BibleProject - Who Did Jesus Think He Was? - God E16

Episode Date: November 5, 2018

Next week is a Q+R! Get your questions ready and send them to [e-mail]. Please keep the audio file to about 20 seconds and let us know your name and where you’re from. This episode continues our series on God. Tim and Jon dive deeper into the portrayal of Jesus as a character in the New Testament. They ask the big question: Just who did Jesus think he was? In part one (00:00-12:15), Tim and Jon briefly recap the conversation so far. As depicted in the Hebrew Scriptures, God is a “complex unity.” Tim says it’s a fundamental mistake and a case of cultural imperialism to read the Bible expecting the biblical authors to use language and words the same way that you do. He offers an example: Would you travel to another country and expect them to speak the same way, eat the same things, and have all of the cultural norms you are accustomed to? Of course not. You travel to see other cultures. So when reading the Bible, the reader needs to be trained to think as a Hebrew author would think. In part two (12:15 - 24:15), Tim breaks down some of Jesus' more inflammatory claims, including that “all the things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son reveals him.” Tim says that when Jesus says this it's another way of Jesus proclaiming he is the Son of Man, but he doesn’t use Daniel 7 Son of Man language. Instead, he uses Father/Son language. Jesus is saying that just because people may not recognize who he is, doesn’t change his identity as the Son of Man. Tim says there was a point in Jesus' human development where he became aware of his identity as the Messiah. The only window into this is the short story in Luke where Jesus is twelve years old and wants to stay in the temple because he’s aware of his identity. In part three (24:15- 40:40), Jon asks how ancient Jews thought of the Son of Man coming? Tim says that the Son of Man figure in Daniel 7 inspired a lot of different ideas. Jesus is claiming that he is opening up a way to relate to the God of Israel as “Father.” Tim outlines Matthew 26. The high priest demands to know if Jesus is the Messiah. Tim makes a key distinction. For the Jews, the title Son of Man is much more blasphemous than the title Son of God. To be a Son of God is a royal title that says you’re a descendant of King David. To be the Son of Man means you are claiming divinity, sharing in God’s own identity. Jesus’ response to the high priest is a response from Psalm 110 and Daniel 7. He says “from this moment,” meaning that as soon as he is condemned to death, it is actually the beginning of his installment or coronation as the Son of Man, who will now be sitting at the “right hand of the Father.” Jesus is then given a robe and a crown of thorns and is crucified. This is his coronation as King of the universe. In part four (40:40 -44:35), Tim gives a historical example of “Alexamenos of Rome,” an ancient piece of Roman graffiti depicting Christ being crucified, only in the image he has the head of a donkey. The graffiti is the Romans mocking someone named Alexamenos for worshiping Jesus, saying that it’s completely absurd. Tim offers an example of twenty-one Christians in the Middle East who were slaughtered and beheaded for their faith in Jesus. The apostles would have you believe that while they were being brutally murdered, they were the ones in charge, not their captors. How counterintuitive. In part five (44:35-end), Tim and Jon briefly discuss Christian baptism. Baptisms bookend the book of Matthew. At the beginning, Jesus is baptized, and at the end, he tells his disciples to baptize new believers. Tim says that, unfortunately, baptism has been controversial and divisive in Christian history. Because the apostles didn't seem to be interested in explaining baptism to the degree that it would solve debates about what baptism actually means and symbolizes. Tim says that regardless, all Christians agree that it is an important motif in Christianity. Why? Because you get to identify yourself with the Jesus story, going through the same ritual he did to identify as a child of God. Thank you to all of our supporters! Have a question? Next week is a Q+R. Send it to us! [e-mail]. Please keep the audio file to about 20 seconds and let us know your name and where you’re from. Produced By: Dan Gummel, Jon Collins, Matthew Halbert-Howen Show Music: La Rentree Des Classes, Lohstana David Another Chance, Tae the Producer He’s Always There, Tae the Producer Moments, Tae the Producer Defender Instrumental, Tents Show Resources: Check out our video on God here: https://bit.ly/2PyKGwc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexamenos_graffito https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Enoch

Hey, this is Cooper at Bible Project. I produce the podcast in Classroom. We've been exploring a theme called the City, and it's a pretty big theme. So we decided to do two separate Q and R episodes about it. We're currently taking questions for the second Q and R and we'd love to hear from you. Just record your question by July 21st

and send it to us at infoatbiboproject.com. Let us know your name and where you're from, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds and please transcribe your question when you email it in, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds, and please transcribe your question when you email it. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

Hey, this is John at the Bible Project, and on the podcast, we've been going through a fairly long series on the complex identity of God in the biblical story. The depiction of God from the Hebrew scriptures is of God as a complex community who is both above, totally other, as creator and ruler, but also intimately involved in the grit and detail of human history. If you've been following along with this series, you've been wrestling with us about the complicated and unexpected ways the biblical authors depict the Creator God. In the last episode, we got to Jesus of Nazareth, and we asked the question, was this human in some way also the Creator God? Because nowhere in the New Testament,

do you strictly see the phrase, Jesus is Yahweh. The gospel authors are using the narrative medium to make claims about Jesus. But it's not a normal way, I guess, that maybe modern or Western Christians have thought about this, we're looking for a nice sentence that just says the fact, you know, give me the facts, and that is what the gospel authors are doing through the medium of Jewish style narrative.

