Who is Jesus?

​And more importantly, what are you going to do with Him?

​Because how you answer that foundational question, will impact everything about your life. What you choose to do with the person of Jesus is something that you have to wrestle with, and I’d even push so far to say that you are already answering this question in some way shape or form.

​This is the third installment of our Handed Down series where we are using the Apostle’s Creed as a launchpoint for us to figure out the essentials of Christianity and what it is that we actually believe. There is so much room for disagreement, gray areas, and healthy debates and conversations within the Body of Christ, but there are also things that we have to agree to if we claim to be Christians at all. We are spending some time here in ZealHouse to walk through those together. Today, we are taking a look at what it means to believe in Jesus. I want to start by reading the Apostle’s Creed:

I believe in God the Father Almighty;

and in Christ Jesus His only Son, our Lord,

who was born from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary,

who under Pontius Pilate was crucified and buried,

on the third day rose again from the dead,

ascended into heaven,

sits at the right hand of the Father,

from there He will come to judge the living and the dead.

And in the Holy Spirit,

the holy church,

the forgiveness of sins,

the resurrection of the flesh.  

​Jesus Christ is the central figure of our faith. In fact, the word Christian was originally a derogatory word meaning “little christ” because early followers of Him were just imitating everything Jesus did in their own lives.

​So in order for us to imitate Jesus (as we’re called to do) we have to properly understand Him and who He was. There are two ideas that the Creed points us to that I want to address.

​First, that Jesus is the Son of God. What does this actually mean? Does this mean He is God Jr.? That God the Father is varsity and Jesus is just trying to get there?

​Not at all.

This simply means that Jesus is a representation of God the Father. Have you ever seen a father and son and either how they look or how they talk or how they act it’s like, “woah… you are absolutely related. You are your father’s son and there’s no doubt about that!” Ever heard something like that? That’s what it means when we say that Jesus is the Son of God.

He is the exact representation of God the Father.

If you want to know what God the Father is like, look at Jesus. He is God in the flesh. He is the image of God in our human bodies and existence.

​The writer of Hebrews puts it this way…

2 And now in these final days, he has spoken to us through his Son. God promised everything to the Son as an inheritance, and through the Son he created the universe. 3 The Son radiates God’s own glory and expresses the very character of God, and he sustains everything by the mighty power of his command. When he had cleansed us from our sins, he sat down in the place of honor at the right hand of the majestic God in heaven.

Hebrews 1:2-3

The second thing that Creed wants us to make note of (besides the fact that Jesus lived in the real world, in a real town, from a real family, and suffered under a real Roman officer, etc.) is that He can and should be our Lord.

Here’s the hard truth… not all of us can call Jesus Lord.

Lord is a choice. Lord is a title that you give to the person or thing that you live in authority under. Meaning that this person or thing dictates how we act, think, talk, and live every single day. If that is what it means for something to be Lord in our lives, can you call Jesus Lord?

Do you submit to Him in everything that you do? Do you invite Him into every moment that you can? What are you choosing to do with the original question, “Who is this Man?”

C.S. Lewis gave us three options… He is either a liar, a lunatic, or our Lord.

Who is He to you?