come to erroneous conclusions while His followers knew His true identity. This pattern continues in the world today. His followers claim that He is the Son of the living God. He is God Almighty, the eternal Second Person of the Trinity who has taken on the additional nature of man. Jesus is the God-Man, who humbled Himself to the position of a servant, lived a perfect, sinless life, died on the cross for the sins of the world, and resurrected in victory over sin and death. He ascended to heaven where He is now enthroned at the right hand of the Father. Consequently, He freely offers eternal life to those who simply believe that He is the Christ (John 3:16; John 4:10; John 20:31; Eph. 2:8-9; 1 John 5:13; Rev. 22:17). On the other hand, the world offers various aberrant theories concerning the identity of Jesus of Nazareth. For example, some say that Jesus is merely legend. Others, such as the Muslims, present a Jesus that is "no more than an apostle" because God "cannot have a son." Oneness Pentecostals teach that Jesus Himself is the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Jesus Seminar, a group of modern liberal "scholars," claims that Jesus is an entirely different figure than is presented in the Bible and early Christian creeds. Yet others hold that Jesus was simply a man who survived the crucifixion and, therefore, could not have risen from the dead. The list goes on and on. From the time Jesus walked the face of the earth, there never has been a shortage of aberrant theories concerning His identity. Even today many continue to re-invent the identity and redefine the work of Jesus of Nazareth. Included in this group of deviant "scholars" who have redefined Jesus are the various cults of Christianity. These are the myriad of groups who claim to be Christian, yet deny one or more of the essentials of the Christian faith. They are especially deviant regarding the person and work of Jesus Christ. With followers who number anywhere from a handful to many millions, these cults are presenting a false Jesus to the world. Since a faith is only as good as the person in whom it is put, a false Jesus means a false faith and, therefore, a false salvation, which yields eternal damnation. The Christology of three cults will be examined below-Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormonism, and the New Age Movement. Each decisively presents a Jesus that is far from the true Jesus. The Jesus of these three groups will be compared and contrasted with the Jesus found in the Bible. In the midst of all the cultic theories and speculations, this activity will help the Christian and the cultist alike come to a better understanding of the true identity of the Lord Jesus Christ. In reality, there can be no more important question that needs to be answered than the one Jesus Himself asked His disciples on the road to Caesarea Philippi: "Who do you say that I am?"
JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES
The Jehovah's Witnesses are a cult who began in the late 1800's by a man named Charles Taze Russell. Since that time, the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society has expanded its outreach into a massive worldwide effort. As a result of the more than one billion man hours spent each year in door-to-door proselytizing, millions of households are visited, thousands of Bible studies are initiated, and millions of pieces of literature are distributed. Even though the Jehovah's Witnesses claim to be followers of the Bible, they are promulgating a false view of God, a false Jesus, and a false gospel. Who do men say I am?
The foremost claim that the Watchtower makes about Jesus is that he is not God. According to the Witnesses, the claim that Jesus is God is contradictory to the revealed Word of God which plainly states that there is only one God, Jehovah. At the core of their denial of the deity of Jesus is a misunderstanding of the doctrine of the Trinity. The Watchtower has vehemently denied the orthodox teaching of the Trinity in an attempt to disprove the deity of Jesus and the Holy Spirit. They claim that the teaching of the Trinity by Christians is an affirmation of three separate Gods. Since they believe that Jehovah is the only true God, Jesus could only be a created being, a perfect human, equal to the perfect man Adam. To prove that Jesus was not God, the Watchtower refers to several Scripture verses. One Scripture that the Jehovah's Witnesses frequently allude to in the quest to disprove the deity of Jesus is John 1:1. The text of the New World Translation renders this verse: "In the beginning the Word was, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a god." The translators justified calling the Word merely "a god," because there is no definite article before theos in the Greek text. They claim that the anarthrous construction points to a quality possessed by Jesus, not an identity held by him. Jesus is "godlike," but he is certainly not Jehovah God. Further, the fact that the Word was "with God" proves that he could not be Jehovah God. "Someone who is 'with' another person cannot also be that other person." There are many other statements in Scripture to which the Watchtower refers in order to prove that Jesus is not Jehovah. The Watchtower quotes John 14:28, "My Father is greater than I," and comments that Jehovah is greater