Skip to main content

No Confusion Then: Jesus Claimed to Be God, and Everyone Knew It

It’s become trendy in recent years—especially in skeptical circles and progressive theology—to suggest that Jesus never actually claimed to be God. You’ll hear it slipped into podcasts, TikTok theology, or late-night documentaries as if it were common knowledge: “Jesus never said He was God.” It sounds bold. Subversive. Enlightened.

It’s also deeply misleading.

The idea that Jesus didn’t claim divinity is a modern projection—something imposed on the text from a distant, skeptical posture. It ignores the context, flattens the meaning of ancient language, and worst of all, disregards what the people who were actually there clearly understood. Because whether you liked Jesus or hated Him, no one in the first century was confused about the kind of claim He was making.


His Followers Worshiped Him—and He Accepted It

In Jewish monotheism, worship isn’t handed out like flattery. It belongs to God alone. Yet Jesus’ disciples worshiped Him repeatedly—and not once does He refuse it.

  • After the resurrection, Thomas falls at His feet and says: “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:28).
  • A man Jesus healed says simply, “Lord, I believe,” and worships Him (John 9:38).
  • When Jesus calms the storm, His disciples worship and say, “Truly you are the Son of God” (Matthew 14:33).

Worship like that would be blasphemy if Jesus weren’t divine—and yet He receives it. No correction. No protest. No hint that they’ve misunderstood. That’s not silence—it’s affirmation.

His Enemies Knew Exactly What He Was Claiming

If Jesus were just a misunderstood teacher, the charges against Him wouldn’t make sense. But again and again, the religious leaders respond to His words with outrage—and not over social or political teachings, but theological ones.

  • “For this reason the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because... he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.” (John 5:18)
  • “It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God.” (John 10:33)

Let that sink in: they wanted to kill Him not because they misunderstood Him—but because they understood Him perfectly. Jesus didn’t just imply equality with God. He claimed it.

He Spoke With Divine Authority

Jesus didn’t teach like the prophets. He didn’t say, “Thus says the Lord.” He said, “But I say to you…” as if He were the source of the law.

He forgave sins—not as a prophet announcing God’s forgiveness, but as the one granting it directly (Mark 2:5–10). The religious leaders immediately recognized the problem: “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” They weren’t wrong.

And then there’s John 8:58. Jesus doesn’t just speak of Abraham—He says, “Before Abraham was, I am.” That’s not bad grammar. That’s Exodus 3:14. That’s YHWH’s personal name. And the crowd understood it clearly—they picked up stones to kill Him.

The Early Church Didn’t Invent His Divinity. They Declared It.

The modern myth is that the divinity of Jesus was some later theological development, cooked up by church councils centuries after the fact. But the earliest Christian writings say otherwise.

  • Philippians 2:6–11: a hymn that calls Jesus one who was “in very nature God,” who humbled Himself and is now exalted above every name.
  • Hebrews 1: says the Son is “the exact imprint” of God’s nature and is worshiped by angels.
  • Colossians 2:9: “In him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily.”

These aren’t subtle suggestions. They are confessions of a risen Christ whom the Church had already come to know as Lord.

The Real Confusion Is Ours

There was no confusion then. Not from the worshipers. Not from the skeptics. Not from the leaders who sought His death. They knew what He was claiming.

The confusion now comes from those who don’t want Jesus to be who He said He was. It's more comfortable to reduce Him to a moral teacher, a misunderstood revolutionary, or a spiritual guru. But that’s not what He left us.

C.S. Lewis put it bluntly: a man who said the things Jesus said and wasn't God would not be a great teacher—he’d be a lunatic or a liar. But the evidence—historical, textual, and personal—says otherwise.

So let’s be clear:

Jesus didn’t whisper divinity. He declared it, and everyone knew. That’s why they bowed before Him—or picked up stones.

Comments

  1. Very theological. I appreciate this exposition. God bless you sir

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Eckhart Tolle - Christian Response

Unbelievable! ...The extent man not founded upon Christ will go and follow in their quest and pursuit of self and attempts to explain away reality and sin. Here's Oprah's spiritual sage... Response: 1. He resurrects errors of the past which deny reality by seeking to replace it with forms. 2. By reducing the past to forms (or photo albums) he not only denies the reality of the past but the extent of it's connectedness and relationship to the present. This error he also translates in regard to the future. 3. He establishes a false premise that one can separate the reality of the present ("now") from reality itself, which he vests in onesself (though he inconsistently goes on to suggest that life is found in abandoning oneself) 4. He has no grounds or basis for assuming reality is found in self (and apart from everything else, or only what one want's to allow) 5. By denying the truth of God, he falsely asserts that the future is no longer problematic...

America: an Islamic Nation?

In President Obama's nobel acceptance speech, he made reference again to Islam as "a GREAT religion" (Caps, my emphasis, though it reflects the tone in which the statement was made). While I recognize both the political and practical benefits of using such a term (i.e., seeking to drive a wedge to separate the greater Muslim community from those presently and publicly endorsing jihad.... so as to avoid WWIII), at the same time I wonder if any News organization would consider counting and reporting the number of times the President of the United States has made reference to Islam as a Great Religion and the number of times he has publicly referred to Christianity as a Great Religion? I guarantee the difference would be ASTOUNDING! Question: Where's the CONSISTENCY when it comes to what many refer to today as "separation of church and state"? Seems while there may be "separation of Christianity and state", there is no "separation of Islam and...

Eckhart Tolle Christianity (Understanding Eckhart Tolle - Comparison / Difference with Christianity)

I believe it important that both believers and unbelievers understand the difference between the teaching of Eckhart Tolle and Christianity. Here's a brief post to introduce you to a few of the significant differences. (Note, I've just been exposed to Tolle, but it doesn't seem to take long to discern the differences) Context (the problem)Taken from here .: Despite Oprah and Eckhart's reduction of Christianity to but one "way" amongst many other equally legitimate ways to God, and their calling Christ a "revolutionary" who has been misunderstood by the Church, and who simply came to manifest "Christ-consciousness", a quick search through the internet reveals that many Christians are following Oprah in attempting to fuse together the teachings of Eckhart, and the doctrines of the historical Christian church. Great website to gain quick summary of Eckhart's beliefs/teachings: Ripples on the Surface of Being Key Responses by Eckhart To...

Search This Blog