Loading summary
Transcript2 lines
- [00:00]
A
What's your view of Christ? Who do you say that he is? I believe your answer to that question will determine your eternal destiny. When we look at that title, Son of Man, what we often do mistakenly is say, oh, wait a minute, we know our Christology, that we believe as Christians that Jesus was vera homo veridaeus, that he was truly man and truly God. He had a human nature and a divine nature. And so when he calls himself the Son of Man, this must be primarily a reference to his human nature. And this is an expression of Jesus humility, where he doesn't boast about his divinity, he doesn't boast about being the Son of God. He says, pseudo, men say that I, the Son of man, am. When we do that, we make a serious error. Because when Jesus uses the title Son of Man, he uses it obviously in light of its connection to Old Testament literature, particularly the Book of Daniel, in which the Son of Man is a heavenly being who descends from the presence of the ancient of days, from the very presence of God himself for a season to carry on his ministry, to which he will later ascend, to be restored to the glory that he had with the Father from the beginning. And if you look every time that Jesus uses the term Son of Man in the New Testament, you will see it's not an exercise in humility. When he will say, for example, that the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath, he's not saying that human beings are the Lord of the Sabbath because the Sabbath is established and instituted by God. When he says that, you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins. He's associating with that title a divine prerogative. Now, don't get me wrong. I don't think that the Son of Man refers exclusively to his deity, but I would say that the title refers chiefly and primarily to his deity, that this is God who has taken upon himself a human nature. And so Jesus reveals a lot about the proper answer of this question by the way he asks it. When he says, who do men say that I, the Son of Man? Well, they give him the Gallup Poll on it, and they say, well, you know, there's different views out there. Some say you're John the Baptist, others say Elijah, others Jeremiah or one of the prophets. The same kinds of questions that were raised about the identity of John the Baptist. When he created such a stir, coming out of the wilderness into the desert, calling Jewish people to baptism and so on. People wanted to know if he was the prophet promised in the Old Testament? Was he the coming back of Elijah and so on? Now they're wondering if Jesus, because a lot of these people up there in the north, they stopped hearing about John the Baptist. He passed from the scene. And they're thinking maybe this is the John the Baptist and he's making a comeback like an Elvis sighting somewhere up there in the north. But that's part of the scuttlebutt that's going on here in the discussion. And Jesus is fine, thank you very much. But now let's get down to business. And he asks his disciples perhaps the most important question that Jesus could ever ask them. Certainly the most important question he could ever ask you or he could ever ask me. Who do you say that I am? Let me just pause for a moment here and ask you, in Christ's name, I question who do you say that he is? What's your view of Christ? I believe your answer to that question, what you honestly believe in response to that question, will determine your eternal destiny. And there's no greater question that you will ever face than that.
- [05:07]
B
Thanks for listening to ultimately with RC Sproul. To hear more trusted teaching from Dr. Sproul and other gifted teachers, check out Renewing youg Mind, another podcast from Ligonier Ministries. A new episode is available seven days a week. Subscribe today wherever you get your podcasts.