Who Was Jesus Before Human Birth

And now for the sermon today, Mr. Tuck.

Happy Sabbath, everybody! I hope that you've had a good Sabbath. The McNeelys enjoyed it immensely last week, being able to visit with everybody and, you know, usually in the morning I got up around six or six-thirty, and Mr. McNeely would be sitting outside in the morning. I don't know what the temperatures were, probably a hundred degrees. And I went out, and he was sitting, you know, out next to the pool, and just kind of looking at things, looking at his notes and so forth. I said, you know it's a little hot out here, but he said, you know it's a dry heat.

So anyway, he resorted to what we say, but he said, you know, I think I could get used to this. And I said, well, this is an area where a lot of ministers come to retire. So anyway, who knows, brother, you may have all kinds of people that retire in the Phoenix area before all is said and done. But they had a really wonderful time here and went back home on Monday, and had a safe trip in going, you know, back out to Cincinnati.

And they had some other things they had to attend to right away. Well, brother, you know, we are warned that in the end time, that there would be much skepticism and much doubt that people would begin to have. We live in, of course, a time of great turmoil in the world right now. And certainly having that is enough, but people sometimes having problems of being skeptical, skeptical of prophecy, skeptical of many other things, you know, that the Bible talks about and doubting, doubting many things, not only doubting about prophecy.

Some people even doubt the whole Bible. I just don't even believe the Bible at all. In fact, we were warned that there would be many that would be coming, that they would be deceiving, and that many would be deceived as a result of deceivers that would go out in the world. We've been warned, in fact, that we would have people even within the church would rise up and try to lead people away from the church. I think we're all familiar with that.

If you've been in the church at any length of time, it seems like we go from one crisis to another, you know, in the church. I came into the church back in 1968, and you know, you think when you are converted that, you know, it's going to be all smooth sailing right into the kingdom of God. But how many of you found that to be solid? If you've been around a little while. It doesn't happen that way, does it? No, there are many times when we're tested. When we're, we have to make up our minds.

One way or another, what we're going to do, we had to do that, of course, in a very big way back in 1995. If you were around at that time, and I realize that we have some that were not around at that time, or at least they were very young when it happened. But you have to make up your mind. In these days we're living in, many books have been written to challenge even the divinity of Jesus Christ.

You know, there are people that have made a lot of money, in fact, writing books about that. And the Apostle John warned over in 1st John 2 verse 18, he said, little children, it is the last time. And you have heard that antichrist shall come. Even now are there many, he says, many antichrists, whereby we know that it is the last time. Of course, John thought that he was living in the end of the age. Of course, he would find out that was not necessarily so, that there was going to be more time that was going to have to go by before Jesus Christ was going to return.

But roll forward 2,000 years, and we see the same patterns that began to happen, that antichrists arise. Now, there will actually be, the Bible indicates, an antichrist, an individual who embody the antichrist, a false prophet the Bible talks about, that is referred to over in the book of Revelation. But John said that there would be many antichrists, and in fact, he says, and let me read it, there are many antichrists, many. He was talking about even in his day. There were many. The word antichrist merely means against Christ. Anything that is against Christ can be a person, can be belief that someone holds. And any belief that lessens the value of Jesus Christ is antichrist.

Would you agree with that? That if it lessens the importance and the value of what Jesus Christ did when in coming to provide his life as a great sacrifice for all mankind, anything that lessens that is antichrist.

It is against Christ. You know, we of course can't imagine anybody would want to be against Jesus Christ, but there are those that are against Christ. Some think that Jesus Christ is not God. That he was just a well-meaning individual. You probably heard the story about how actually Thomas Jefferson, you know, cut out all of the parts in the Bible that referred to Jesus Christ as being a deity. And they actually published a Thomas Jefferson Bible that extracts all of that so that basically his book is talking about a man who said a lot of good things, but he was not God.

He was not the Son of God. So that was a little exercise that he went through. He got apparently a Bible and cut out with a razor blade, you know, all those things that he didn't think belonged in the Bible.

