The fact that Jesus is spoken of as the only begotten Son of God should be sufficient to establish a belief in his divinity. As Son of God, he must partake of the nature of God.
"As the Father has life in himself, so has he given to the Son to have life in himself." (John 5:26)
Life and immortality are imparted to the faithful followers of God, but Christ alone shares with the Father the power to impart life. He has "life in himself," that is, he is able to perpetuate his own existence. This is shown by his own words when, showing the voluntary nature of his sacrifice for man, he said:
"I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man takes it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again." (John 10:17-18)
That Christ is divine is shown by the fact that he receives worship. Angels have always refused to receive worship and adoration. But we read of the Father, that
"...when he brought in the first begotten into the world, he said, And let all the angels of God worship him." (Hebrews 1:6)
If he is to receive worship from angels, it follows as a matter of course that he should receive worship from men; and we find that even while here on earth, in the likeness of man, he received worship as God. The prophet John thus records the adoration which Christ will finally receive equally with the Father:
"And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, be unto him that sits upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever." (Revelation 5:13)
If Christ were not God, this would be idolatry. The great indictment against the heathen is that they:
"...changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshiped and served the creature more than the Creator." (Romans 1:25)
It matters not what the position of a creature may be, whether a beast, a man, or an angel, worship of it is strictly forbidden. Only God may be worshiped, and since Christ may be worshiped, Christ is God. So say the Scriptures of truth.
It is hardly necessary, with all this army of testimony, to speak of the pre-existence of Christ. One of the strangest things in the world is that men professing to believe and reverence the Bible, will claim that Christ had no existence prior to his birth of the Virgin Mary. Three texts only will be quoted here to disprove this theory, but texts which will be quoted later, on another point, will just as fully prove the pre-existence of Christ.
The first text is in the prayer of Jesus, on the night of his betrayal. He said:
"And now, Father, glorify me with your own self, with the glory which I had with you before the world was." (John 17:5)
We don't know what could be plainer, unless it is the statement that he made the world. John says that:
"All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made." (John 1:3)
But stronger still are the words of the prophet, who foretold the place of the birth of the Messiah, in these words:
"But you, Bethlehem Ephratah, though you be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of you shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from the days of eternity." (Micah 5:2, margin)
He who would dispute the pre-existence of Christ, in the face of these texts, would deny that the sun shines at midday, if it suited his notion to do so. Jesus is the only begotten Son of God. He was begotten, not created. He is of the substance of the Father, so that in his very nature he is God; and since that is so,
"...it pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell." (Colossians 1:19)
Or, as the apostle states in Colossians 2:
"For in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily." (Colossians 2:9)
It would be difficult to frame language more expressive of the divine nature.
Some have difficulty in reconciling Christ's statement in
"My Father is greater than I" (John 14:28),
with the idea that he is God, and is entitled to worship. Some, indeed, dwell upon that text alone as sufficient to overthrow the idea of Christ's divinity. But if that were allowed, it would only prove a contradiction in the Bible, and even in Christ's own speech, for it is most positively declared, as we have seen, that he is divine.
Christ is the Son of God. The statement is emphatically true in view of the position which Christ had assumed. He
"...emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men." (Philippians 2:7, R.V.)
"[He was] made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death." (Hebrews 2:9)
In order to redeem men, he had to come where they were. He did not lay aside his divinity, but he laid aside his glory, and veiled his divinity with humanity.
So his statement, "My Father is greater than I," (John 12:48) is perfectly consistent with the claim, made by himself as well as by all who wrote of him, that he was and is God.