By Titus Azariah.
Scriptural references that claim the deity of Christ exist in the Bible. The word Theos is used of Christ in multiple places in the Greek Old Testament. Isaiah 9:6 is one such example.
In John 8:58-59, Jesus clearly says that he was alive even before Abraham was and people around him started to throw stones at him as he was equating himself with God the father by referring to himself as ‘I am’.
When Jesus stilled the storm at sea with a word in Matt. 8:26–27, and through many other miracles, he proved that he was Omnipotent. By knowing people’s thoughts in multiple instances, he proved that he is Omniscient. He didn’t explicitly show that he was omnipresent, but these verses prove the same: “Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them” (Matt. 18:20) and “I am with you always, to the close of the age” (Matt. 28:20)
Over time, many scholars, theologians tried to comprehend the fullness of humanity and fullness of divinity in the person of Christ with their human mind, and came up with theories which ultimately do not explain everything.
We get a lot of questions like
“How could Jesus be omnipotent and yet weak?”
“How could he leave the world and yet be present everywhere?”
“How could he learn things and yet be omniscient?”
When we are talking about Jesus’ human nature, we can say that he ascended to heaven and is no longer in the world (John 16:28; 17:11; Acts 1:9–11). But with respect to his divine nature, we can say that Jesus is present everywhere.
So, we can say that both are true about the person of Christ —He has returned to heaven, and He is also present with us. We can say that Jesus was about thirty years old (Luke 3:23), if we are speaking with respect to his human nature, but we can say that he eternally existed (John 1:1–2; 8:58) if we are speaking of his divine nature.
In his human nature, Jesus was weak and tired (Matt. 4:2; 8:24), but in his divine nature, He was omnipotent (Matt. 8:26–27; Col. 1:17; Heb. 1:3).
We see both His humanity and divinity in the stilling of the storm, as He slept in His humanity and calmed the storm in His divinity.
Anything either of the two natures which Jesus had does, the Person of Christ does. To summarize, Jesus continued “remaining” what He was (fully divine); He also became what he previously had not been (fully human). We have a God who has gained additional experience as a human, He can understand us, empathize with us and help us in all the struggles and temptations better than anyone. Let’s trust him wholeheartedly and surrender our lives to him.