than Jesus in office and person. They also point to 1 Corinthians 11:3, "The head of Christ is God," and claim that since Jesus is a created angel, God is his head. Also, they point to John 3:16, "For God loved the world so much that He gave His only begotten son, in order that everyone exercising faith in him might not be destroyed but have everlasting life" (NWT). They claim that since Jesus is begotten, he is created and, thus, he is not God. This is by no means all the verses used to prove that Jesus is not Jehovah, but these few well illustrate the logic and hermeneutic employed by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society. Another claim the Watchtower makes is that Jesus is a created being. He was created directly by God "thousands of millions of years prior to the creation of the first human." Jesus, in his prehuman existence was a "created spirit being just as angels were spirit beings created by God. Neither the angels nor Jesus had existed before their creation." Moreover, Jesus was created before all the spirit sons of God and he is the only one who was directly created by God. All other things were created through and for Jesus. As a result of his position in creation, he is described as "the second greatest personage in the universe." Citing Colossians 1:15, they claim that Jesus was the "first-born over all creation," reasoning that "first-born" means that he had a beginning. Furthermore, they argue that Revelation 3:14, which states that Jesus was the "beginning of God's creation," proves that Jesus is a being "created by God as the beginning of God's invisible creation." The Watchtower also points to the use of the words "only begotten" in John 3:16 to show that Jesus had a beginning to his life. Having been created, Jesus is presented as a "junior partner" who is in a secondary position to God in time, power, and knowledge. The Watchtower also teaches that Jesus, before being born on earth as a male child, served in heaven as the Word. He became Jesus Christ after being born in Bethlehem. However, the Watchtower teaches that Jesus, in his prehuman and post-resurrection existence, is Michael the Archangel. They claim that because Michael is called "one of the chief princes," "the great prince," and "the archangel" (Dan. 10:13; 12:1; Jude 9), he must necessarily be the Son of God. An example of their reasoning is as follows:
At 1 Thessalonians 4:16, the command of Jesus Christ for the resurrection to begin is described as "the archangel's call," and Jude 9 says that the archangel is Michael. Would it be appropriate to liken Jesus' commanding call to that of someone lesser in authority? Reasonably, then, the archangel Michael is Jesus Christ.
Furthermore, at his resurrection, Jesus retained the name "Jesus" to keep up his identity as the Son of God. He also resumed the identity and title of Michael the archangel to tie in with his prehuman existence. In the Watchtower book, Your Will Be Done On Earth, we read that the post-resurrection Jesus, who resumed the identity of Michael the archangel, took over the reign of heaven "at that time," which is identified by the Watchtower as A. D. 1914. The Watchtower claims that the "very name Michael, asking as it does, 'Who is like God?', points to the fact that Jehovah God is without like or equal and that Michael his archangel is his great Champion or Vindicator." This Vindicator was an angel (Michael) who became a man (Jesus) and then returned to be an angel again. Hence, in keeping with Watchtower theology, Michael/Jesus cannot be God. One final teaching that the Watchtower holds regarding Jesus is concerning his bodily resurrection. Since the Watchtower teaches that the man Jesus resumed the identity and spirit nature of Michael the archangel at his resurrection, they must deny the bodily resurrection of Jesus. Jesus left his human nature (his body) in the grave and was resurrected in the "spirit" only. This was necessary because all in heaven are spirit creatures of God and, thus, have a "divine nature." The reception of this new "divine nature" requires a "new genesis, a new birth, a change in nature through death and resurrection." This is a change from the physical to the spirit. According to the Watchtower, when the physical body dies, a new spiritual body needs to be resurrected. This is precisely what happened to Jesus. His physical body died and he was resurrected in a new spiritual body so that he might enter heaven. The Watchtower explicitly states that Jesus' "resurrection was 'in the spirit,' to life in heaven." In the book Let God Be True, the Watchtower teaches that Jesus was "raised from the grave, not a human, but a spirit." Elsewhere, the Watchtower teaches that Jesus "was not given human life again . . . but was made alive in the spirit." Therefore, since Jesus has forever left behind his humanity and will forever remain a spirit creature, it is impossible that he will return bodily and visibly to earth. This is why they teach that Jesus/Michael returned invisibly in 1914 to reign as king. There are many more Watchtower teachings concerning Jesus that could be explored. However, the ones discussed above will suffice to illustrate that the Jesus of the Watchtower is not the Jesus of the Bible. Consequently, the disciples of Jesus preach a different Jesus than the "men" of the Watchtower.
