Jesus is our Mighty God
By Michael Kelley
Isaiah 9:6 reads like this: “For a child will be born for us, a son will be given to us, and the government will be on his shoulders. He will be named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.”
These names are fulfilled in Jesus. And while all the names in this list help us broaden our vision of who Jesus is, one is a bit unique from the rest. We might know Jesus as our Wonderful Counselor, Eternal Father, and Prince of Peace, to say that Jesus is God requires not just an intellectual acknowledgment but a tangible, life-shaping response from us.
That little phrase - Jesus is God - is weighty. That’s because this statement and the orthodox Christian doctrine it represents, more than anything else we can say about Jesus, sets Him apart from any other human being that has or will ever walk the earth.
And it is also the most controversial. Now we know something of the controversy today - it seems as though, in today’s world, you can talk about God and meet little resistance. You can even mention Jesus without too much. But if you maintain the belief that Jesus Christ is God, then you invite at least a measure of confrontation and disagreement. But that is nothing new.
John 8 contains a fairly long discourse between Jesus and group of Jewish pharisees, the religious leaders of the day who adhered to a very strict understanding of the law we know today as the Old Testament. And in a sense, their discussion was all about identity. The Jews claimed to know who they were - they were the descendants of Abraham and because they were, God was their father. Jesus saw them differently and claimed that they could not be the true children of God because they weren’t willing to accept Him. In fact, Jesus tells them that not only is God not their father; their father is actually the devil. And then we come to the end of their conversation:
“If I glorify myself,” Jesus answered, “my glory is nothing. My Father—about whom you say, ‘He is our God’—he is the one who glorifies me. You do not know him, but I know him. If I were to say I don’t know him, I would be a liar like you. But I do know him, and I keep his word. Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day; he saw it and was glad.”
The Jews replied, “You aren’t fifty years old yet, and you’ve seen Abraham?”
Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, before Abraham was, I am.”
So they picked up stones to throw at him. But Jesus was hidden and went out of the temple (John 8:54-59).
Now that escalated quickly. But the reason it did so was not primarily because Jesus said they were of their father the devil; it’s because when Jesus identified Himself, He invoked the holy name of God - I Am. And that was incendiary because for the Jews of the time, the thought of God, who is supremely holy and separate, being a man was the height of blasphemy. And yet that is exactly what Jesus claimed.
Jesus is God. That is who He is. And though the implications for us are many, here is a very basic and general one:
You do not have to wonder what God is like. If you want to know what God is like, then look to Jesus. He will show you.
We don’t need more books. More podcasts. More speculation. Or more wondering. We can know what God is like. Look to Jesus:
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For everything was created by him, in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through him and for him (Col. 1:15-16).
Michael Kelley is a husband, father of three, author, and speaker from Nashville, TN. His latest book is a year-long family devotional guide called The Whole Story for the Whole Family. Find his personal blog at michaelkelley.co.
