Our lives revolve around questions. Spending thirty minutes
with a toddler is enough to remind us of this reality. Questions from the
mouths of children are so frequent that rattling off one after another has
become stereotypical of our younger counterparts, but, if we’re honest, we have
to acknowledge that as we grow older we hardly ease up on the
question-formulating.
Maybe we don’t express our questions as frequently as we did
when absolutely everything was new and unknown, but certainly we still have
questions. How can I get this to work?
How long will it take me to do such-and-such? Where is that? Who knew? When was
such-and-such invented? Why didn’t so-and-so respond the way I thought they would?
What happened? Who should I talk to about this problem? Why did this happen?
But of all the questions that run through our minds on a
daily basis, there is one question that is of supreme importance. In fact, I’d
go so far as to say that it’s the most important question we could ever ask,
because its ramifications for our lives are of the most profound nature.
Literally it is a very simple question—just three or four words,
and short ones at that. But conceptually it’s loaded—and massively so. Furthermore,
it happens to be one that we can find in Scripture. So let’s take a look . . .
Exodus 5 picks up the history of the Israelites at the point
when they are on the cusp of deliverance from four hundred years of bondage to
the Egyptians. Moses, a Hebrew who was raised by Egyptian royalty and fled the
nation after committing murder, has just met with God in the wilderness and has
been given the task of returning to Egypt to go before Pharaoh and demand the
Israelites’ release.
Accompanied by his brother Aaron, he does just that, as we
see in Exodus 5:1 when he says, “Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, ‘Let my
people go, that they may hold a feast to me in the wilderness’” (ESV).
Pharaoh’s response to this command is to ask a question—you guessed it—the most
important question of all: “Who is the LORD, that I should obey his voice and
let Israel go?”
Who is the LORD?
Pharaoh isn’t the only one to ask this question, though.
Fast-forward a millennium and a half or so, and we arrive in Luke during Jesus’
time on earth. Jesus, being the human that He was, was taking a snooze in a
boat that was transporting Him and His disciples across a lake. Meanwhile, a
storm developed with high-speed winds creating fierce waves that began filling
the boat. Fearing for their lives, they woke Jesus with exclamations of
impending doom. So Jesus, being the God that He was, ordered the wind and waves
to settle down, and they did, causing the disciples to say in fear and
amazement, “Who then is this, that he commands even winds and water, and they
obey him?” (Luke 8:22-25, ESV).
Who is this?
In both of these instances, the question was the same, but
the responses differ, as do the postures from which the question was asked.
See, Pharaoh had already decided the answer to this question in his heart
before he voiced it out loud. His tone was akin to that of Goliath’s, who
scoffed at David, “Am I dog, that you come at me with sticks?” (1 Samuel 17:43, ESV). As far as Pharaoh was
concerned, God was not someone who had any authority over him—or any right to
presume authority over him. Pharaoh had decided that this Yahweh was not worthy
of obedience or even of respect. He was not important enough to be considered.
The disciples, however, demonstrated more genuine curiosity
and awe in their asking. They recognized that Jesus was someone who had
authority over creation itself, and as their story continues to unfold in the
gospels, we see them arrive at the conclusion that Jesus is the promised
Messiah, the Son of God (see Matthew 16:15-16).
They decided that this Jesus was deserving of worship and worthy of
their very lives.
Now, another millennium later, we are faced with the same
question. Who is God? And who is Jesus? God has graciously spelled out the
answer to this question in Scripture, but it is up to us to determine whether
or not we believe the answer to be true—and to realize how our answers affect
our lives.
Do we believe that “He is the King of glory” (Psalm 24:8)?
If we do, then we honor Him.
Do we believe that He is, “the Alpha and the Omega […] who
is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty” Revelation 1:8)? If we do,
then we worship Him—and if we do, then we can rest in the knowledge that He is
in control of all things, always has been, and always will be.
Do we believe that He is the Bread of Life (John 6:35)? If
we do, then our souls can be satisfied in Him.
Do we believe that He is “the Lamb of God, who takes away
the sin of the world” (John 1:29)? If we do, then we can trust in Him for
salvation and forgiveness.
C. S. Lewis’s Mere
Christianity includes a paragraph that often has been summarized to say
that Jesus is either a liar, a lunatic, or Lord. That is to say, He made
specific claims about Himself, and either He was dishonest in those claims, He
was crazy, or He was right. We are confronted with those claims, and we must
decide what we will do with them.
Will we ignore them, living our lives for ourselves and
striving in our own strength to make it through each day? Will we discount
them, telling ourselves that we answer to no one or that we are here for no
other reason than to be happy while we can? Or will we accept them, recognizing
that God’s absolute power and holiness means we cannot stand in His presence
without some outside intervention, that His perfect justice demands the penalty
be paid for our grievances against Him, and that His profound mercy and
unending love have provided a way for us to stand in His presence through the
perfect life, substitutionary death, and victorious resurrection of the
God-man, Jesus Christ?
The question, “Who is Jesus/God?” is so significant because
it has both immediate implications for our daily lives and eternal implications
for our souls. Our answers determine who and what we live for, what we value most,
how we make each decision in our lives, and what our fate will be when we die.
Today, Jesus is essentially asking each one of us, “Who do
you say that I am?” (Matt. 16:15). What will your response be?
To read the Arabic translation of this post, click here.
لقراءة الترجمة العربية لهذا المنشور إضغط هنا.
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