Who do you say that I am?
Though the Jesus that is presented by the Watchtower may seem logical and even biblical to the average person who has just invited the Witness into his home, he is certainly not the Jesus that has been presented by the Apostles, the early church Fathers, or the body of Christ throughout the twenty centuries since Jesus, the God-Man, walked the face of the earth.
The Deity of Jesus The Trinity and the Incarnation. The orthodox Christian teaching concerning the deity of Jesus was recorded in the Nicene Creed (A. D. 325). This creed recorded the fact that Jesus was fully God and fully man. All heresies concerning Jesus that have been advanced by the unbelieving world have denied one or the other of these. As we have seen above, the Watchtower denies both. The reason for this is a defective understanding of the Triune nature of God. When an understanding of the basic concept of the Trinity is reached, one can understand how one person can be both fully God and fully Man. A concise definition of the Trinity can be stated as one God who eternally exists in three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. God is one in nature, or essence, and three in person. In other words, God is one in one sense, His nature or essence, and He is three in another sense, His personage. These separate persons are equal, have the same attributes, and are equally worthy of worship, adoration, and faith. It is the distinction between essence and person that keeps the doctrine from violating the law of non-contradiction and being heretical teaching. The affirmation that God is one in essence and three in person is really an affirmation that God is one What and three Whos. His What (What He is) is His essence, nature, or being, while His Whos (Who He is) are the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Consider the following chart that illustrates the one Divine nature that is shared by three distinct and separate persons:
Notice that the three Whos (Persons) all share the same What (Essence). So God is a unity of essence with a plurality of persons. Each person is different, yet they share a common nature. This is adequate proof that Christians do not affirm Tritheism, as the Watchtower charges. We affirm one God who is three in Person, one of whom is the Son, Jesus. It must be stated that the Son of God, the Second Person of the Trinity, has been the Son of God and, therefore, He is God from all eternity. Thus, the distinction made by the Watchtower between Jehovah the Creator and Jesus the creature is totally illegitimate. Jesus Christ is the eternal, immutable, infinite God who took on the additional nature of man two thousand years ago in Bethlehem. This Incarnation is one of the deepest and most beautiful truths in Christian theology. It has been defined as "the act whereby the eternal Son of God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, without ceasing to be what He is, God the Son, took into union with Himself what He before the act did not possess, a human nature, and so He was and continues to be God and man in two distinct natures and one person, forever. The Council of Chalcedon (A. D. 451) stated that the one person of Jesus Christ possessed "two natures without confusion, without change, without division, without separation, the distinctiveness of the natures being by no means removed because of the union, but the properties of each nature being preserved." Consider the following chart that illustrates the two natures within one person, Jesus:
Christian theologians have never claimed that God "became" a man. God cannot "become" anything because He is pure actuality, with absolutely no potentiality for change. He is immutable, therefore, cannot change. The Incarnation is not an instance where God became, or changed into, man. However, He did take on the additional nature of man. Consequently, there are two natures, a Divine nature and a human nature, present in one person, Jesus Christ, the God-Man. John 1:1. Because of the anarthrous noun theos the Watchtower mistranslated this passage, "the Word was a god," in order to prove that Jesus is not God, but a god, or godlike. However, the fact that theos has no definite article does not mean that it should be translated "a god," as they claim. In fact, the overwhelming testimony of Greek scholars declare that this passage is correctly translated, "and the Word was God." Concerning anarthrous noun constructions, A. T. Robertson states that "The word may be either definite or indefinite when the article is absent. The context and history of the phrase in question must decide." If the noun is the "only object of a kind," such as God, heaven, earth, sun, and moon, it is definite and anarthrous. This is the case of theos in John 1:1. Also, it is preceding the verb in the predicate position which, as a rule, takes an anarthrous noun. Greek scholar E. C. Colwell commented on this passage:
A definite predicate nominative has the article when it follows the verb; it does not have the article when it precedes the verb. . . . The opening verse of John's Gospel contains one of the many passages where this rule suggests the translation of a predicate as a definite noun.
