Jesus accepted worship
If The Son of God is a ‘mere man’, why is it that he accepted
worship from people?
How could the man that said:
Matthew 5:17
¶Think
not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to
destroy, but to fulfil.
couldn’t be responsible for allowing people to break the first
commandment:
Exodus 20:4
Thou
shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is
in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under
the earth:
5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them:
for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers
upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;
Even today some people ignore God’s principle of delegated authorities and go as far as to say 'I'll obey God and not man'- I'm sure somebody must have said that to Jesus!
Consider, then the following shocking statement:
1 Chronicles
29:20
And
David said to all the congregation, Now bless the LORD your God. And all the
congregation blessed the LORD God of their fathers, and bowed down their heads,
and worshipped the LORD, and the king.
Now before you start throwing dust in the air, ripping your clothes
and shouting 'blasphemy', allow me to suggest the following:
The issue to be resolved is not whether Jesus, or indeed any king
or dignitary should receive worship, but rather our understanding of the
meaning of the word worship.
There is a worship that is due to God alone.
It is the adoring response of the creature to the creator.
It is the acknowledgement towards God of all that he, uniquely is.
However, worship in the sense of paying homage and bowing or making
obeisance before someone in respect of their position is also appropriate so
long as they are worthy of respect.
You honour your parents, your boss at work, your king, president,
prime minister etc. for who they are, recognising that this is the ordinance of
God.
Psalms
75:5
Lift
not up your horn on high: speak not with a stiff neck.
6 ¶For promotion cometh
neither from the east, nor from the west, nor from the south.
7 But God is the judge:
he putteth down one, and setteth up another.
You are not,
however to reverence them as God.
We need to understand that our God is sovereign and that he chooses
to order the universe by means of delegated authorities:
Romans
13:1
¶Let
every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God:
the powers that be are ordained of God.
2 Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.
It is impossible to be submitted to God whilst resisting the powers
he has delegated or allows to exercise authority over a given jurisdiction.
We must be wary of stepping beyond our bounds in resisting
authority, be it celestial or earthly:
Jude 1:8
¶Likewise
also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil
of dignities.
9 Yet Michael the
archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses,
durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke
thee.
Instead we honour and submit to the God we cannot see by obeying
the authorities he has set over us:
1 Peter
2:17
Honour
all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king.
Above all, we owe allegiance to God’s Son, Jesus.
We cannot honour God without also giving Jesus his due:
John 5:23
That
all men should honour the Son, even
as they honour the Father.
He that honoureth not the Son honoureth
not the Father which hath sent him.
When we honour Jesus for being the anointed king whom God has
and set at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all
principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named,
not only in this world, but also in that which is to come (Ephesians 1:20-22)
in
so doing we acknowledge both the ordinance of God and the wonderful and unique
work which he has done for us through Jesus our Lord that the Father may be glorified in the Son (John 14:13).
When we do this the glory goes to God as the Bible clearly states:
Philippians
2:9
Wherefore
God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every
name:
10 That at the name of
Jesus every knee should bow,
of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth;
11 And that every tongue
should confess that Jesus Christ is
Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Add to this the fact that in every case in which Jesus is described
as being 'worshipped', the word translated from the Greek means, literally to 'prostrate
oneself in homage’, ‘to do reverence’ and ‘to, adore'
(Strong's no. 4352 proskuneo- In fact, it from this word that
the English word ‘prostrate’ is derived from).
What more appropriate response could there be towards a king and
saviour such as Jesus?
The Bible is full of examples of people bowing:
Compare these 2 accounts of the same event, in which Jacob
leaning upon his staff, bows over the bed head.
In the Old Testament passage the word is rendered 'bowed' and in the New
Testament it is 'worshipped':
Genesis
47:31
And he said, Swear unto me. And he sware unto him. And Israel bowed himself upon the bed's head.
Hebrews
11:21
By
faith Jacob, when he was a dying, blessed both the sons of Joseph; and worshipped, leaning upon the top of his
staff.
David, the anointed of God bowed before the royal prince, Jonathan:
1 Samuel
20:40
And
Jonathan gave his artillery unto his lad, and said unto him, Go, carry them to
the city.
41 And as soon as the lad
was gone, David arose out of a place toward the south, and fell on his face to the ground, and bowed himself three times:
and they kissed one another, and wept one with another, until David exceeded.
And it's not just men of such worthy character as Jonathan:
1 Samuel
24:8
David
also arose afterward, and went out of the cave, and cried after Saul, saying,
My lord the king.
And when Saul looked behind him,
David stooped with his face to the
earth, and bowed himself.
David bowed before Saul whom God had rejected and who was in the
act of hunting him down to kill him, out of respect for the fact that he was
'the anointed of the Lord'. He was the one God had once chosen and had had the
holy oil poured upon him.
How much more should we bow before the one whom God has anointed to
be both Lord and Christ.
Genesis
33:3
And
he passed over before them, and bowed
himself to the ground seven times,
until he came near to his brother.
If Jacob whom God loved bowed 7 times before Esau, whom God hated,
giving him the respect due to a firstborn brother whom he had wronged.
How much more should we bow before God's beloved Son who became sin
for us and bore our curse.
The question then arises: should we bow before the unrighteous, is
there a time when it is appropriate to rebel?
Only when obedience to 'the power' constitutes disobedience to God.
I don't want to digress. Suffice it for me to provide 2 notable
examples:
Daniel
3:16
Shadrach,
Meshach, and Abednego, answered and said to the king, O Nebuchadnezzar, we are
not careful to answer thee in this matter.
17 If it be so, our God
whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will
deliver us out of thine hand, O king.
18 But if not, be it known
unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden
image which thou hast set up.
Esther 3:2
And all the king's servants, that were in the king's gate, bowed, and
reverenced Haman: for the king had so commanded concerning him. But Mordecai
bowed not, nor did him reverence.
You would never see me bow before the Pope as ‘the vicar of Christ on earth’, for example. I do not recognise his authority and neither does God.
It is entirely appropriate both to bow before Jesus as King, to
thank him as Saviour and to adore him as the lover of our souls.
It is appropriate to praise both Christ and God for their
respective works towards us:
Revelation 5:13
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 honour, and glory, and power,
be unto him that sitteth upon the
throne,
and unto the Lamb for ever and ever.
However, it is blasphemy and a violation of both the 1st
commandment (Exodus 20.2-3) and the greatest commandment, the Sh’ma (Deuteronomy
6.4)
to worship him as God Almighty.
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1. Introduction |
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10. Seen! |
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17. Jesus- a
Godsend |
18. 1
Creator |
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20. The
firstborn |
21. The name
of God |
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