Today on the show, we're going to look at what Jesus thought about his own identity. We'll look at the claims that he makes about his relationship with the father, claims they ended up getting a kill. And then he goes and says something like this. All things have been handed over to me by my father. No one knows the son except the father, and no one knows the father except the son. And those to whom the son revealed him.

So what you are saying here is, listen, the son of man, I am the human one appointed to share in God's rule of creation, but people don't recognize it. No one knows the sun, but the father knows me. That's just a story. He has a saying,

I know who I am, I'm the real deal. And the fact that all these people don't recognize it or reject that doesn't affect the reality of His claim. We'll look at how Jesus claimed that He is offering to others a unique relationship with the Creator God and how this unique relationship is symbolized by the significant tradition of baptism. Baptism is a way of you undergoing what Jesus underwent

when he was publicly identified as a child of God, the child of God. All that and more today on the podcast, thanks for joining us. Here we go. So we're talking about the identity of God or the phrase I've been toying around with is the experience of God. And how God's identity is revealed to us. And we've gone through the Old Testament and then we started into Jesus.

And why don't you give us a quick recap of where we've been and why we're here. So yeah, the depiction of God from the Hebrew Scriptures is of God as a complex unity who is both above and totally other as creator and ruler, but also. Fancy word is transcendence. And transcendence, but also is intimately involved in the grit and details of human history and that when biblical characters experience Well, that's a paradox that because transcendent means I can't experience God or I can't I can't know God I can't know God in like the fullness the fullness

We have to get 40 out of words. Yeah, that's right the 40 object. I can't know this being in his complete fullness, but I can know this God as he reveals himself and this God consistently reveals himself in historical cultural moments where he takes on a certain appearance or when when God appears. Yeah, when God appears. It's and is made known. It's something that these people, these biblical figures, can wrap their minds around. It's a human person. The message of Yahweh. Or typically, even the visions that the prophets have of Yahweh on his throne or Ezekiel sees the God-mobile, the divine throne chair yet.

Even that fits into categories of other ancient or Ezekiel sees the Godmobile, the divine throne chair yet. Even that fits into categories of other ancient Israel's neighbors in ancient Near East. So it's a cultural form that they add of reference for. And it's not always a person we talked about being the glory of God, sometimes, well, what is sometimes a person? Sometimes it's just a big cloud, lightning cloud. And other times when the figure wades's just a big cloud, lightning cloud. Yeah. And other times,

when the figure wades into the foggy cloud, like Ezekiel, the other sees the divine glory chariot with a human figure on the throne. But then other times it's more abstract, like God's wisdom gets personified as a woman. Yes, that's right. As a woman in Proverbs. God's spirit, His personal life-giving presence. So the New Testament authors tell narratives that make a claim that that same God has revealed himself in a new way to fulfill where the whole story has been going. And so it does so, both continuing using those earlier categories of the complex unity of God. So it's going to draw not that language,

but it's also going to blow the ceiling off of it. At the same time, and just Jesus, yeah, he uses pre-existing categories to explain himself while at the same time exploding those into a whole new level of meaning. So, we've talked about that already, as we've been going through the gospels, that all of the gospels begin in some way quoting or alluding to Old Testament texts that are about Yahweh, and then they use those to introduce Jesus. Hmm, we looked at the baptism of Jesus that's in all four of the gospel accounts.

And this is a moment where God's complex unity is just on full display, where Jesus comes onto the public scene and he's marked by the heavenly king, the throne, the one who's in throne above the heavens, speaks and sends the spirit to communicate the love between the heavenly king and the earthly king, Jesus. And that's Yahweh on page one of the Gospel of Mark. Yahweh is coming, he quotes Isaiah 40. Yahweh is all three of these personalities interacting. That's the narrative logic of Mark's claim here. He quotes and all that. It doesn't come out and say that.

Well, he does. He does it in a narrative way. He does it in a narrative way. It's through the medium of the narrative. Yeah. So, and then Jesus from that story onward walks around doing what I call Yahweh stuff. Right. Stuff that's Yahweh's prerogative in the Hebrew scriptures and then just Jesus does it. And the foremost example is pronouncing that people sins are forgiven. Not that he forgives them. He uses the passive, just you are forgiven. Yeah, we're sins are forgiven.

Yeah, and who can do that? We talked about that. Yeah, we did. So then that raises the question for the Bible nerd sitting around is, who is this guy? And they just put it together. Who can forgive sins except the one God? Yeah. So Jesus seems to have behaved in ways that intentionally raises the issue of his identity and authority.

So I just want to highlight a couple of other times in the Gospels where this keeps ramping up. Okay. Because again, it's helpful. It's the Gospel authors are using the narrative medium to make claims about Jesus, which is just, it's not a normal way, I guess, that maybe modern or Western Christians have thought about this. We're looking for a nice sentence that just says,

the fact, you know, give me the facts. Give me the facts. And that is what the Gospel authors are doing through the medium of Jewish, spy on narratives. Right, so. Yeah. I want a textbook.