Hence, according to the Greek scholars, theos should definitely be translated "God." The Watchtower translation is completely unjustifiable. In addition, the context clearly indicates that the Word is God Almighty. If this passage is translated "a god," then it is affirming the existence of deity other than God Almighty. The Watchtower translation makes them polytheists. This is the mistake that Israel made which caused them to be taken into captivity. Furthermore, the term "In the beginning" is used purposely by John to draw his reader's mind back to Genesis 1:1. John is writing about a new beginning, a new creation, and he uses the words that recall the first creation. The Word was "in the beginning" and, therefore, He was before all else. In other words, John 1:1 is a claim that Jesus is eternal, an attribute that can only be possessed by God Almighty. Also, the Watchtower rendition of the phrase "with God" confuses essence and person. Just because Jesus was "with" God does not mean that He is not God. That the Word was "with" God suggests close relations as well as equality. The Second Person was "with" the Father in eternity. We see a clear Trinitarian distinction of persons in this verse. Also, the preposition pros expresses that Jesus was personally, intimately in God's company in eternity. God alone is eternal. Jesus is eternal. Therefore, Jesus is God. John 14:28. Jesus' claim that the Father is greater is cited by the Watchtower as a direct statement by Jesus that His nature is not equal with God's nature. However, Jesus was not speaking in His divine nature as God the Son, but in His human nature. The Father is greater than the Son in office, but not by nature, since both are God (see John 1:1; 8:58; 10:30). Just as an earthly father is equally human with, yet holds a higher office than his son, even so God the Father and God the Son are equal in nature, or essence, but different in function. Jesus is subordinate to the Father in function only. 1 Corinthians 11:3. The Watchtower points to this Scripture to claim that since the head of Christ is God, then Jesus cannot be God. The answer to this is very similar to the answer to John 14:28. Jesus came to earth and humbled Himself to take on the additional nature of man. He humbly placed Himself in submission to the Father so that God's will might be done on earth. Therefore, since Jesus, as the God-Man, placed Himself in submission to the Father, the Father can be said to be the head of Christ. John 3:16. The Watchtower claims that the term "only begotten" means that He is a created being, thus, not God. However, the Greek term, monogenes, does not mean "begotten" in the sense of "created," but merely "one and only" or "unique." While the Bible uses the term "sons of God" to describe other people, when "Son of God" is use of Jesus it denotes that He is God's Son in a unique, different way than others. The Son is a complete partaker in the same nature with the Father. The Son is the eternal Son as the Father is the eternal Father. Thus, "the one and only Son," is a claim to the deity of Jesus as the Son of God. At times, the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society seems to be nothing more than an apologetic agency with the mission to disprove the deity of Jesus. However, the evidence proving the deity of Jesus is overwhelming. For instance, Jesus repeatedly made direct claims to be Yahweh, such as His claims to be "First and Last" (Rev. 1:11, 17) and "I AM" (John 8:58). Jesus is also pictured as doing the work attributed only to Yahweh, such as "Creator" (John 1:3; Col. 1:16; Heb. 1:2) and "Savior" (Luke 19:10; Acts 4:12; 1 Jn. 4:14). Also, Jesus is God because He accepted worship, prescribed prayer in His name, claimed to be Messiah, fulfilled prophecies from the Old Testament, and offered unique and repeated supernatural confirmation of His claims. When all is considered, the irrepressible mountain of evidence points to the fact that Jesus is who He claimed to be-God. Since the Watchtower denies the deity of Jesus, they must affirm that He is a created being. In fact, as seen above, they say that God created Jesus as Michael the archangel, who then became Jesus the man, and at the resurrection, he once again became Michael. They point to several Scriptures to prove their point, but, again, their hermeneutic is greatly deficient. Colossians 1:15. The Watchtower asserts that Jesus is a created being by their misunderstanding of the phrase, "the firstborn of all creation." Just because Jesus is