03.05. What Think Ye of Christ?

WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? In Matthew 22:1-46, Jesus Christ asked a question which was destined to become one of the most famous questions of the ages: "What think ye of Christ, whose son is he?" It is the question on the lips of religionists all over the world today. It is the question of Jesus to the multitudes. It is the question of God to the world today: "What think ye of My Son?" It is a question that has come down through the ages. The Church should consider this question and make her way through sandy desert, over the barren wastes, climb the highest mountains, descend into the darkest valleys, cross the widest streams, hail all whom she meets and ask of them, "What think ye of Christ?" This is the real issue between the Fundamentalists and the Modernists. The issue is not the inspiration of the Scriptures. The real issue is Jesus. Whose Son is He? The answer to that question ends all arguments. A Subtle AttackIn this chapter of Matthew we have a picture of certain people who were trying to confuse the Master with difficult questions. The first who came were the Herodians, trying to ensnare Him regarding the law. With much flattery they said, "Tell us therefore, What thinkest thou? is it lawful to give tribute unto Caesar, or not?" But perceiving their wickedness, Jesus said, "Why tempt ye me, ye hypocrites? ....

Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s." And when they heard these words they marveled and went away.

Next came the Sadducees. They tried to ensnare Him regarding the law of Moses and the resurrection by questioning Him regarding marriage after the resurrection. Without hesitation He answered them, and the Scriptures say that they were astonished at His doctrine. When the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees they came questioning Him regarding the commandments. Whereupon, as soon as He had answered them, He also asked them a question, saying, ’What think ye of Christ? whose son is he?" A Fair Question

Many questions are foolish, but a more sane question could not be asked than the words of the text. Many questions are unfair, but there is nothing deceptive about this.

If I asked you what you thought of the President, you would not hesitate to give your opinion. If I asked you what you thought of one of your friends, you would be quick to answer. At certain periods each year we hear ringing from pulpit and press statements of what the world thinks of such men as Washington, Lincoln and other great leaders of the past.

What you may think of the present leaders of our nation, or the leaders of the past, is not extremely important. But "What think ye of Christ?" is the most significant question you will ever hear. Not only will your answer affect you in this world, but it concerns your eternal destiny.

Many Answers For more than two thousand years men have been trying to answer that question, and their answers have been varied and many.

Some would have us believe that Jesus was a good man nothing more. Some say that He was a willful impostor. Others tell us that He was a deluded enthusiast. Some say He was the product of evolution; that what we are now, God used to be; that what God is now we all will be someday; that Jesus was "just a little ahead" of His fellow men. There are some who believe that He was born of earthly parents, just as other men, and that He became the Son of God. There are others who tell us that He is, that He always was and ever shall be the Son of the Everlasting God.To this latter theory I hold with all my heart. I believe that Jesus was God incarnate, God come down to live among men; that He was born of a human mother, but He was conceived by the Holy Ghost; that He was both human and divine.

Christ Is Divine

I believe in the divinity of Christ because of the Biblical evidence, the miracles He performed, the words He spoke and the arguments found in His conversations. I believe In His divinity because of the life He lived. I believe in His divinity because the belief harmonizes with the thoughts of the greatest minds who have lived since His day. I believe in His divinity because of His power over sin. And last, I believe in His divinity because of a personal experience which I have in my own heart.

Wonderful

Isaiah said He was "wonderful." Who has looked into the life of Jesus of Nazareth and refused to agree with the prophet?

He was wonderful in the fact that He did not view the people as a crowd; He did not see them as a mass; He saw them as individuals. He never sought the multitude, yet never passed by an individual who needed attention. His heart went out to people. His impulse was to pity them, sympathize with them and help them. "He took their pain, laid it on His own heart, until tears were His meat and drink, by day and by night." He became a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief." He took upon Him the woes of the world until He was bowed as with the weight of years. His cheeks were grooved with the tears of sympathy.

He was wonderful because He was a beneficent man -- not only a well-wisher, but a well-doer. He was continually doing good; opening blind eyes, healing the sick, cleansing the leper, raising the dead, breaking the bands of Satan and loosening the serpent’s coils. Those who followed Him declared that He did all things well.

He was wonderful in the way He spoke. Police sent to arrest Him remained silent. When they heard His voice their murmurings were silenced, hushed was their tumult, and they returned to their superiors, saying, "Never man spake like this man.