But, brethren, believing Jesus Christ came in the flesh that gave his life. He was the Son of God. And he came and he gave his life for all of us as a litmus test for those who truly are God. If we don't believe that, I guess the question is, why are we here? Why would we even want to be here? In fact, in John's day, there were some people that taught that Jesus Christ did not come in the flesh or that the anointed one or the Christ did not come in the flesh. I'm sure you've studied this. If you've been in the church for a while, it was called docetism. The belief that Jesus the belief that when the Christ came, he only appeared to be human.

You know, he only appeared that way, but he didn't really, you know, he didn't come in the flesh. He was spirit. Kind of a stupid way of viewing it, but it was a belief, a major belief during the time of John when Gnosticism was, of course, a big force that he also had to deal with. But if you begin to think that Jesus Christ did not come in the flesh, you know, as the Emmanuel, you know, as the being who was God with us, obviously you begin to immediately begin to question the divinity of Christ, if you think that way, if you believe that way. And the rationale of people when they begin to think that way is that, well, if we believe that Jesus is God and then there's the Father, that's polytheism. Polytheism. But you know, brethren, in the Bible, the word polytheism is not there. That's a man-made word. Monotheism and polytheism? That's simply not there. Like a lot of things, man has invented these things, these concepts that are there. And so people began to think that Jesus could not be God. He was, you know, someone special, obviously, but he was not God. And you know what, brethren, the same idea is still around today. It's still around today. There was an individual that died recently who kind of hearkens back to 1974 when we had some ministers that sort of rose up and started their own group. And he was one that was a bandleader for this one God concept. And when you hear people talking about one God, they don't mean it the way we mean it. They mean that Jesus was not God. That's what they mean. But this man used to be affiliated with the worldwide Church of God in the past, and he led a group out back in 1974. I know that because I went into one of the areas that was devastated by some of the thinking back then. And that was not one of them then, but he later got into some heresy that he was the ringleader with and right up until his death. So let's ask and answer this question, brethren. Who and what was Jesus before his human birth? Who was he and what was he? Let's go over here to John chapter 1. John chapter 1 over here. We'll go through the first five verses here. But it says, In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God and the Word was God. And it says, He was in the beginning. So the topic here is the Word. We understand again, breaking down the subject and the predicate of this sentence. The subject is the Word. Who is the Word? He, the Word, was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him. Who? The Word. Correct? Because again, that's the subject here. All things were made through him and without him nothing was made that was made. In him was life and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness and the darkest did not comprehend it. Now the world didn't really accept Jesus Christ when he came. Didn't comprehend who he was. Why he came? And notice going on down here again, the subject, what it is. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us and we behold his glory. John, of course, and James, you know, were there to witness, you know, Christ himself being glorified. And the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. John bore witness of him and cried out saying, This is he of whom I said, He who comes after me is preferred before me, for he was before me.

And so the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. You know, John says here. So verse one, of course, from the very beginning, we see that the Word and the Greek, of course, for that word there is logos and it means the spokesman. He was the one that spoke for the Godhead.

But it says, in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God. And the Word, God here, is translated in the Greek theos. Theos. It was the word that we use here. But it goes on to say, And the logos was theos. Logos was theos. And then the logos became flesh and dwelt among us. So here John is very clearly saying this, that Jesus is God. He's the one that, again, was flesh, the Emmanuel, that God with us, that dwelt among us, and that Jesus is the Creator. He's the one through whom God creates. And that Jesus is the one that has life, that was given, that was imparted here. Now let's think about things in a very big way, you know, here. Think about the universe that is out here. All of us have seen the fantastic pictures that come back from Hubble, and that show us far and distant galaxies, and how wonderful and beautiful this universe is. Last night I took a little walk, and I was looking up because I was in an area with not a lot of lights, so I could you could see the the Milky Way band, that is so clear when you don't have that lighting out there. But I want you to think about this. If the universe is eternal, why would you need a Creator? Do you get what I said there? That vast universe out there, if it has always been there, why would you need a Creator? You get what I'm saying here?