called "firstborn" does not mean that He is created. The Greek term prototokos refers not to one who is firstborn, but one who is the preeminent heir to the family estate. The term was used 130 times in the LXX to indicate temporal priority, sovereignty of rank, or one who had a special place in the father's love. As prototokos Jesus is unique, being distinguished from all creation. He is both prior to and supreme over that creation since He is its Lord. Revelation 3:14. To the Watchtower, the phrase "the beginning of God's creation" proves that Jesus had a beginning and is, therefore, not God. This is not the case. The Greek word translated "beginning," arche, when speaking of philosophical matters such as creation, means "first cause," "origin," or "source." Thus, this verse is proclaiming that Jesus is the source, origin, or architect of God's creation, and not merely the first creature made by God. In refutation of the Watchtower idea that Jesus was created with the nature of an angel, then became a man, and then again became an angel, one must examine the attribute of God called immutability. To affirm that God is immutable is to affirm that God is unchangeable in His essence, nature, and perfections. Apologist Norman Geisler explains that "a God of Pure Actuality ("I Amness") has no potentiality. For everything that changes has potentiality. But there can be no potentiality in God (He is Pure Actuality). It follows, therefore, that God cannot change." Accordingly, since Jesus is God (John 1:1; John 8:58; etc.), His nature cannot change as the Watchtower affirms-from angel to man to angel. His Divine nature can, and did, take on something new at the incarnation-a human nature. Nevertheless, His nature did not change. The Bodily Resurrection
As described above, the Watchtower denies the bodily resurrection of Jesus, saying that it was not physical, but a spiritual resurrection only. This idea, however, is foreign to Scripture.. Both Jesus and His apostles taught this central doctrine of Christianity-a physical, bodily resurrection. In John 2:19-21, Jesus declared to the Jews, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." Though the Jews thought that He was speaking of the Temple, verse 21 makes it clear that "He was speaking of the temple of His body." Moreover, He predicted His resurrection many other times (Matt. 12:39-40; 16:4; Mark 8:31; John 10:18). This is a clear prophetic indication that Jesus was resurrected in the same physical body that went into the grave. Furthermore, every post-resurrection appearance in the Gospels is a physical, bodily appearance. All the Gospels, which were separate eyewitness accounts, unanimously agree that Jesus appeared physically and bodily to the disciples and other witnesses. In his book, In Defense of the Resurrection, Norman Geisler gives overwhelming evidence for the materiality of the resurrected body of Christ:
These are only a few of the proofs offered, but the overwhelming evidence undeniably proves that Jesus rose in the same physical body He had before He was crucified. Once again, the Watchtower has proved to be a false organization. Their Jesus is certainly not the Jesus that is found in the pages of the Bible. In which case, faith placed in the Watchtower Jesus will only lead to eternal destruction.
CONCLUSION
Discernment is at an all time low in the Christian church. Because of an abysmal lack of biblical literacy, the sheep have lost the ability to distinguish between the True Shepherd and an impostor, Living Water and deadly venom, the truth and a lie. As a result, the cults, through their massive outreach programs, are pulling scores upon scores of Christians out of the true church and into false religious systems. The Apostle Peter warned the church of these deceitful disciples of the devil in 2 Peter 2:1-2:
But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed.
Jesus and the Apostles commanded the Church, which had been bought with the blood of Christ, to "earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints" (Jude 3). Even though we may seem divisive and intolerant in the refutation of cultic theology,
The difference between Jesus and His cultic impostors is the difference between the truth and a lie. For the seeker, it is the difference between eternity in heaven and eternity in hell. As Walter Martin once said, "The Jesus of the cults is a poor substitute for the Incarnate God of the New Testament."
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CULTIC
IMPOSTORS OF THE TRUE CHRIST