He was wonderful because He was unselfish. He emptied Himself and made room in His soul for the lives of others. He had no hours in which to greet the public. He was readily accessible at all times. No private secretaries had to be interviewed before one could see Him.

He Claimed To Be God

What think ye of Christ in His claims to divinity? That He made such assertions no one can deny. Someone has said, "There are nearly one hundred and fifty such claims in the Gospels." In CapernaumIt was evening in Capernaum, the city of our Lord. The streets were crowded, and what a crowd it was! The lame, the halt, the blind were there. Here was a deaf-mute with a foolish grin, there a leper drawing his tattered garments about him, while with sad voice he cried, "Unclean, unclean." Yonder was a man whose face was hardened by the lines of sin and shame, while his eyes flashed the hellish fire of the demon that dwelt within. In the midst of the crowd was a low building which was filled to the doors with an eager throng. In the center of the building stood Jesus of Nazareth, healing the sick and teaching them the way of life.

Down the street came a strange procession. Four men were bearing a paralytic on a mattress. They made their way to the door but were unable to enter because of the crowd. They went to the windows, but they were filled. Then, climbing onto the low roof, they removed the tile and lowered the sick man into the presence of Jesus. Had one asked those about Him, "What do you think of Jesus?" they would have answered, "He is a great man, a wonderful teacher and a mighty healer." But when Jesus saw the faith of those who had brought the sick man, He said to the paralytic, "Son, thy sins be forgiven thee." At once there was an uproar. The leading men declared that it was blasphemy and asked, "Who can forgive sins but God?" In this question they were right. Man cannot forgive sins. Again and again the Scriptures teach that forgiveness comes from God. When Jesus announced that this man’s sins were forgiven He clearly and definitely announced the fact that He Himself was God.

Philip

Jesus claimed to be God when He was talking to His disciples. You will remember that Philip said, "Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us." Jesus answered, "Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father?"

Prayer

He claimed to be God from all eternity when He prayed, "And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was." In this statement He referred to the days when God created the world and hung it in space, beyond the beginning of time, into the unfathomable eternity, and declared that even then He was clothed with the glory of the very Selfhood of God. When Conversing with the Jews

He claimed this title when conversing with the Jews and answered their questions by saying, "Before Abraham was, I am." And in that answer He claimed to be of greater antiquity than their father Abraham, as great as that might be. He claimed to be the same one who spoke to Moses from the burning bush. He claimed to be the great I AM, who was the God of Abraham, Isaac andJacob. When the Jews heard that assertion they understood what He meant and immediately seized stones to stone Him, but He passed from their midst. At another time, while talking in their presence, He made the statement, "I and my Father are one. Again they were about to stone Him when He calmly said, "Many good works have I shewed you from my Father; for which of those works do ye stone me?" They answered, "For a good work we stone thee not; but for a blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God." The Jews were not deceived. They knew that He claimed to be God. His Own Arguments His own arguments proved that He claimed to be God inherit eternal life?" Jesus answered, "Why callest thou me good? none is good, save one, that is God."

What is the argument here? Simply this: "You call Me good. There is none good but God. If I am not God, I am not good."

"What think ye of Christ? whose son is he?" Was He a good Man? If He was God, yes. But if He was riot God, He was not good, but the greatest impostor that ever lived. If He was not God, then not only does disaster fall upon Him, but upon all His followers. If He was not God, then He has never forgiven the sins of a single soul, and all those who have died in the past two thousand years trusting in His Name have died unsaved and have gone into eternity without God.

If He Is Not Divine You remember the condition of your own heart, your heavy burden and your loathsome sin.

You abhorred yourself, and your situation seemed hopeless. But in your distress you called upon Christ for help. You accepted Him as your Saviour, your Sacrifice, your Substitute and your God.

Now you say, "I’m saved, I’m saved." All this and more you have felt in your heart and confessed before men. But, if Jesus was not God, He never forgave your sin; you have been deceived; your peace has been a false peace; your hopes have been in vain. Your paradise has been a fool’s paradise. If He is not God He has no power to forgive sin.