Yeah, yeah. Or just we want them to do it in the way our culture has trained us to think. Yeah. How arrogant of us. How presumpt think. Yeah. How arrogant of us. How presumptuous. Yeah. I've told you the analogy that I use about traveling, international travel.

Hmm. No. Oh, about how in the West, we know that it's rude to go travel to another country and get off the plane, not having done any preparation whatsoever to learn about the place where you're going and then to get off the plane and just start talking to everybody in English. You know asking them where the McDonald's is. Like we, right, we like, or if you've ever traveled internationally and you watch those people those Americans Yeah, yeah

bad form So we have a sensibility that that's rude and so why why do we think that's rude? It's pretty intuitive. I think from those people you're not loving your neighbor You're not you're not honoring people's other difference and you're not recognizing the fact that you're in their land. Yeah. So, I'm the one who needs to adapt. You need to get a phrase book, like do a quick Wikipedia history review of whatever Berlin or something.

You know, it's just like being a good person. Learn the customs. Yeah, that kind of thing. And so that's exactly the mentality. Most people don't have when they open the pages of the Bible. Right. Is I need to honor these authors.

Yeah. And not assume that they're going to talk the way I talk. And not assume that it's just stupid or boring. Or when they don't communicate the way I would prefer them to. Right. and not assume that it's just stupid or boring or right, when they don't, communicate the way I would prefer them to. Right. And so just apply the same logic. It's about traveling, like traveling to another place.

Green the Bible is like traveling to a foreign land. Yeah, be courteous. Yeah. Like, yeah. Well, there's something really, I love traveling to other cultures because it turns you into a, I mean, tourist is a bad word

in most people's minds, I suppose, but the tourist mentality of, I'm setting aside assumptions and I'm expecting to see things differently. And to learn different things. Yeah. Like that kind of mentality. You kind of have to have when you travel. Yeah.

Especially somewhere in another culture. Yeah. And yeah, you have to expect to feel a bit uncomfortable. Yeah. Or maybe that you're going to make mistakes. Right. You know? Yeah.

Do say your things the wrong way or something. Well, and then some people travel trying to not do that. They'll go to a place where everyone's speaking English, the food's gonna be what you expect, and it's just sunnier than the place you came from or something. Yeah. And it doesn't matter where it is. Yeah.

But the magic of traveling to other cultures is just letting yourself be a foreigner. I love that. Yeah, so I think that's a mentality of open-mindedness to another culture, language, way of seeing the world. I think most people would say they would want to be that kind of person if they traveled. Yeah, take that mentality. Yeah, big part of our value of the Bible project is reading the Bible in its historical, cultural context. And that's it. It's being a courteous traveler. And so it's not actually not that hard to do, but you have to be intentional about it when you travel Paris or when you open the pages of the Bible. Okay. Okay, so Jesus is intentionally ramping up the controversy about his identity.

There's a line in Matthew, chapter 11, it's the conclusion of Matthew 11, which is a whole series of narratives where people, Jesus is done as thing. He's given the sermon on the mount He's performed 10 incredible wonders to heal people and do other things and then Matthew 11 and Matthew's compiled all of these different types of Responses that people have to Jesus. So once John the Baptist in jail. Mm-hmm. Like are you the really the one? He told her are you sure? Remember I baptized you? Yeah. Now I'm in jail. Yeah. Yeah. So he's kind of like nervous. Not sure. Yeah, you get narratives of straight up hostility and resistance

in chapter 11 and in chapter 12 from the religious leaders. You get a story about family, his mother and brothers send for him, and they want him to kind of reign it in So then he said some things you know about his family that are kind of intense and and then summer fans Yeah, I guess we love you. It's great. So everyone's trying to figure out who like that's right the identity of this guy Jesus That right. And then he has this saying at the end where he says, all things have been handed over to me by my father. Now that already out of ring, some Daniel 7 bells. Why is that?

Well, some member Daniel 7 is a crucial for Jesus' language that he used to talk about in his identity. Yeah, it's a human figure who's exalted, vindicated from persecution, exalted up to God's presence, and then given God's own rule and authority. So all things have been handed over. Yes. That part. Yeah. Yeah. He's drawing on an idea here of the unique human one that God would share his authority too. Correct, okay. So essentially it's another way of him saying,

I'm the son of man from Daniel 7. Right, but he doesn't use ancient of day's son of man language, seven, he uses father, father son language. All things, which is, yeah. And that's I think where I didn't see the Daniel 7 thing because Daniel 7 doesn't say Father. That's right.

Yeah, Jesus is overlaying the ideas that work in Daniel 7. But he's introducing this Father language. Yeah, which we kind of already had in the baptism. Actually, we did have it in the baptism. It's the heavenly king saying, you are my son. Saying to Jesus, you are my son. I love you if Jesus is being called son who's the heavenly voice? It doesn't say it in the baptism narrative, but it doesn't need to

Here Jesus just says it straight up and he's already said it in the sermon on the mount teaching people to go call God our father That kind of thing I got really confused about this whole father thing, and I'm just thinking through how I would explain it to someone. Okay, good. And what I'm realizing is, you get to Jesus in the baptism, which we talked about in that last episode.

