The true nature of Jesus

God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things…by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross (Colossians 1:19-20).

During the early years of the Christian Church, a man named Arius began teaching that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was not truly God the way that His heavenly Father was. In Arius’ view, Jesus was a bit less than God; the Father had created Him, along with everything else. This false teaching appealed to many people, who could not understand how Jesus, the Father and the Holy Spirit could be three different Persons and yet be equal together as only one God.

Eventually, even one of the emperors of the Roman Empire came to believe Arius’ false teachings. One day, this ruler elevated his son to share his throne with him. Several bishops of the church came to congratulate the emperor on this noteworthy occasion. One of the bishops, Amphilochus, had suffered much persecution for opposing Arius’ followers. He approached the emperor, offered a very nice address, and turned to leave. "What!" cried the ruler, "do you take no notice of my son? Do you not know that I have made him a partner with me in the empire? Is this all the respect you pay to a prince that I have made of equal dignity with myself?" At this, the bishop looked the emperor in the face and said, "Sir, do you so highly resent my apparent neglect of your son because I do not give him equal honor with yourself? What must the eternal God think of you, who have allowed His coequal and coeternal Son to be degraded in His proper divinity in every part of your empire?"

When Jesus healed a paralyzed man, He told him "Friend, your sins are forgiven" (Luke 5:20). Religious men who were watching this were offended; they said, "Why does this fellow talk like that? Who can forgive sins but God alone?" (Luke 5:21). They raised an excellent point--only God can forgive sins. So the question is, can Jesus forgive sins? If He is truly God, then of course He can—but if He is a lesser being, a creation of God as Arius claimed, then He is not truly God, and He cannot forgive anyone’s sins.

If Jesus is less than God, then what was the point of His being insulted by the Jews and beaten by the Romans? If Jesus cannot forgive our sins, then what purpose was there in His dying on the cross? Jesus’ suffering, death and resurrection only has meaning for us if He is indeed fully God as well as fully human. Only the death of God could make sufficient restitution for thousands of years of human evil. It is only because Jesus is God that we can find comfort in His words, "Friend, your sins are forgiven."