The Divine Origin of Jesus Christ

I'll never forget the time that I spent working for a Hospice company in East Texas.  Although the responsibility revolved around death, I found myself learning a lot about life.  The demands of this responsibility were sometimes overwhelming, but the cause was always worth it.

One of the critical responsibilities of Hospice included the need to be there when ill weather hit.  That is, if a tornado, a flood, or any other natural disaster hit, we had a contingency plan in place to help lead our patients to safety.  In a sense, this was a "backup plan" for when things went wrong.

Many have concluded that--like this Hospice plan in times of unforeseen danger--Jesus is God's backup plan to the unforeseen sin of Adam and Eve.  The thought is that God was taken by surprise when Adam and Eve sinned and Jesus was His way of fixing what He initially messed up.  The Scriptures, however, tell a much different story.  They state that Jesus had a divine origin.  This is important because this divine origin conveys a powerful meaning of what it means that "God so loved the world."

In John 7, Jesus is found teaching at the Feast of Tabernacles.  In verses 25-27, some of the participants begin questioning the deity of Jesus because they "know where He is from."  They had essentially misinterpreted Malachi 3:1 which prophesy's of the Messiah "appearing suddenly in the temple."  Jesus was from Nazareth, so how could He really be this "sudden" Messiah that the prophecy spoke about?  Jesus gives an unequivocal answer--"I have not come of Myself, but He who sent Me is true.  I am from Him, and He sent Me."  That is, Jesus had a divine origin!

The divine origin of Jesus Christ is important for at least three reasons: First, if Jesus was a created being, then that would testify of a God who made a mistake in His creation of man and woman. That is, God was taken by surprise by the choice Adam and Eve made.

Second, if God made a mistake once with Adam and Eve, then who is to say that He won't make more?  Can one single creation of a "Son" really account for the various other mistakes this kind of God will most certainly make?

Third, if Jesus was a created being--if He didn't have a divine origin--then the love that God has shown by sacrificing Him would be greatly devalued, if not completely diminished.  Essentially, John 3:16 would lose it's value!  Can you imagine a verse stating, "For God so loved the world that, after being surprised and realizing His mistake in creation, He created someone to die in order to fix it?"  Not only does this water down the Gospel, it speaks of a weak and cowardly God.  Thankfully, this is not the case.  1 John 4:9-10 captures the value of Jesus' divine origin well,

"By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him.  In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins."

It is of the utmost importance that we believe that Jesus is not God's "backup plan."  Scriptures galore testify of this divine origin of Jesus Christ.  The four great messianic passages of the Bible reveal glorious revelations of Jesus' divine origin with the Father (Colossians 1:13-20, Hebrews 1:1-3, John 1:1-5, Philippians 2:5-11).  Moreover,1 Peter 1:19-20 states that Jesus is the "foreordained Lamb." 

If Jesus is a created being then we would essentially be worshipping a God who is capable of making multiple mistakes and one who cheated what it means to express love.  Jesus is indeed the eternal Son of God and this expresses the powerful testimony that God so loved the world that He sent His one and only Son whom He has had eternal fellowship with.  This is true love!