If it's always been there, then why would you need a Creator? Well, there had to be, again, a time when it did not exist. This physical universe that we see out here is not unlimited, it's not infinite, it is physical, and it is subject to decay. You look at the moon, how pockmarked it is by whatever pummeled it in times past.

You know, an interesting thing to think about is this, and it really, when you start listening to what the scientists say, it's almost like they they paint themselves in a corner. You know, have you ever noticed that about scientists that are so smart? It's like they paint themselves in a corner. You know that scientists say that the moon pulls away from the earth just a few feet every year. At one time, the moon was very close to the earth, but now it is 240,000 miles away in its orbit. Now let me let this ask the question that the scientists don't like to hear. You know, if the universe is expanding and the universe has been around forever, why do we even see the moon? If it's been this way forever, frankly, then why do we even see the stars? If everything's been around for eternity?

The fact of the matter is the universe is not infinite. It is finite. The earth is finite. This earth is between four and five billion years old.

Astronomers say that the universe itself is about 14 billion light years. I think they adjust that up a little bit, you know, from time to time. I think the last I heard it was 14.5, but about 14 billion years old, because the farthest point that they could see out of the universe, and we're very limited by the ability with telescopes and the things that we were able to use, is about 14.5 billion light years. And it takes 14.5 billion years for the light to get to us, so that we can see what's out there 14.5 billion light years away. So again, that points to the fact that this universe is finite. At one time, it did not exist. Jesus Christ, or the one who became the Christ in the form of Jesus, existed before time began. When measurement of time. Then he was the logos. He was the spokesman. I've heard Mr. Armstrong explain it this way. You know, if you can imagine, there was a time when there were two brilliant beings that were, you know, in the blackness of whatever it would have been called back then, but there was nothing whatsoever that existed. And then they created what is the universe today. They brought it into existence. But you know, before this even happened, the angels were created. So you don't have just two beings at this time that witnessed this, but you have the angelic world that's already in existence before this physical universe was even created. Because the Bible tells us that they shouted for joy at the time of the creation. The angels are there to witness the creation of this universe. Now, whether it was a big bang or a big thud, I don't know what it was. Who could even know? But again, realize that Jesus Christ existed before the physical universe. He existed before there were angels, because we just read that He created all things. He was there. He existed as the Creator then, and it makes false sense that John states that He was the Word. He was the spokesman for God, and He was God. You see, it makes false sense that He was God. Now, the book of Micah gives this. Let's notice over in Micah chapter 5. Micah chapter 5 in verses 1 through 2. I'm going to read this from the modern King James Version. But Micah has an interesting prophecy about the Messiah that was prophesied to come. And remember the Magi, when they came and they spoke to Herod, he inquired of them diligently when this Messiah was going to appear. And in fact, there were prophecies, and this would have been one of them. But notice it says, now gather yourself in troops, daughter of a troop. One sets a siege against us. They shall strike the judge of Israel with a rod on the cheek. And you, Bethlehem Ephrata, Bethlehem, remember, plays very much into where the Messiah was going to be born. You, being least among the thousands of Judah, out of you, he shall come forth to me to become ruler in Israel. He who is going forth have been from of old, from the days of eternity. From the days of eternity. That's the Messiah, the Christ that was to come. From the days of eternity. We know that that he was born a physical man, fully man, and fully God. A baby, of course, and growing up much the way we do, of course, with quite different knowledge, because it was inherent within him as a result of the Spirit being with him, you know, from birth. Because he was begotten by the Holy Spirit. But he was eternal.

From the days of eternal eternity, or everlasting, as it says in King James Version. So it shows, even in the Old Testament, the pre-existence of the Christ that was to come. And he came and gave his life for us. Now, there are other chapters we could go to, if we wanted to go to Hebrews in the New Testament, and look into the example of Melchizedek, of which Jesus Christ, remember, is a priest after the order of Melchizedek forever. And what the Scriptures are talking about that are none other than Jesus Christ, who had no lineage, no beginning of days, or end of days. Was from eternity, as it says in Micah. What did Jesus Christ himself claim about himself? Let's go to John chapter 1 here, down to verse 18.

