“For we did not follow cleverly devised tales when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty.
“For when He received honor and glory from God the Father, such an utterance as this was made to Him by the Majestic Glory,
“’This is My beloved Son with whom I am well-pleased”– and we ourselves heard this utterance made from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain.” (2Pe 1:16-18)
Readers,
In this study we will take a closer look at one of the most wonderful mysteries in the Bible, that is, the mystery of the Father and the Son. The question we want to unravel is how the earliest Hebrew believers could hold to an absolute monotheism and yet direct their faith and their worship to Jesus Christ as the Son of God, as well as to God the Father?
Not everyone is very familiar with the early Jewish believer’s theology of Christ, while others are little aware of how the Messiah was seen in ancient beliefs of that time. Everything centered on the word ‘identity‘.
With this key in mind let’s take a closer look at the Father and the Son.
The Hallmark of Hebrew Christianity
Very often we fail to understand terms like, ‘And the Word was with God,‘ or, ‘He existed in the form of God‘, because these terms are in Hebrew thought form. They don’t always mean the same thing to us as they would to a Jewish person. These expressions were deeply embedded in ancient Judaism. They reflect on a great mystery to be found in God Himself.
The earliest believers saw Jesus Christ as intrinsic to who God really is. Jewish believers had been schooled in the Scriptures and in the ancient sages. They believed that in
the one true God was a mystery that reflected on terms such as, ‘the Word’, or, ‘the Form‘, or ‘the Image‘, or ‘the Glory‘, or even, ‘the Shekinah.’
The earliest Christians were absolute monotheist. They believed that Jesus Christ originated in and came forth from the Father, that is, without becoming separate from Him in His spiritual essence. This was part of the mystery that they accepted.
However, what made this belief so strong was that the Scriptures actually wrapped themselves around this great mystery in God. These new Jewish believers were discovering Jesus and letting the words of Moses and the prophets unwrap themselves in their hearts and minds.
It wasn’t long before the non-believing Jewish rabbis countered by accusing the Christian Jews of believing in two powers in heaven. The rabbis used the book Hebrews as a backdrop in their accusations against the Christian Jews, and especially where it says,
“In these last days [the Father] has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world.” (He1:2)
It was this statement that pretty much qualified the earliest theology of the Jewish church. It says that in the last days God has spoken to us (or speaks to us) in His Son, and that it was through His Son that the Father made the world.
An Uncomplicated Theology
The early believers fully accepted Jesus Christ as the Son of God, and as Yahweh of the former testament. They also firmly held to a Father-Son view of God.
Paul Himself brings this forth in reaffirming the sh’ma of Israel. He said,
“Yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom are all things and we exist for Him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we exist through Him.” (1Co8:6)
Where Paul says ‘one Lord’, he is drawing on the ancient ‘She’ma’ creed of Israel.
“Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD is one!” (Deu 6:4 NASB)
A great many scholars today are beginning to reach back to a more Hebraic form of theology. They are setting aside the notion that the Trinitarian doctrine is intrinsic to Christianity and that to be a Christian you must accept this form of theology.
This is not an affront against Trinitarian beliefs. It is simply for the benefit of a better understanding of how the early Hebrew Christians generally held to a less-complicated theology of the Godhead.
The point is that the earliest Christians were scriptural-centric. Both Jesus and the apostles instructed the evolving church to never exceed, “what is written”. The term ‘what is written’ had regard to Moses, David, and the prophets.
Thus we hear:
[Jesus] “Now He said to them, ‘These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.’ Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.” (Luk 24:44-45)
[Paul] “Now these things, brethren, I have figuratively applied to myself and Apollos for your sakes, so that in us you may learn not to exceed what is written, so that no one of you will become arrogant in behalf of one against the other.” (1Co 4:6)
The Divine Image
The apostles were expressing a very ancient belief held in Israel at that time. Jesus was looked at as the ‘eikon‘ (divine image) of the invisible God. The Judaic beliefs before the rabbis made their anti-Christ intrusions, believed that you had the invisible God who could not be seen, and God who makes Himself visible across history and across time. Or, as one early Christian writer said, “God brought forth from Himself a beginning.”
For the early Jewish believers, Jesus did not become for them a second god or another deity. Paul explained Christ as the hidden mystery of God. The apostle wrote,
“To me, the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ, and to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things.” (Eph3:8,9)
Regardless of how difficult this may seem to us, the groundwork had already been laid for the mystery of the divine image to be revealed. Here are a few Scriptural considerations:
“Who has ascended into heaven and descended? Who has gathered the wind in His fists? Who has wrapped the waters in His garment? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is His name or His son’s name? Surely you know!” (Pro 30:4)
“For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; and the government will rest on His shoulders; and His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of
Peace. …
“ … There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this.” (Isa 9:6-7)
“’What do you think about the Christ, whose son is He?’ They said to Him, ‘The son of David.’ He said to them, ‘Then how does David in the Spirit call Him “Lord,” saying, ‘THE LORD SAID TO MY LORD, “SIT AT MY RIGHT HAND, UNTIL I PUT YOUR ENEMIES BENEATH YOUR FEET”‘? “If David then calls Him ‘Lord,’ how is He his son?” (Mat 22:42-45)
“I [Yahweh] will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son, and they will weep bitterly over Him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn.” (Zec 12:10)
My Lord and My God
How is it than an orthodox one-God, Jewish man could fall down before Jesus, and say, “My Lord and my God?”
And how is it that everything Jesus did in His earthly walk reveals that He was intrinsic to the very identity of God’s person? Jesus did God things.
And so we must agree with the Jewish author who stated that Christianity is the most Jewish of all the non-Jewish faiths.
I would go further as to say that Biblical Christianity fills out the Jewish faith in that the God of the Hebrews came into the earth as a man to fulfill His own program of redemption. Did the early Jewish believers worship the Father and Son as one God? Absolutely.
Now the big question — Does our salvation hinge on acknowledging that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the Lord God Almighty?
John said it well enough;
“Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also.” (1Jn 2:22-23)
The Mystery Called, ‘Wonderful’
Do we still have a mystery? Sure we do. It is a mystery that is wondrous indeed. What we do know is that the divinity of Jesus lies within God Himself. And when we worship Jesus we are not worshipping a second deity. We are worshipping the Father in the Son.
For all our Christian, Jewish and Muslim friends, take time for this song. Let the Lord open your heart to hear from God – ‘O Come Oh Come Emmanuel’.
Your servant in Christ,
Buddy
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