Have you ever been in this situation—your friends are sharing opinions about a person you’ve never met, or a movie you’ve never seen, or book you’ve never read? You might feel left out. You hear snippets of what they say and want to form opinions, but you get frustrated not knowing whose judgment to trust, and you wish to break out of your ignorance.
We don’t want you to have this experience with Jesus. Tons of smart people, skeptical people, and religious people talk on and on and on about the question, is Jesus God?
We suspect that you sincerely want to know whether Jesus is God—that’s why you’re reading this.
You won’t find the answer to that question from Christian apologists (apologists meaning not people who say sorry but people who defend our faith). You won’t find it in tweets or long debates on YouTube. You won’t even find it entirely on this page. You have to open the Bible for yourself because that’s where we find Jesus’ own claims to be God. Otherwise, you’ll just be overhearing conversation about Jesus without encountering him for yourself.
It’s one thing to hear someone else answer a question. It’s another thing to come to those conclusions yourself.
Where Do I Find the Answer?
If you really want to know about someone these days, you research it or you “Facebook stalk” that person. Our guess is you wouldn’t go asking other people what they think about that person. Instead, you would take a look at that person’s own self-disclosure, whether via social media, or their resume, or in an interview.
No reasonable person debates that Jesus actually lived. He existed, historically. The self-disclosure we have of him are four first-century biographies written by his followers. Fascinatingly, they’re the most accurate ancient historical documents of all time—they’re more reliable than the stuff you read about Caesar in grade school (Check out “Why Should I Trust the Bible?“).
The first book for you to read about Jesus would be John. It’s one of these biographies or “gospels.” Know what’s awesome? Two thousand years ago, John anticipated your question. In his account about Jesus, John wrote, “But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name” (John 20:31 NIV).
Read John, then Matthew, Mark, and Luke—they are all in the Bible. Ask yourself as you read, “Is Jesus God?” How does he go about claiming to be God? Does his life match up with his claim?
And if he really is God, what are the implications? If Jesus is God, would that have any impact on your life?
Why Would I Want the Answer?
Maybe that seems like a lot of unnecessary work to do if we could just give you “our reasons” for why Jesus is God. We could do that and answer the question for you, but that won’t do you any good. Here’s why. At the end of the day, you have to answer that question.
We often hear in society that truth doesn’t matter or doesn’t exist, but let’s be real here. One day we’re going to die (100% of people die!) and something is going to be true. Everyone can’t be right. There can’t be the God of the Bible and reincarnation and nihilism… someone’s got to be right. The task is seeing which worldview fits best with reality. If Jesus is God it’s a game changer for life.
And we care about your life! We know that you reading this are a real person, with meaningful life on earth ordained by God, and an eternity ahead of you.
Jesus is not only God to us, but he’s also everything the Bible says that he is. We have come to know him in our experience to be the same man the Bible reveals him to be. And we want you to know him too.
This question is actually one of the most important questions in the whole Bible, because our worldview hinges on that question. It’s also the most important question in your life—Is Jesus God?
“This one who is life itself was revealed to us, and we have seen him. And now we testify and proclaim to you that he is the one who is eternal life. He was with the Father, and then he was revealed to us. We proclaim to you what we ourselves have actually seen and heard so that you may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. We are writing these things so that you may fully share our joy.” (1 John 1:2-4 NLT)