He, again, said, and John writes these things down, because I'm sure heresy began to crop up quite rapidly, and John wrote those things down that need to be known. But John says, no one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father. He has declared Him.

So, here, John is saying, the only one that had ever seen the Father, or God, as it's referred to, here, was the one who had ascended after His crucifixion, and that was Jesus Christ. He was there with the Father in heaven.

And Jesus Christ is the one who came and declared about the Father. Now, think about the fact that you and I wouldn't know anything about the Father had not Jesus Christ revealed it to the first century. We wouldn't have a clue about the Father.

The world did not understand about the Father or the Son, and the relationship that was there. But this is what John was taught by Jesus Christ, who was right there.

And Jesus Christ came proclaiming knowledge of the Father because He had known the Father. And He was the only one that had known the Father.

Let's go now to John 6 over here. After the miracle of feeding the 5,000 with the fish and the bread, let's notice here in John 6 and verse 32 and verse 33 here, of course, we read this as we go through the Passover and talk about some of these things quite a bit. But in this context, let's go to this verse and think of it from this perspective. Verse 32 of chapter 6 of John, Then Jesus said to them, Most assuredly I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. Well, Moses didn't give the true bread from heaven or the bread that they were given, that was from heaven. But he says, My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. Because Jesus, the first time, was dispatched to this earth, and He is indeed the bread of life. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. The potential of life came through the arrival of Jesus Christ for us. Verse 38, For I have come down from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of Him who sent me. Nobody had ever said these things about God. No one was aware of these things. That He was dispatched, He was sent by the Father to do what He had to do. So He claimed to be the bread of life sent from the Father come down out of heaven. Verse 41, Then the Jews then complained about Him, because He said, I am the bread which came down from heaven. And you know, we would have probably been right there with, you know, the Jews and be complaining about what He had said as well. It sounds out of this world. You know, if somebody here began to talk of themselves in these ways, what would we think about them? Well, we probably want to call a paddy wagon, you know, and put one of those little white jackets on that you tie, you know, the arms behind the back. And they said, Is this not Jesus, the Son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How is it then He says, I've come down from heaven? Now, wait a minute. You know, they're saying, you know, I know His dad, I know His mom, I know His brothers and sisters, but He's saying He came down from heaven. You know, they had problems with this claim of Jesus. But let's understand, brethren, that Jesus wasn't playing word games with people here. They knew what He was trying to say. He wasn't using metaphors, but He was being quite literal with them. Verse 57. On down here, verse 57, it says, As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on me will live because of me. He was talking, of course, about the word that He spoke, because He was the spokesman for the Father, saying what the Father wanted Him to say. If you live by those words, you will live. If you go against them, you will perish. This is the bread which came down from heaven, not as your fathers ate the manna, and are dead. He who eats this bread will live forever. This is a spiritual thing. We eat of this, and we live forever.

The bread sent down from heaven, you know, He is the manna that was sent down by the Father. He is the bread of life. Jesus spoke about, in fact, some of the same things when He was at the Feast of Tabernacles. Let's go to chapter 7 over here. Chapter 7. Remember when He went up secretly, and in the middle of the feast He began to teach, you know, at the Feast of Tabernacles, even though He was risking His life by even being there. But here in verse 28, then Jesus cried out as He taught in the temple, You both know Me, and you know where I am from. I have not come from, it is as of Myself.

For He who sent Me is true, whom you do not know. You don't know God. But I know Him, for I am from Him, and He sent Me. I came from the Father. Jesus is saying, of course, they had problems with that, didn't they? Again, He wasn't playing any word games with them at all.

