Faithfully yours - The Son of God, but also God the Son

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Published on Saturday, December 12, 2015

By Neil Strohschein

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Several years ago, a ministerial colleague sought my help with a difficult counseling case. He had been working with this client for roughly six months and was making no headway at all. So he began probing the client’s spiritual beliefs and that only added to his confusion.

“Everything my client believes,” he said, “is what a true Christian should believe, including that Jesus is the Son of God. So why can’t I make any progress in this case? What am I doing wrong? What questions should I be asking that up to now I haven’t asked?”

“Just one,” I replied. “We know your client believes that Jesus is the Son of God. Does he or she believe that Jesus is God the Son?”

There was a long pause, and then my colleague said: “What difference does that make?” That is the question I want to answer (to a limited extent) in this column.

In the opening verses of his gospel, St. John writes these words: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” (John 1:1) The “Word” is equal with God, possesses all of the attributes of God, speaks the words, does the works and understands the ways of God. But then we read: “The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. We beheld his glory; the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14)

To those words, John adds the following: “No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son,” (note the wording) “who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.” (John 1:18)

These verses reveal a most important truth about Jesus. While on earth, he had a body of flesh, blood and bone—just like yours and mine. But the person inside the body was the God who created the heavens and the earth and who gave life to every living entity on this planet.

In his earthly form, Jesus was the “Son of God.” He had a divine father and a human mother. But that alone would not set him apart as anyone special. Legend has it that the Greek god Zeus had 36 children in all, half of whom were the product of unions between Zeus and mortal women. So in his day, when Jesus claimed to be the “Son of God,” his listeners would ask: “Which god?”

But as “God the Son,” Jesus exists in a class by himself. He is God revealed in human form and just as he did before he came to this earth, Jesus spoke the words of God, did the works of God, understood the ways of God and fulfilled the plan of God to save humanity from its sins.

So why are so many sincere believers so reluctant to speak of Jesus as being God the Son? We have no problem with him being the Son of God. But God the Son—that’s a different story.

I think we are afraid of the implications of doing so. If Jesus is God the Son, then his words are the words of God. They carry as much authority as the 10 commandments. We need to listen to them, understand them and obey them. And that is not something our society wants to do.

We want to humanize and politicize Jesus; treat his words as authoritative when they suit our political or social agenda and reject them when they do not. More on that next week.