And there's the three and one, but there's a lot of mystery around, well, what's the voice from heaven? Yes. And we have this idea of ancient of days. We have a handful. It's like in Tanner under passages in the Hebrew scriptures, where a prophet or a poet will call God,

Yahweh is Israel's father, the father of Israel. Okay. So it's in there, it's in their tradition. It's in their tradition. Not a main goal. Yeah, but the appearances of God that were more developed were the ones of appearing like a man or these more abstract ones of his attributes being personified. This idea of someone sitting on the throne who is the father isn't as completely developed.

There's some shelves, but it's not super tight. That's right. Correct. So I think when you get to the baptism, we could say, well, there's three. We're still trying to figure out the identity of Jesus. But that isn't completely clear. We see that he's doing Yahweh stuff. We see some of the language he's using.

So we know that what Mark is saying is this is part of this is Yahweh appearing as Jesus in the Spirit and this figure in heaven. But I think just while explaining it to someone, it would be kind of holding it loose and kind of saying like, yeah, it isn't very clear yet. It's letting the narrative develop. Let the narrative develop in it. And so I put us on a tangent about trying to figure out what the God was the Father, and I think this is actually totally helps that we're going to jump into about Jesus using that language.

Yeah, let the narrative develop it. Yeah, so the baptism puts it on your radar of the heavenly figure calling Jesus my son that I've loved by means of the Spirit. Yeah. And then Jesus walks around doing Yahweh stuff, causes the controversies, and then he goes and says something like this. Okay. All things have been handed over to me by my father.

No one knows the sun except the father, and no one knows the father except the sun, and those to whom the sun reveals him. So it's as if Jesus is providing this backwards reflection. There's all these people now who have different responses to him. Uh-huh. Everyone's wondering who he is. Yes.

So what Jesus is saying here is, listen, he, son of man, I am the human one appointed to share in God's own rule over creation. Yeah. But people don't recognize it. No one knows the sun. But the father knows me. The baptism story. The father, so it's like he has a saying, I know who I am. I'm the real deal. And the fact that all these people don't recognize it or reject that doesn't affect the reality of his claim. So no one knows who I am except the father and no one knows the father. No one, this is remarkable. What are you saying is nobody knows Yahweh.

Yeah. Except how I'm revealing who Yahweh is right now in his claims and in his mission. Now no one knows the father. his mission now no one knows the father Excuse me no one knows the father. Yeah, okay. That's a Jackie right right? You know he's saying you can read the Hebrew scriptures you get this portrait But there's something happening here that is blowing the ceiling Yeah, I think what's interesting is like when I think of the when I think I think at the categories I had of the Trinity The Godhead is that God the Father is Yahweh. And so when I look back and I read about God in the Old Testament, that's just God the Father, God the Father. Father, I see.

But what this is saying is like, no one knows God the Father. Yeah. No one knows God the Father. Like what you've been experiencing, and you've, like what humans have been interacting with, and experiencing of God isn't God the Father. Well, it seems like he's saying, no one knows the Father. If no one knows the Father, like didn't Moses know the Father? Didn't like David know the Father?

They knew the God of Israel as God had revealed Himself to them. Yeah, and they didn't, and they didn't reveal himself as the Father. Correct. That's what I'm realizing. Correct. That this relationship, this experience that Jesus had with God, and who God was Yahweh as the Father,

is unique to Jesus. Correct. That's right. No one else has had that. Correct. And no one else can have it unless Jesus reveals it to them. Correct. That's right. No one else has had that. Correct. And no one else can have it unless Jesus reveals it to them. Correct. That's the claim that he thinks. That's the claim that he's making. Yes. So just be clear, is he saying like no one, like this is a completely new realization

of God's identity that no one's experienced before? That's the claim that he's making. Yeah. That his relationship to the Father and the Father's relationship to him and what that means about God's identity, this God's identity and being and nature is uniquely revealed in the person and the story of himself. And you have shelf space for it. When you say uniquely revealed. Yes. Revealed to us in this narrative. Revealed. Yeah. And the narrative is depicting things that Jesus said and did. It's right. It's a representation from the apostles of how Jesus talked and walked and... Well, so Jesus uses the language made known or anyone know. Yeah, yeah.

So using revealed as synonymous with no. Yes. Okay. Yeah. But it's only revealed if the sun reveals him. Yes, that's right. Okay. So, I and my father have had this thing going for a long for eternity past.

We're going to see, as we go on. Yeah. Okay, well he hasn't said that, but... No, he hasn't. No, he hasn't. The implications of it will... Yeah, bear fruit later. Okay.

So me and my father, who's God? Me and my father. We've got this thing going on. Yeah. And the way that my father and I have this thing going on, we know about it, and now we're sharing it with others. But the only way you're gonna learn about it is through me and what I'm doing and saying right now.

