The Only Begotten Son

Why would God send His Son after sending all those prophets?

• clarify and sharpen the message (Matthew 5:22,28,32, etc)
• convey the importance of the message (Luke 20:13)
• allow us to perceive His love (1 John 3:16)
• only His Son could redeem us (Hebrews 10:4)
• show us the Father (John 14:9)

What does this passage tell us about Jesus?

• messenger from the Father (2)
• Son of God (2)
• heir of all things (2)
• made the worlds (2,10)
• brightness of God's glory (3)
• express image of God's person (3)
• upholds all things by the word of His power (3)
• purged our sins (3)
• sits on the right hand of God (3)
• much better than the angels (4)
• inherited a more excellent name than the angels (4)
• firstbegotten of the Father (6)
• God (8)
• loves righteousness and hates iniquity (9)
• above His fellows (9)
• everlasting and unchanging (11,12)
• He shall wrap things up (12)

A Superior Messenger!

When God began His relationship with man, He connected very directly and personally with Adam and Eve. One could easily get the impression that He visited them daily, going on walks with them through the garden (Genesis 3:8). He did not rely on any kind of messenger to communicate with them. He was His own messenger, revealing Himself to His special creatures personally and directly. Adam and Eve learned to know God, His will, and His ways from God Himself!

Alas, only a little time had unwound from history's clock till this incredible relationship ceased and the man and his wife found themselves banished from God's presence. As time continued to tick away, the connection between God and man grew flimsier. Oh, God continued to speak to mankind, alright -- especially to His chosen people -- but it just wasn't the same. He mostly used human messengers to relay His words to their fellow humans. No, it just wasn't the same.

Then came that scheduled event for which God surely had waited with tremendous anticipation. He sent to earth a superior Messenger -- The Best Messenger of All. God sent His Son to restore and to enable our communion with Him. But as wonderful as that may sound, we cannot let that distract us from a deeper reality: The Father and the Son are one. That means God didn't just send us another messenger to tell us about Himself, He Himself came to us directly and personally!

A Superior Message?

In the opening chapters of the Bible (and of time), God communicated directly with man. Then we have year after year and chapter after chapter of God speaking to His people through a few selected men and even fewer selected women. Finally, God came again, speaking unto us by His Son. His Son eventually left, promptly sending the Holy Spirit to maintain God's direct and personal presence with (and in!) His people.

As you know, all of this generated many chapters compiled into what we call the Bible. It is the written revelation of God, His will, and His ways. It is His message to us. I have an crucial question for you, though: Is God's message through His Son superior to His message through His prophets and apostles?

What you are reading right now, I wrote by my own hand. I am commissioning this message to you. If I commissioned someone to go deliver this message, that could conceivably be more special. Or I could present my message to you directly. But the message is still mine.

Can you see how, in a feeble and flawed way, that shows the equality of the message through the prophets, through the Son, and through the apostles? It is still God's own message. So heed it; live it!

Is the Father superior to the Son?

In normal usage, words like son, servant, and chosen point to a lesser position relative to someone else. The father is "greater" than the son, the master than the servant, and the choice maker than the chosen one. Shall we understand the relationship between the Father and Jesus in a similar fashion?

No.

"I and my Father are one" (John 10:30).

"Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God" (Philippians 2:6).

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (John 1:1).

"God...Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son...Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person..." (Hebrews 1:1-3).