Some of the people began to believe, but the religious leaders wanted to seize Him. They would have liked to probably put Him to death right away, but they know that He was popular among the people and might have had an uprising as a result of it. But they had to have people that they staged, in fact, that would testify against Christ falsely. And they had to basically drum up enough people that would be against Him that they could say, well, the people wanted to do it. It wasn't what we wanted to do, but it's what the people wanted to do. Very often that happens. You know, in politics, even, there are games that people play in the world that we live in. And I frankly don't want to have anything to do with the games that people play. It seems like there was a song back in the 60s when I went to Northeastern State University, the games people play now every night and every day. You know, in a very popular song back there at that time, when everybody was, of course, they thought they were finding themselves, but they were losing themselves even more. How many of you lived in the 60s, by the way? Okay, quite a few of you know what I'm talking about. Some of you have no clue, is what I'm talking about. When talking about the 60s. You know, it was a time when people were, you know, bending their minds in the wrong way with the use of drugs and pot and other things like that. One of the things I would say, though, that I had nothing to do with that kind of generation myself, I decided that wasn't what I wanted in life. But going on here, let's notice in chapter 8 in verse 23.

Again, Jesus talked about these things at the Feast of Tabernacles.

In verse 23, and he said to them, you are from beneath. You hear Christ talking to about the scribes and the Pharisees of his day. You're from beneath. You're from down here.

I am from above. You are of this world, and I am not of this world.

Verse 42, same chapter, and Jesus said to them, if God were your father, you would love me. For I proceeded from and came from God, nor have I come of myself, but he sent me.

Sometimes we have a lot of dissidence in this country.

I'm going to tell you what. We talk about Native Americans, African Americans, you know, Oriental Americans. If you go over to another country—I remember when we were in Egypt, and we were the only Americans that at least we saw over there.

If you don't see Americans for a while, it really is a breath of fresh air when you do. And you know what? You don't care what they're racist. And then when Jesus here is talking about, he says, look, if you knew the father, you'd love me. You'd love me. If you're from America, you love Americans. If you're in a foreign land, you know, where you're a stranger in that land, and Christ said, look, if you were the father, like I am, we'd click with each other. You'd love me.

But Jesus Christ spoke this way about himself and what he was doing, rather than he was revealing himself to mankind who he was. That he was not just, you know, a wise man, as oftentimes people think, they just, you know, a very erudite, very wise, you know, counselor of his day, said a lot of good things, kind of like a throw or somebody like that, you know, who was noted for his wisdom, you know. But Christ was more than that, much, much more than that. I know you know that, rather than I'm preaching to the choir. But to, again, help us to remember, if anybody talks about, you know, Jesus Christ as though he was just a, you know, a well-meaning prophet or, you know, a good and decent man, he was more than that, much more than that. He alone had seen God. Nobody on the face of the earth could claim that he, that they had been with God, that they had seen God. Let's go to John chapter 6. John chapter 6. John 6 and verse 46.

It says, not that anyone has seen the Father, except he who is from God. He is seeing the Father. And so here we see Jesus talking about that he alone had seen the Father.

Now, interestingly, you know, there are those who were saying that the Father was the one who is in the Old Testament. You've probably heard this before he even came into the church. I know I did. You know, how many of us heard before we came into the church that the Father was the God of the Old Testament and Jesus Christ is the God of the New Testament? How many of you heard that when you were coming along? I know I did. I used to believe that.

And I'll tell you, it was a revelation when I found it wasn't true. A tremendous revelation that changed my whole way of thinking about Jesus Christ and the Father.

Jesus Christ says, oh, he's the only one that has seen the Father. And yet there are a number of accounts where there were people in the Old Testament who saw God. Who saw God? So, is Jesus lying here about this? No, he's not lying.

Who was the Lord that appeared unto Abraham in Genesis 17 verse 1? Who was that? Was that the Father? Did Abraham see the Father? If he saw the Father, then Jesus was lying here in the New Testament.

How about Isaac and Jacob in Exodus 6 and verse 3? You know, Isaac and Jacob and Abraham did not even know God from the Tetragrammaton YHWH, which oftentimes is pronounced Yahweh, right there in Exodus 6 and verse 3, says that Abraham, that Isaac and Jacob did not know God from the term Yahweh, YHWH or VH or whatever it is, which was used, of course, you know, after the time of Moses, you know, in terms of times when it began to be utilized by the children of Israel. Well, what was he known by? Some of you remember your Bible. What was he known by, by Abraham? He was known by the Almighty, the name Almighty. It was called the Almighty. And of course, we oftentimes refer to God as the Almighty, God. But God did, was not manifest to the way He did with Moses in the time after Moses. And over in Numbers 12 verse 8, I'm giving you the Scripture so you can look them up and read them, Moses spoke to God face to face. Now, what did he mean by that? He spoke to him mouth to mouth. Usually when you're talking mouth to mouth, you're looking at somebody's face, right? But they spoke face to face with each other.