That's why I'm using the phrase uniquely revealed. This is part of the Apostles' claim. Yes, Jesus as a human, right? He was born and pooped his diapers, and he, his brain developed. Yeah, there was a point at which he became aware of his identity. Yeah. Right. And so the only window within the apostolic testimony and the New Testament is that little narrative in Luke where Jesus 12. Yeah, and he stays with the... Yeah, freaks parents out.

Yeah. Because he wants to be in the house of his father. So even a 12, he's got an awareness of some draw to the temple. Yeah. And that this is a place where I belong. Yeah. So fascinating. It's super fascinating.

So there's pre-Atalesean Jesus. Denity has formed and so- He's woken up. Yeah. To his identity. And so that formed and so- He's woken up to his identity. And so that, and then you get these statements. So at some point he became aware, and then the baptism. So he becomes aware of his identity.

He fosters that, he cultivates it. Certainly through reading prayerfully, the Hebrew scriptures, to asserting his vocation, his identity. And then once it's worked out in his mind and heart, he says stuff like this. And then he sees it as his mission and calling to announce that the kingdom of God is here, and what God's rule over the world is being revealed. Yes, my father and I, rule. All things have been given to me. So yeah, I'm with you. The categories are there, yeah, from where the story's gone, but he's, yeah, it's a new level

of claim being made about the identity of God. The claim is when people look to Jesus, they are seeing a unique revealing of God's heartbreak and character and purpose. When people in this time period, second temple Judaism, anticipated Yahweh coming like in Isaiah passage. Yeah. That mark quotes, do they think of it as him coming as a man, or do they think of it as like coming more like as he came in Exodus with the Tavern of Cloud and the Cloud and the Cloud. Yeah. We only have access to know what people thought through the literature that survived from this time period.

And there's a lot of it, Jewish second-tepal literature. And what you see is just a huge diversity. And of course, it was a really diverse culture, a religious tradition. So there's all kinds of... Like would Jesus as claim of Ben on the spectrum of possibilities when people were talking about Yahweh coming, or was it completely counted? Yeah, I mean all these texts that generated hope and expectation, so there's the coming king from line of David, so you know, and he'll come, rock him, sock him, kind of stuff. But there was no sense that that was Yahweh himself. In some texts, in most texts, yeah, the David figures is going to be like a David figure

in the human king. The Son of Man, passage in Daniel 7 generated a lot of speculation, and so there are texts where there's a handful of them. One of them is in the popular book called Inoc, in the Inoc tradition, first Inoc, and second Inoc. And there, the son of man, figure, is a human figure. See, it's actually one of the closest expressions to the things that are said about Jesus in another Jewish work.

Which is no wonder he used that phrase so much. Yeah, that's right. So we don't know, but where the books of Enoch come from, and how widespread or influential those were, it's really hard to know. The Jewish scholars down in the Dead Sea scroll community. How do they? They had copies of Enoch. Anyway, so we're back to here.

The God revealed in the Gospels is the complex unity that consists of the Father and the Son and the Spirit here and the Father and the Son. And you won't know it by just reading the Hebrew Bible, he's saying. You won't know it by staring up into this guy. You know it by looking at the story of Jesus' life and death and resurrection. That's his claim here. And let me ask a clarifying question about this idea of knowing God here. Is it more know about, like know the identity,

like have the information of who God is or is it more about having a relationship or an experience or interaction with kind of knowing. Yeah, it's more that. The second. Yeah. It's a relational knowing. Yeah, so from this point forward, Jesus is claiming to really have a relationship with the God of Israel means to have that relationship through Jesus. Okay. It involves reconfiguring a whole bunch of mental furniture.

Yeah. Yeah, this seems like a significant shift where if you were a second temple Jew and you're thinking about your relationship with Yahweh, you have texts where Yahweh is your father, but the father of your people. Father of the people. Mm-hmm, yeah, talked about as a father. But Jesus would be coming saying,

there is an aspect of God's, of Yahweh's identity that you have not had access to experiencing and knowing relationally. But I do. And I wanna give that to you. I want you to know God in that way. Yeah. Yep.

Which would be a brand new development. Yeah. It's a new development. I mean, it's not brand new. Because again, it's a new development. God has had a covenant people that he called his son. So it's not brand new, but it's a new step. It should feel very...

It's a new step that in a progress, that feels like a radical claim about if Jesus is the one who's saying that. To know the God of Israel means to know the God of Israel the way that I do. Yeah. Which means you know me and the God of Israel as a complex unity. Because I think about Jesus and the radical claim being that Jesus is the Lord. Jesus is Yahweh.

That's the one that's like the radical claim. And it is, but it seems like just as much is the radical claim of the identity of God as Father, which I've never really thought about those being both radical. I see. Yeah, okay, yeah. You're right, yeah.

Yes. So it's like the least radical one is the spirit, like as far as the categories. There's precedent for that. There's a lot more precedent. Both the identity of Jesus as the human, exalted one. There's some precedent, Daniel 7 being the biggest one. Yeah. Okay.