If He is not God then away with the New Testament, for it tells us that He is. If the New Testament is a fraud then away with the Old Testament, for it has its fulfillment in the New. When Christ goes out of the Bible, God goes out, too, and we are left hopeless and wrecked on the sands of time. His Holy Life

"What think ye of Christ?" His holy life proved Him to be God.He was holy. He was harmless. He was sinless. He said, "Which of you convinceth me of sin?" Someone has said, "For two thousand years He has been discussed by a hostile world. The strongest searchlights of criticism have been turned on the land in which He lived. Every rod of ground upon which He traveled has been dug up, surveyed or trodden. His words have been measured and then weighed in the balances of the greatest scholars of the world. The most powerful X rays have been turned upon every sentence endeavoring to detect a flaw, a break or an error. His very words have been split open as you would break a rock, and their contents poured into the crucible of criticism." His teachings have been, as it were, technically dissolved and each part analyzed. Still, after two thousand years of the closest scrutiny by the greatest minds of earth, not an authoritative lip can make a charge against Him. Still the challenge is flung at the feet of a wicked and godless world, "Which of you convinceth me of sin?" Like the Sadducees of old, men are silent.

Great Minds "What think ye of Christ?" Every great mind has been engaged with the thought of Him.

"He has towered in the world as its central figure, so human that the most humble and the poor are at home with Him, so divine that the greatest have looked up to Him. His influence has penetrated the civilized world, and His words have been translated into almost every language under heaven."

Geniuses The greatest geniuses of earth have bowed to Jesus. Poets, scientists, artists, philosophers, statesmen and warriors have paid Him tribute, and many of them have stood ready to crown Him Lord of all.

Poets

"What think ye of Christ?" Our greatest poets believed in Him. Jean Paul Richter writes, "The life of Christ concerns Him who being the holiest among the mighty and the mightiest among the holy, lifted with His nail-pierced hands empires from off their hinges, turned the stream of centuries out of its channels and still governs the ages."

Scientists

Ask the scientists, "What think ye of Christ?" You will find that such men of science as Galileo, Newton, Bacon and Kepler set the Name of Jesus above every other as the Name by which man must be saved.

Pasteur, one of the brightest lights in science, a Catholic, died clasping a crucifix as evidence of his faith and hope in Christ.

Philosophers

Philosophers think well of Him. None has passed Him in silence. Carlyle called Him "our divinest symbol." Channing confessed, "The character of Jesus is unexplainable on human principles."

Statesmen

Make your way into the presence of the greatest statesmen of time, and you will find that such men as Gladstone and Webster believed in Him. William Jennings Bryan said, "It is easier to believe Him divine than to explain in any other way what He said, what He did, and what He was."

Soldiers

Ask the heroes of the great battlefields of the past, "What think ye of Christ?" You will find that they believed in Him.

Napoleon once remarked to an officer, "Do you know who Jesus Christ is?" When the officer declined to answer, the great general said, "Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne and I founded great empires. Upon what did these empires depend? Upon force. Jesus Christ founded His empire upon love, and to this very hour millions would die for Him. I think I understand something of human nature and I tell you that these were men and I am a man, but Jesus Christ was more than a man." His Enemies His enemies spoke well of Him. Pilate thrice spoke in the presence of the throng, saying, "I find no fault in him." His wife declared Him to be a just man.

Mark tells us that the centurion who saw Him die said, "Truly this man was the Son of God."

Ask Judas, and hear him say, "I have betrayed the innocent blood."

Ask the devils, and hear them answer, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? art thou come hither to torment us before the time?"

I have read that Voltaire, the infidel, in death cried, "I am abandoned by God and man! I shall go to hell! O Christ! O Jesus Christ!"

Thomas Paine, the greatest of American infidels, died quoting the words of Jesus on the Cross.

Artists The great artists had faith in Him. It has been said that Raphael’s pictures of the Transfiguration and of Christ bearing the Cross are evidence of his faith and hope. When he finished his wonderful picture of the Madonna, he threw himself on his face and wept. There was a picture in his heart which he could not paint.

Masters In Song As for the masters in song, their love for Christ and their thoughts concerning Him are expressed in every word and song, and are sent over the world, announcing their praise of Him who gave His life that man might be redeemed.

Ask Charles Wesley "What think ye of Christ?" and hear him sing:

Jesus, Lover of my soul, Let me to Thy bosom fly, While the nearer waters roll, While the tempest still is high.

Hide me, O my Saviour, hide, Till the storm of life is past;

Safe into the haven guide;

O receive my soul at last.

Ask A. J. Gordon "What think ye of Christ?" and hear him answer: My Jesus, I love Thee, I know Thou art mine; For Thee all the follies of sin I resign. My gracious Redeemer, my Saviour art Thou;

If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.

