The Lord Jesus taught that God’s express will is for everyone to render unto the Son the same kind of honor that the Father himself receives:
“For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son: 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.” John 5:22-23
In light of this, we are going to quote verses where the God-breathed Scriptures ascribe to Jesus the exact same honor that is supposed to be given to God alone.
Worship
The Lord Jesus emphatically affirmed that only God is to be worshiped and served:
“Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.” Matthew 4:10 – cf. Luke 4:8
This explains why Apostles such as Peter,
“And as Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him, and fell down at his feet, and worshipped him. But Peter took him up, saying, Stand up; I myself also am a man.” Acts 10:25-26
And Paul,
“And there sat a certain man at Lystra, impotent in his feet, being a cripple from his mother’s womb, who never had walked: the same heard Paul speak: who stedfastly beholding him, and perceiving that he had faith to be healed, said with a loud voice, Stand upright on thy feet. And he leaped and walked. And when the people saw what Paul had done, they lifted up their voices, saying in the speech of Lycaonia, The gods are come down to us in the likeness of men. And they called Barnabas, Jupiter; and Paul, Mercurius, because he was the chief speaker. Then the priest of Jupiter, which was before their city, brought oxen and garlands unto the gates, and would have done sacrifice with the people. Which when the apostles, Barnabas and Paul, heard of, they rent their clothes, and ran in among the people, crying out, and saying, Sirs, why do ye these things? We also are men of like passions with you, and preach unto you that ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God, which made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are therein:” Acts 14:8-15
As well as God’s righteous angels strictly prohibited anyone from worshiping them:
“And I John saw these things, and heard them. And when I had heard and seen, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel which shewed me these things. Then saith he unto me, See thou do it not: for I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them which keep the sayings of this book: worship God.” Revelation 22:8-9 – cf. 19:9-10
And yet we find the Lord Jesus accepting worship from a variety of individuals in a variety of contexts.
For instance, the Hebrew Bible prophesies that the kings of the east would offer gifts and bow down in worship to the King Messiah:
“Give the king thy judgments, O God, and thy righteousness unto the king’s son… He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth. They that dwell in the wilderness shall bow before him; and his enemies shall lick the dust. The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents: the kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts. Yea, all kings shall fall down before him: all nations shall serve him… His name shall endure for ever: his name shall be continued as long as the sun: and men shall be blessed in him: all nations shall call him blessed.” Psalm 72:1, 8-11, 17
That this is a Messianic Psalm, one that announces the coming of the Christ, can be seen from the fact that even non-Christian Jewish sources interpreted it in this manner:
“Composed by Solomon, uttered in prophecy. O God, give your just rulings to the King Messiah, and your righteousness to the son of King David… May his name be invoked for ever; and before the sun came to be his name was determined; so all the peoples will be blessed by his merit, and they shall speak well of him.” Psalm 72:1, 17 (Edward M. Cook, Targum Psalms: An English Translation http://targum.info/pss/ps2.htm; bold emphasis ours)
And:
… the Messiah, the antitypical Solomon; who is often called by this name in the Song of Songs; see Song of Solomon 3:7; Solomon being a type of him in his wisdom and riches, and in the peaceableness and extent of his kingdom; to which reference is had in this psalm. But a greater than Solomon is here; that the Messiah is the subject of it is manifest from the largeness of his kingdom, it reaching to the ends of the earth; which was not true of Solomon, Psalm 72:8; and from the duration of it, it being as long as the sun and moon endure, Psalm 72:5; and from the abundance of peace and prosperity in it, which equally last, Psalm 72:3; and from the subjection of kings and nations to him, even all of them, Psalm 72:9; and from the happiness of his subjects; they having protection, deliverance, and salvation by him, and all spiritual blessings in him; which shows him to be the promised seed, in whom all nations should be blessed, Psalm 72:2, and from the honour, praise, glory, and blessedness, ascribed to him, Psalm 72:15. So TertullianF11, long ago, observed, that this psalm belongs to Christ, and not to Solomon. And that the Messiah is intended, many of the Jewish writers, both ancient and modern, acknowledge, as appears from the Targum, Talmud, Midrash, and other writings, which will be observed in the exposition of it. Jarchi, though he interprets it of Solomon, yet owns that their Rabbins expound the whole psalm of the Messiah: and Kimchi, who explains it hyperbolically of Solomon, acknowledges that, in the proper and literal sense, it is to be understood of the Messiah; and which is the sense given by his father, R. Joseph Kimchi. Aben Ezra says, this psalm is either concerning Solomon, or concerning the Messiah; but AbarbinelF12 makes no doubt that it is said concerning him. R. Obadiah says, it is concerning the coming of the Messiah; and to this agrees the title in the Syriac version,
“and a prophecy concerning the coming of the Messiah, and the calling of the Gentiles.’ (John Gill’s Exposition of the Whole Bible http://www.studylight.org/commentaries/geb/view.cgi?bk=18&ch=72; bold emphasis ours)
Psalm 72 was partially fulfilled when certain wise men from the east came to worship and give gifts to the young Messiah whom they visited at his home in Bethlehem:
“Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judæa in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him… And when they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and worshipped him: and when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts; gold, and frankincense, and myrrh.” Matthew 2:1-2, 11
Its complete fulfillment awaits the physical, bodily return of the risen Lord from heaven where he will reign over the nations from Jerusalem:
“Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, and thy spoil shall be divided in the midst of thee. For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the women ravished; and half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and the residue of the people shall not be cut off from the city. Then shall the Lord go forth, and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle. And HIS FEET shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south. And ye shall flee to the valley of the mountains; for the valley of the mountains shall reach unto Azal: yea, ye shall flee, like as ye fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah: and the Lord my God shall come, and all the saints with thee… And the Lord shall be king over all the earth: in that day shall there be one Lord, and his name one… And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles. And it shall be, that whoso will not come up of all the families of the earth unto Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, even upon them shall be no rain.” Zechariah 14:1-5, 9, 16-17
“And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven. Then returned they unto Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is from Jerusalem a sabbath day’s journey.” Acts 1:9-12
“to the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints.” 1 Thessalonians 3:13
Nor is this the only OT text which speaks of the Messiah being worshiped forever by all the nations:
“I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.” Daniel 7:13-14
The NT identifies this glorious Son of Man figure that the prophet Daniel saw as our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He is said to be the reigning Son of Man who rides the clouds of heaven:
“But he held his peace, and answered nothing. Again the high priest asked him, and said unto him, Art thou the Christ, the Son of the Blessed? And Jesus said, I am: and ye shall see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven.” Mark 14:61-62
“But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up stedfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God, and said, Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God.” Acts 7:55-56
Hence, Jesus is the divine King whom the OT Scriptures prophesied would be worshiped and served by the whole inhabited earth for all eternity.
With the foregoing in perspective, we are now ready to proceed to the second part of our discussion https://islamunmasked.com/2017/07/15/honoring-the-lord-jesus-as-god-pt-2/.
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