Cool. Okay, so let's take it the next step. Next step. Here's another fascinating story. It's a famous story that I have found when I point this out to students or people it's one of those like, oh, I'd never saw that was sitting right there. So this is a G.S. as trial before the Jewish religious leaders, the Sanhedrin. And through the whole thing they're accusing him and he's silent. And they're like, he said he was going to destroy the temple, they try and charge him as a terrorist, and that doesn't work.

Anyway, so he kept silent. This is Matthew chapter 26, in verse 63. So then the high priest said to him, I charge you under oath, put your hand on the Bible. Right. Right. By the living God. Yeah. It's whereby you all weigh himself. Yes.

That you tell us whether you are the Messiah, the Son of God. Right. Are you the political leader that's going to help us become a successful nation? That's right. Psalm 2, this is the language from Psalm 2. Yeah. The anointed king from the line of David, who, because you represent the people as king, if all the people of Israel are

the son of God, then the king is the son of God. It's probably important to notice here then. He's not asking, are you Yahweh? That's right. Yes. I always read it that way though. Because Son of God to me became synonymous with just being in God incarnation. In Carnot God. That's right. But he's just saying, are you this political leader that we that Jewish people are hoping? Yeah. So yeah, to clarify, yeah, what's what we're to imagine is in his intention saying Son of, is different than how Mark began his gospel. Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God. So same exact phrase, but when an apostle says it, he has in mind this whole story that's re-enfused that term with more meaning. So the point is is in the Hebrew scriptures, the Jewish culture, the phrase Son of God is a royal title from Psalm 2 linked in Psalm 2 to the phrase anointed king,

Mr. Christ, or Messiah. But then once Jesus does his whole thing and calls himself the Son, then that phrase Son of God takes on its more trinity type of meaning. And that's how the apostles are using it. And that's how then Paul goes on to use it in his writings and so on. So there's an irony here. Do you find that people trip up on this language of Son of God, Son of Man?

Well, yeah, it's another, that's why I want to do a separate video just on the phrase, Son of God. Yeah, yeah, it's another, that's why I want to do a separate video just on the phrase Son of God. Yeah, I think another video will be good on both those phrases. Son of God and Son of Man. But for this video, do we try to do it? We have to do something with Father and Son. Yeah. And so whether it's just a quick clarification on Son of God was a title given to the family of kings from David's line.

Yeah. And it's a royal title. Because the quick explainer is, Son of God is a royal title for humans in the line of David. Yes. So it doesn't have anything to do with whether you are the like actual Divinity as such that's right. Yeah. Yeah, okay, and then Son of man is this unique phrase in Daniel 7 Where it is infused with some something more something, a human that crosses the line.

Crosses the line. To come share in God's rule over the universe. So if someone like, yeah, who's this in the story again? Is it's here at No? Typesus, the high priest. Okay. If he says, are you the son of God? He's thinking of it in terms of the human leader.

Correct. Are you claiming that you're the true leader and representative of Israel? Yeah, but as Jesus identity is formed the way he thinks of it and the way the apostles begin to understand it is that being the son of man is part of a person of Yahweh. What's the language? Ironically. Yeah, in the gospels, for Jesus to say he's the son of man, is actually a more scandalous claim. Yes, and saying a son of God.

It actually implies in their context, way more clearly, crossing the line. He's crossing the line to share in God's own identity. He doesn't think he's just some empowered ruler in the line of David. So ironically, Son of God means, implies deity, less than the phrase Son of God.

But then, you circle back. Right, but then, if you circle back within this whole story in mind, and now you use the word Son of God, even fused it with that same definition. After the Jesus story has gone down, the Son of God finds new meaning within the Christian movement. And how is that connected to when Jesus just says,

I'm the son, without son of, it's just like in this last one we looked at, where he just said, yeah. Well, there it's the, we're hearing the word son in this new key, in this new mode of Jesus. Blending at all. Oh, that God way, the God of Israel is the Father and the Son who love each other by the Spirit.

When Jesus uses the phrase sun, describe Himself, that's what He's talking about. Here the phrase, sun of God is in the mouth of the high priest who's asking Him, you say you're from the line of David. Yeah. So is that what you're saying? Say it. Yeah. And what would tell Jesus' response is, you said it.

So we're back to the story. Yeah. Tell us whether you're the Messiah, the Son of God. Jesus answered him. You said it. He said it in the form of a question. Nevertheless, I tell you, him, you said it. He said it in the form of a question. Nevertheless, I tell you, and this is the key, from now on, from this moment on, you will

see the son of man sitting at the right hand of the power and coming on the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest tore his ropes and he said, this man has blasphemed. What further need do we have of witnesses? Everybody here, you heard his blasphemy. Yeah. And that's the case closed. Yeah, he might as well have just said like,

yeah, I am so important. I'm more important than you realize. Yeah. And I have all the authority of Yahweh himself from this point on. Yes. So he's doing two things. He's doing scripture kung fu again. He's taken a phrase from Daniel 7, the son of man. Yep. And he's taken a phrase from Daniel 7, the son of man, and he's taken a phrase from Psalm 110,

which we talked about. This was the most quoted text from the Old Testament used by the apostles in the New Testament, and Jesus himself. And why do the apostles focus on this? Because Jesus himself. Is this, sorry, is the Psalm 1 10, the one where David says, it's where my Lord says, yes. David tells you a story. Yeah.