Ask Joseph Scriven, and hear him say:

What a Friend we have in Jesus, All our sins and griefs to hear!

What a privilege to carry Everything to God in prayer!

O what a peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we hear, All because we do not carry Everything to God in prayer.

Ask Fanny Crosby, the little blind poet of Bridgeport, Connecticut, "What think ye of Christ?" Then hear her lift her voice and sing:

Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine!

Oh, what a foretaste of glory divine!

Heir of salvation, purchase of God,Born of His Spirit, washed in His blood.

Edward Perronet voices the sentiments of every Christian of every age when he sings:

All hail the pow’r of Jesus’ Name, Let angels prostrate fall;

Bring forth the royal diadem, And crown Him Lord of all.

Ye chosen seed of Israel’s race, Ye ransomed from the fall, Hail Him who saved you by His grace, And crown Him Lord of all.

Let ev’ry kindred, ev’ry tribe, On this terrestrial ball, To Him all majesty ascribe, And crown Him Lord of all.

O that with yonder sacred throng We at His feet may fall;

We’ll join the everlasting song, And crown Him Lord of all.

Christ’s Power Over Sin

Christ’s power over sin proves Him to be God. "For two thousand years in every age, in every clime, among all classes of men, from the refined infidel to the vilest sinner, from the cold-hearted atheist to the brutal idolater, men have been changed through faith in His Name."

Men who have been vile; men who have been bondslaves to the god of lusts, whose base passions have been set on fire of hell; men with low thoughts, rotting bodies and sin-cursed souls, have flung themselves at the feet of Christ and heard His words, "Thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace." They have arisen to find that "old things are passed away and all things are become new." No one can save men but God; Jesus saves men; therefore, Jesus must be God. A man was speaking to a group of students in Glasgow. He had been magnifying the power of Christ to save from the lowest sin. In the midst of his message he lifted a piece of paper in his hand and said, "I have a letter here from one of your number, asking how it is possible for one who has been low and vile to be lifted out of sin and made pure and clean." Then, turning to the open window, he pointed to a fleecy white cloud that hung a thing of beauty in the heavens and said, "O cloud, from whence did you come? The cloud answers me, saying, ’I came from the low, dark, muddy streets of the city. The sun of heaven reached down and lifted me up, up, up, and with its rays purified me. Now his shining upon me makes the thing of beauty you behold.’ " The speaker continued, "To you who wrote this letter, and all others, let me say that the Sun of Righteousness can reach down and lift you out of the mire and clay, transform your life and make you a new creature." Do You Doubt?

If you doubt Christ’s power on earth to forgive sin, find the drug addict that has been cured, the thief that has been made honest, the harlot that has become pure, and ask them, "What think ye of Christ?" They will sing to you that -- There is a fountain filled with blood, Drawn from Immanuel’s veins; And sinners, plunged beneath that flood, Lose all their guilty stains.

If you doubt His power to save find the redeemed drunkard, the man who had tried every cure, broken every pledge, in whose breast had burned fires of hell; and when you have found him as he sits in some mission hall, in some church or under his own vine and fig tree, sober and happy, ask him how it happened, and he will sing, too, of how -- Jesus paid it all, All to Him I owe;

Sin had left a crimson stain, He washed it white as snow.

Personal Experience

I believe in the divinity of Christ because of a personal experience in my own heart. I, too, was bound by sin, broken in heart and life, but I came to Christ on the recommendation of others.

They said He could help me. I called upon Him, and He forgave my sin. I know He lives today, for He lives in me. I know He is divine, for He has done a divine work in my heart. The old Welsh mother said to her friend, "I believe that when Jesus was on earth He spoke Welsh." The other old saint replied, "I don’t know if He spoke Welsh then or not, but I know He speaks it now for He was talking to me today." I know He speaks to men, for He has spoken to my own soul.

I was once far away from the Saviour, As vile as a sinner could he, And I wondered if Christ the Redeemer Could save a poor sinner like me.

I wandered on in the darkness, No ray of hope could I see. The thought filled my heart with sadness, "There’s no hope for a sinner like me."And then in that dark lonely hour A voice sweetly whispered to me, Saying, "Christ the Redeemer hath power, To save a poor sinner like thee."

I listened and, lo, ’twas the Saviour That was speaking so kindly to me;

I cried, "I’m the chief of sinners," And He saved a poor sinner like me.

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