And God spoke to Moses out of a burning bush, a pillar of fire, and a cloud of smoke.

The children of Israel saw God that way. You know, so interestingly, the Bible actually says that no one can see God and live. What does this mean? What does that mean?

If you can't see God and live, then who has seen God?

What does it mean that no one can look upon God and live? Well, let's go to Exodus 33. I don't want to get bogged down in this kind of minutia, but in Exodus 33, Exodus 33 verse 17, Moses wanted to see God's glory. You know what? God permitted him to have a manifestation of God before his eyes. Even though Moses had seen God, apparently it was a manifestation that was different than what he wanted to see.

But notice here, verse 17 here, So the Lord said to Moses, I will also do this thing to you that you have spoken, for you have found grace in my sight, and I know you by name. He knew him in an intimate way. And he said, please show me your glory. So Moses, speaking to God as he had done before, and then he said, I will make all my goodness pass before you. Here God is talking to Moses, and I will proclaim the name of the eternal before you. Now I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. But he said, you cannot see my face. For no man can see me and live. So the concept here, we have to understand when the Bible says that no one can see God and live, you can't see his face. But apparently, in this case, he was able to see a part of God.

And the eternal said, here is a place by me, and you shall stand on the rock, so it shall be, while my glory passes by, I will put you in the cleft of the rock, and will cover you with my hand while I pass by. Now take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.

Who was this that Moses saw?

Well, Jesus Christ said, nobody is seeing the Father.

The only being it could have been was the Word, was Jesus Christ. He saw the backside of the one who became Jesus Christ.

Because Jesus said he had been the only one he had seen, God.

Interesting what it says over in 1 Corinthians 10 and verse 4. 1 Corinthians 10 and verse 4. You wonder, when these scriptures exist in the Bible, how it is people get confused. But in 1 Corinthians chapter 10 and verse 4, speaking of the children of Israel when they were in the wilderness, and they all drank the same spiritual drink, for they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ.

So who did Moses see? He saw Christ.

In fact, nobody's ever seen the Father.

So Paul identifies the God of the Israelites. This is who the Israelites knew as God, as God, the one God, the one God concept.

And, you know, this is the one they looked to. They didn't know about the Father. When Jesus was dispatched the first time to this earth, he came to reveal the Father, that in fact the Godhead has two beings, the Father and the Son, and that God is a family.

There's an important concept of the word knowing. You know, there are two Greek words for the word to know. One is genosko, and the other is eida, eida or idol. Genosko is a Greek word that means knowing as a result of discernment, being around somebody. You know, you learn a little about somebody. You grasp more about who they are. It's like if you go to camp with someone and you see them perform, you know, at camp or whatever, you get to know a different side of somebody. You discern, you grow in your understanding of them. In fact, the more you do with a person, you learn more about them, right? You grow in your understanding of them. The Greek word idol implies, though, absolute knowledge, absolute knowledge. And Christ had absolute knowledge of the Father. He knew the Father very, very well. It's like if you know somebody so well, you know their character up one side, then down the other. He knew him so much. He said to the disciples, if you see me, you see the Father. That's how well I know the Father. You see me, you see the Father. The book of Hebrews talks about how that Christ was the except, the express image of God. And that word, if you look it up, is the express character of God. He was the stamped image of the Father in heaven. So we had absolute knowledge of the Father.

And when he talked to the Jews and when he spoke to them, he spoke about his knowledge of the Father, both his knowledge that had come from discernment, of getting to know the Father, and his absolute knowledge, because, of course, he was like the Father.

You know, he came to reveal himself to mankind as the Messiah. He came to reveal himself as the Son, and to reveal God as his Father to mankind. He came to offer this complete revelation to humankind. And Jesus Christ claimed on separate occasions these things before the Pharisees, and he did so before his disciples. And the implications of what Jesus is saying is this, because it is a divine, complete revelation from Jesus Christ. Number one, to reject Jesus Christ is to reject the only full revelation of God given to humankind.