Yahweh said to my master, yeah, got it right at my right hand. And so Jesus is identifying himself as a son of David, but more than the son of David, he's the human one who was exalted. Right hand of power. who was exalted. Right, hand of power. Who was exalted, yeah, to share in God's own rule.

Now, this is the thing that just point, it's right there. When is Jesus appointed to sit and share in God's rule over the universe? By His words here. At this moment. From this moment on. So from this moment on. From the trial on. You will see. Share in God's rule over the universe and notice the last phrase. And here's the thing that you're going to see from this moment on. You're going to see me coming on the clouds of heaven. Which is a Daniel seven reference. It's right from Daniel 7. The Cloud Rider. The Cloud Rider.

So this is important because the Cloud Rider image is gonna get connected later on in the New Testament to G.S.'s return. Mm-hmm. And most often, it's depicted in popular Western Christianity. It's like this is Jesus is coming from heaven on the Cloud's back door. The Cloud Rebuild, that's right, that he's coming down here. Yeah. That's like this is Jesus is coming from heaven on the clouds back out of the building. The cloud reveal. That's right. That he's coming down here. Yeah. Which means that we've reinvented. We're the ones reinventing that image. Yeah, because

in the image, he's riding clouds up. Correct. The riding of the clouds is about Jesus being brought in ascending to power, ascending to, and just to participate in God's rule of, to embody and be a part of God's rule over the universe. So what he's saying is the moment you condemn me in this court to death is actually the moment that I'm becoming the king of the universe. From this moment, I'm ascending the clouds. And then just think of how that, the statement of Jesus is then meant to train you to see every event that follows in the trial before

pilot and the beating and the whipping in the mockery. He gets a grob, he gets a scepter, he gets a crown, he gets lifted up and exalted on the cross. And this phrase backwards. Total coronation. It's that upside down thing. But it's just this phrase is Jesus saying, everything that's about to happen is my enthronement to divine rule over the universe. And Daniel 7, the son of man, had just gotten trampled by the beast.

Right, members of the super beast that embodies Babylon and every other kingdom. So he's saying, what you have got- I'm letting a kingdom trample me. Yes. And Daniel 7, what happens next? Yes. He rides the cloud up to sit at God's right hand

and share in his divine authority. And so that's what's going to happen next. You got it. Yeah. So, oh, okay, I forget this was somewhere in the 70s or 60s, in Rome, I think it is a piece of graffiti. On my old third century, from the 200s to 300s, building found, it's called the Alexaminos graffiti. It's a picture of a guy named Alexaminos, and he's standing before a human figure being crucified, but the human figure has a donkey head.

And it says in Latin, Alex Saminaz worships his God. Some Roman Christian named Alex Saminaz and he became a worshiper and a follower of Jesus, his friends, not only think that he's stupid, they think that it's ridiculous and shameful that he would give his allegiance to a crucified Jewish man. Just think, this is a perception that Romans would have of... So this is them mocking him. That's right.

So this is a time period before the cross becomes something you can wear as a mask. Right, right. So this is a time period before the cross becomes something you can wear as a mask. Right. The cross is still shameful. Yeah. It's like an electric chair or whatever. It's the needle, whatever they inject. This is such a good image.

Yeah. So what Jesus is doing is taking one of the most shameful, like base horrifying things about their culture and their time. And he's calling that his divine throne. Yeah. It's so astounding. Yeah. So of course, he doesn't convince anybody in the room where he does make them angry. Yeah.

And tear their clothes. And tear their clothes and kill him. But that's the... I've never been so angry I have torn my clothes. Can you imagine? I can't. Anyhow. It's interesting just the thought is that you said that the cross is like the flexor chair or the needle or something. It seems like nowadays with the way we execute people we still try to keep some dignity. You know?

Yeah, that's a good point. Or the cross was like the opposite. It was like, let's strip you of your dignity while we kill you. Correct. We don't really have that parallel anymore. Except for maybe like a beheading or like a torture. Yeah, you know when those 21 Christians, were marched out to the coast of I forget Libya or something, and it was recorded the whole thing. They got there.

Heads sawn off with machetes. Yeah, it's like that. Yeah. Yeah. horrifying. And yet, how would the Apostles want us to view that video footage? You know, we don't know this 21 people's stories, but what they would have us trust and believe is they were ruling the world. Those martyrs, John the visionary in the revelation. Oh, what's that? By losing their heads for the sake of their allegiance to Jesus. In reality, they're the ones in charge of that situation.

How counterintuitive. Yeah. 1 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 個 The last text to point out here in this connection is the last sentence of the gospel of Matthew, known as the Great Commission. Yeah. Passage. So then it's literally the last sentence of the gospel of Matthew. Then the 11 disciples went to Galilee to the mountain where Jesus said, we're going to rendezvous there.

And they see him. And they see him. And they worship him. But they were some who doubted. That's a good line. So some people are like, father, the son. Yeah, you were Yahweh and the worshipping him. This, right? New revelation of God through Jesus.

