Jesus is God
Jesus is God
It happened again. Last week as we were working through Colossians in our yearly Bible reading plan, the buzzer rang. It has been years since we've had a visit, so it was bound to happen eventually. However, you cannot plan these things. Only God can. It was the Jehovah's Witness.
Why was this a 'divine coincidence'?
A few years ago, my co-pastor was preparing his message on Colossians 1:15-20 in his home right behind where I live. Amid his preparation, the Jehovah's Witness buzzed his door. Here's why I see the Lord at work here and why I want you to be ready when they buzz your door:
What is a "firstborn"?
The most important thing to know is that Jehovah's Witnesses deny the deity of Christ, saying that he was not fully God. This is because they do not believe that Jesus is one with the Father according to orthodox Christian belief in the Holy Trinity. Instead, they believe that he is a created being. This belief comes, in part, through a faulty understanding of Colossians 2:15:
“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.”
When One Letter Makes an Eternal Difference
Jehovah's Witness will defend this view by committing another Greek grammatical error when they read John 1:1.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ”
Their translation (The New World Bible) adds an indefinite article, 'a', at the end of the sentence, saying: the Word was a God. So, without getting too geeky with the greeky, this article is wrongly inserted where the original language does not.
Thank God for Athanasius
Athanasius was a church father that spent his life defending the full deity of Jesus and codifying the Nicene Creed of 325 AD. From 325 until he died in 373, Athanasius faced a world that vehemently propounded the idea that Jesus was not God. It was indeed him against the world! He believed that man could not be brought to God unless one who is fully God redeems man. And that God could not redeem that which he did not fully assume. This is essential to the gospel of Jesus Christ and our faith as Christians.
Praise God that Jesus is fully God and fully man, the new creation that we will enjoy forever...if we believe this essential truth.
Contending with you for the faith,
Loren