And number two, thus to reject Jesus is to reject God. If we don't accept Jesus, in fact, as the Son of God, as God indeed, we reject the Father. We reject him, we reject what is above him, and that's the Father. On occasion, Christ would, in fact, say that he was, you know, the Son of God. And the Jews were irritated at that because they knew instantly what it meant, that he was equating himself with God. They viewed him as a blasphemer, as a matter of fact. That's why they thought he should have been put to death.

But when we come to the New Testament, what the New Testament tells us, the Apostle Paul actually says the same thing. You know, Paul says that Jesus was in the form of God, you know, before coming in the flesh, and he thought it not robbery even to be equal with God.

But he made himself of no reputation. He took upon himself the form of a servant made in the likeness of human beings, of man. He emptied himself, in other words, brethren, and he came as a man. And again, we called him, he was referred to in the Bible, as Immanuel, or God with us. Now, let's go to another part of this in Exodus chapter 3. You know the story in the account where Moses is appearing before the burning bush.

In chapter 3, of course, he was a reluctant individual. He made excuses to why he could not carry the message to Israel that was in Egypt. You know, I've got a problem. I can't give speeches. He might have had a problem of stuttering. God says, what? You know, I created the mouth. You've come to the perfect person, the perfect being. I can heal the mouth. I can do that. I'm good at that. You know, so God can do that. You know, God has an answer for every excuse you and I can make. You think you can't do something? You know, God can help you do it. He can help you accomplish it. But in Exodus chapter 3 and verse 13, let's put a sign down here. Then Moses said to God, Indeed, when I come to the children of Israel and say to them, the God of your fathers has sent me to you, and they say to me, What is his name? What shall I say to them? And God said to Moses, I am who I am. And thus you shall say to the children of Israel, I am has sent me to you. I am has sent me to you. That sounds like something John Wayne would say. You know, I am sent you to me. You know, so he was known as I am to Moses.

And on seven occasions in the New Testament, Jesus introduces himself as what? I am. What does he say in John 14 verse six? When he told his disciples, you know, we read it the Passover every year. I am, I am the way, the truth, and the light. He called himself I am. The night that Jesus Christ was arrested. You know, Judas, of course, had betrayed him into the hands of the the scribes and the Pharisees.

And so a band of officers came from the chief priests, the Pharisees. They came to the lanterns of the torches and the weapons. And Jesus, knowing all things that were coming upon him, went out and he said to them, whom do you seek? Who are you seeking? And they answered him, Jesus of Nazareth. And Jesus said to them, I am. If you look in the, by the way, the King James, it says, I am he. The he part is left out. It's an italics. Words, he said, I am. And Judas had betrayed him, also stood with them. And it says, then, as soon as he had said this to them, I am, they went backward and fell to the ground. They knew what this meant. They knew what this meant. The I am had come. And Jesus was the I am. He was the God who had worked with the children of Israel.

So, brethren, Jesus claimed he came from God. He claimed he alone had seen God, that he knows God. He claimed to come to declare the Father, to reveal God. He claimed he was the equal with God. Jesus was God.

Now, brethren, either we have to accept what the Bible reveals to us, and I believe that I've just given you a thumbnail here of what the Bible says. Or we, if we don't accept what the Bible says, we conclude that Jesus Christ was a liar and a lunatic, and we need one of those white jackets.

We either accept everything he claimed to be the fullest revelation of God, made known to man in the only way to God, or we reject him. We either accept him or we reject him.

That Jesus indeed is God, pre-existed, and now is at the right hand, in full-blown glory, at the right hand of the Father in heaven, as our meteor-aider, brethren. Again, we either accept him or we reject him. And I hope, brethren, that you don't let anybody dissuade you from recognizing Jesus Christ, who is our Lord and our God in heaven, and that he is the only begotten Son, and he is full of glory. And when we go to God, we pray in the name of Jesus Christ.