And then some are like, I still don't understand what's happening right now. Then Jesus came and said, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me in your seven. So go, now, it tell the nations that there's a new king in town and invite them to become my devotees, my followers.

So go invite everybody to live under my reign and rule, baptizing them, taking them through the key initiation ritual into sonship. Think Jesus, what was the key moment? Oh yeah, you became a son. Or he was marked out publicly as God's own son before others. And so now you have...

That's why he's maintaining the ritual for that sonship piece. There's at least one layer of its meaning. Its baptism is a way of you undergoing what Jesus underwent when he was publicly identified as a child of God, the child of God. So baptize them, but do it in the name singular, the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. It's just terrible grammar. But it's a perfect expression of this brand new category that the story is trying to form in the form of the complex unity, in the name of the God who is Father, the Son, and the Spirit.

Which is what the baptism, back at the beginning, was trying to say in narrative form, Jesus sums it up right here. And then I'm with you to the very end of the age. We just toured the gospels from end to end and this motif of Daniel 7 and of Jesus as the sun in relationship to the Father, loved by the Spirit, which is right through the whole narrative. It's interesting how a lot of it hinges on the baptism. Yeah, at the beginning and end. Father loved by the Spirit, it's just right through the whole narrative. And. It's interesting how a lot of it hinges on the baptism. Yeah, at the beginning and end.

Yeah. That's right. Yeah. It seems significant. I'm thinking back to how I'm trying to anchor this on this idea of experience of God, or relationship of God. Yeah.

It's like it seems like the baptism is the ritual that marks that you have an experience. Like you're living a new reality of a new experience with God. That's right. There was a ritual that marked Jesus' experience with God. It's a ritual that marks Christians' new experience with God. And that experience of God is the three in one. Yeah, baptism is a big deal.

And it's obviously been, unfortunately, controversial and divisive. I think because the apostles apparently weren't interested in explaining it to the degree that it would solve debates when you put later questions to what this means. Right. You know, that's why there's so much debate about it the debate being Oh, yeah, just like is it actually do you have to do it to be a true follower of Jesus?

You have to do it to be saved whatever that's supposed to mean and There's Protestant Catholic There's many divides yeah over the meaning of Baptism but what you can easily say that everybody agrees on is that it's really important. Because Paul, the Apostle, and Peter, both in their letters and the New Testament, they'll look back to this physical symbol, this physical reality that you underwent, and see in it both a symbol but also a reality expressed your life. Your being is being joined to Jesus' story.

You're undergoing what he underwent so that you can become what he is. And then why the language of the Spirit is also the word baptism is used. As you go on as a follower of Jesus, your continued experience of renewed and greater degrees of devotion to Jesus is talked about as a further immersion in the spirit. It gets into controversial territory, but the core meaning is powerful.

But you're right, baptism echoes at the beginning and end of the gospels of Matthew in that way. Right. So there you go. The gospels make a clear, I think, when you have eyes to see it, a clear narrative claim about the identity of God as Father, Son, and Spirit.

You wouldn't have known it without the Jesus story. Hmm. Right? If no one knows that identity. Yeah, you wouldn't have known. You wouldn't have had language for that or known to make that claim about God. So it's revealed through

Jesus, but at the same time it's incontinuity with everything that's come before. It's also really interesting that you wouldn't have known it without Jesus' claim, but also it's hard to see it unless you have read the Old Testament scriptures and wrestled with them to the level that we've kind of been doing. Yes. Like, I've read those passages, yeah, for I've heard them read my entire life, yeah, and never saw the connection.

So clearly, to God's identity and the Old Testament. And I think that's just kind of a nature of not spending as much time in the Hebrew scriptures in the tradition I grew up in. But yeah, it's really illuminating. Yeah. It's cool. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Bible Project Podcast. Next week, we're going to do a question and response episode.

So, if you have a question as you've been following along in this God series, we'd love to hear it. Record yourself, try to keep it to around 20 seconds. Let us know your name and where you're from, and we'll get to as many questions as we can. Also, if you haven't seen our video on God, we released it two weeks ago. It's up on our YouTube page, youtube.com slash the Bible project, and it's on our website at thebibepproject.com. This episode of the podcast was produced by Dan Gummel, music by Tay the producer, and the theme music is by the band Tens. We're crowdfunded non-profit, we're in Portland, Oregon, and all of the things that we make

this podcast, the videos, study notes, are free because of the generosity of thousands of people like you crowdfunding this effort. Thanks for being a part of this with us. Hi, I'm Grace Bay from Alameda, California. The first time I watched one of the Bible-patch videos was when our church was going through the epistles together and it was so cool to see how these epistles have a whole history, like to understand what

audience they were told to because I often thought you know the Bible was just this like overarching big thing with difficult words and ideas in it but it was really cool to see that the audience that the the epistles are written to or people just like me who are going to struggle that I can very much relate to. We believe the Bible is a unit you'll okay let me start over guys. We believe the Bible is a unified story that leads to Jesus. We are a crowdfunded project by people like me. Find free videos, study notes and more at thebibelproject.com.