Did Jesus Claim to be God?

Jesus said, “I and My Father are one.” Then the Jews took up stones again to stone Him. Jesus answered them, “Many good works I have shown you from My Father. For which of those works do you stone Me?” The Jews answered Him, saying, “For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy, and because You, being a Man, make Yourself God” (John 10:30-33)

The first pastor I worked for as his associate was from the Assemblies of God. He believed and preached that Jesus never claimed to be God.

In John 10, Jesus preached a marvelous sermon on being the Good Shepherd of the sheep whom the Father gave to Him. His sermon ended with Him saying, I and My Father are one.

Many people would run right past those words, but the Jewish leaders sure didn’t! Instead they took up stones to kill Him. The Jewish theologians understood Jesus to claim equality with God the Father. He was claiming absolute deity. They knew what Jesus was saying, yet this Assemblies of God preacher for 50 years didn’t; and I wish I could say he was the only pastor ignorant of Christ’s own words.

Jesus did in fact claim to be God, and His contemporaries took His claim seriously.

Christianity stands or falls on the deity of Jesus. If He is not fully God with the Father and Spirit, then Jesus was either crazy or a conman, deluded or deceived. If He was only a man, then He could never save a sinner from sin.

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He Calls His Own Sheep by Name

Whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified, and whom He justified, these He also glorified (Romans 3:30).

Daniel had a little playmate named Emily. On a summer’s day, all the children would be out playing and around a certain time of the night Emily’s mother would step out on the porch of her house and yell, “Emily” and then let out a long whistle. Just a little bit later I’d see Emily run down the street toward home. She knew her mother’s call and she responded.

Now image one evening Emily’s mother stepped out of the house, called for Emily and let loose a long whistle. Hearing the call, I slipped on my shoes, ran out of the house and showed up right in front of Emily’s mother. She’d look at me and say, “Well Richard, it’s nice to see you tonight. What can I do for you?“

She’d think I’d totally lost my marbles if I told her I’d heard her call and came running fast as I could. See, her call wasn’t for me. It was for her daughter, for Emily. She called her own.

Throughout the Bible is a wonderful theme of God calling His people. Whether it was Abram in the big city of Ur or Moses at a burning bush in the desert, a little boy named Samuel, or an old fisherman named Peter, God always calls His own by name. Jesus put it like this: He who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice; and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out (John 10:4). While everyone can hear the voice of the Shepherd in the proclamation of the gospel, only His own sheep respond, and they respond to Him straight away.

Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion (Hebrews 3:15).