Jesus’ Deity

Now it’s kind of a strange thing about unbelief: Unbelief often asks the right questions, but then does not willingly accept the truthful answer.

Jesus is Confronted by Jewish Leaders

John 10:24 Then came the Jews round about Him and said unto Him, “How long will you make us doubt? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.”

The Feast of Dedication is sometimes called the Feast of Lights. It is Hanukkah, the commemoration of the revolution when Judas Maccabaeus and his rebels delivered Jerusalem from the hands of Antiochus Epiphanes who had killed many Jews, and desecrated the temple.

The Jewish leaders have Jesus surrounded now. At least they thought they did. If He claims to be Messiah again, they’ve got the stones right there to kill him. The temple was always in some type of repair; they were always rebuilding something, and there were rocks everywhere.

The Jews had ignored all of Christ’s signs and wonders. The trouble was not with a declaration of Christ, but with their own unbelief. Unbelief is always the mother of ignorance, and faith is the mother of understanding.

Jesus Claims Deity

John 10:30 I and My Father are one.

Jesus had just answered their question. I and My Father are one is an obvious claim to be equal with God. It’s amazing how people are confused about this.

Many today say that Jesus was not God and that He never said that he was. Jesus clearly said that He and God are one—one in power, one in essence, and one in work. Everything I do the Father does; We’re one. He is talking about His indivisible union with God.

The Jews Charge Jesus with Blasphemy

John 10:33 The Jews answered Him saying, ‘For a good work we don’t stone you, but for blasphemy, and because you a man, make yourself God.’

This was their answer to His claim to be God. They knew what He was claiming, no question about it. They regarded Jesus as a mere man who committed the terrible sin of claiming to be God.

This claim was to be punished by death. Isn’t it an amazing thing, how unbelief disqualifies all the evidence? Unbelief eliminates all the possibility of evidence. These people never even considered His deeds. They were totally plagued and obsessed with His blasphemous utterance and they didn’t care about what He did. They didn’t even see the deeds in their perspective.

Jesus Challenges Their Reasoning

John 10:34 Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your law, ‘I said “Ye are gods”’? 35 He called them gods unto whom the Word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken).

Jesus challenges them to be objective in two areas. He wants them to be objective. Objectivity does not start with a pre-conceived conclusion and then disregard the facts. Objectivity takes the facts and allows them to lead to a conclusion. Objective one was Psalm 82:6: it speaks of certain judges that were set to rule over Israel. They ruled in the place of God and were referred to as gods.

The second area where Jesus challenged them was by works.

Jesus says, “If I do not the works of My Father, then don’t believe Me. But, if I do, though you believe not Me, believe the work.” Jesus says if you will just be objective, then you can come to the right answers. He also told them to look at the works and the nature of the works He’d done.

Jesus Escaped the Threat and Returned To John the Baptist’s Area

John 10:39 Therefore they sought again to take Him, but He escaped out of their hand 40 and went away again beyond the Jordan into the place where John had first baptized; and there He abode. 42 And many believed in Him there.

Jesus escaped from Jerusalem, never returning until He came back on Palm Sunday. He returned to the area where John the Baptist had first seen Jesus and baptized Him. He had begun there, and now three years later Jesus returned. There, He did no miracle, but they all remembered Him, and all things that John spoke of this man were true.

Some made choices to believe in Jesus based upon the truths that John the Baptist had given them.

Amidst all the hatred and violence, it appears maybe God had a little flock of His sheep stuck up there near Jordan, and Jesus left Jerusalem and gathered that little flock.

John 10 continues to focus on the deity of Jesus. Here, Jesus reminds the unbelieving Jews to look objectively at those areas that would point to His deity,

He still says the same thing to each of us today. Look at the reasons and facts objectively before you make a choice to discard your belief in Me.