Wallace G. Smith

[The text below represents an edited transcript of this Tomorrow’s World program.]

Who Do You Think Jesus Is?

Ask five different people about Jesus Christ and you’ll likely get five different opinions. However, one question sits at the heart of the religion that bears His name: Is Jesus God?

And today, we’re going to answer that question. Don’t go away!

Overwhelming Historical Evidence That Jesus Christ Was a Real Person

Greetings, and welcome to Tomorrow’s World, where we help you to make sense of your world through the pages of the Bible. We’re glad you’re here, and today’s question is one of the most important questions you could ever ask: Is Jesus God?

This question about Jesus is important. Estimates indicate around 2.4 billion people in the world claim Christianity as their religion—almost half-a-billion more than claim Islam and more than a billion more than claim Hinduism. Yet, even as almost one-third of the planet claims a religion centered on the person of Jesus Christ, many of those same people disagree on exactly who He really was.

For some, even some claiming to be Christian, Jesus was simply a man—a Jewish teacher in the first century, who just happened to have an outsized impact on world culture. The late Shelby Spong, a bishop in the Episcopal Church, was quite famous for his stance that Jesus was not actually God, was not born from a virgin, and was never resurrected.

Other religions claiming to be Christian teach different things about Jesus’ divinity. Some teach that Jesus was a created being, like the angels. Some identify Him with the archangel Michael. Others claim that Jesus and the Devil were brothers in the past. And others, further, claim that Jesus and the Father are the very same person, and not two separate divine persons, at all.

Outside of nominal Christianity, ideas vary, as well. Some religions consider Jesus to have been a holy man, or wise guru, or even a prophet, but not truly divine in the way God is divine. Others consider Him a manifestation of God, like an avatar, or some sort of ascended master in the manner of new age teachings.

And then, there are those who don’t think He ever existed—as if He were a figment of the imagination, or a fiction created in the first century to form the basis of a new religion.

Perhaps we should tackle this question first, in the event some of you have been infected by this pernicious lie.

There is abundant evidence that Jesus of Nazareth did, indeed, exist. Even if we treat the New Testament not as Scripture, but as a mere human product of history, just like Homer’s Iliad or Caesar’s commentaries, it provides abundant evidence that Jesus was a real person, going back to within two or three decades of His life. We even have a fragment from the gospel of John, the famous Rylands Library Papyrus P52, that dates back to within a handful of years after the Apostle John is believed to have written it.

And, outside of the New Testament, a number of secular historical records refer to Jesus and the impact of His teachings and example in the first century. The contemporary Jewish historian Josephus, the Roman historian Tacitus, and Pliny the Younger all speak of Jesus Christ as a real person—much too early in the historical record for some imaginary account to have taken hold so profoundly.

In fact, one of the most effective defenders of the very real existence of Jesus Christ is New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman. While Ehrman has publicly declared that he does not believe Jesus was divine, does not believe in the supernatural, and does not consider himself a Christian, he is just as clear that the evidence for Jesus’ existence is overwhelming.

Referring to those who claim Jesus’ existence is just a myth, Ehrman writes,

“It is fair to say that mythicists as a group, and as individuals, are not taken seriously by the vast majority of scholars in the field of New Testament, early Christianity, ancient history, and theology” (Did Jesus Exist? The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth, 2012. p. 20).

In fact, almost all scholars, secular and religious alike, tend to agree. As Ehrman summarizes,

“Despite the enormous range of opinion, there are several points on which virtually all scholars of antiquity agree. Jesus was a Jewish man, known to be a preacher and teacher, who was crucified (a Roman form of execution) in Jerusalem during the reign of the Roman emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was the governor of Judea” (p. 12).

In short, those who say that Jesus never existed should be taken as seriously as those who say the tooth fairy or Santa Claus do exist.

Facts are facts. And the man Jesus of Nazareth did live and walk this earth around two thousand years ago in Judea, teaching around the Sea of Galilee and in Jerusalem.

But is that where the story ends? A great teacher dies in His early thirties and just happens to have a religion founded in His name? Or was Jesus more than a man?

Jesus Christ Was God in the Flesh—but Also Preincarnate

And the question at the heart of our discussion today—is Jesus God?—is either true or false. So, which is it?

Admittedly, that idea that Jesus could be God, like God the Father is God, is a large and audacious claim, to be sure! And the only way to know is to let God, Himself, reveal the answer to us.

Let the scholars and skeptics have their opinions and debate their conclusions. What should concern us is what God says of Jesus. What DOES God’s word say? Was Jesus merely a man? Or, perhaps, something greater than a man but less than God, like an angel? Or was He truly GOD in the flesh?

The Bible answers these questions plainly: JESUS IS GOD!

In fact, His identity as God was declared long before He was even born!

In his gospel, Matthew explains that Jesus’ virgin birth had been prophesied long before by Isaiah:

“So all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying: ‘Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a son, and they shall call His name Immanuel,’ which is translated, ‘God with us’” (Matthew 1:22–23).

That’s right: Jesus is, literally, “God with us”!

The Apostle John, in his gospel account, explains this in some detail. Let’s read it in John 1, beginning in verse 1:

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:1–5).

The “Word”—or, in Greek, the “Logos” or “Spokesman”—is the One who became Jesus Christ. In the event it is not clear, John specifies a few verses later:

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14).

John is plain. The One now known as Jesus Christ had been with God and was, Himself, God also! He had been with God in eternity past, before Creation existed. In fact, in His final Passover on this earth, Jesus prayed that after His crucifixion He would be returned to this state of glory with His Father—back to the state of eternal co-existence they had known before He became flesh. We read it in John 17 and verse 5, where Jesus prays,

“And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was” (John 17:5).

Yes, existing in eternity past with the One we now call the Father, Jesus, too, was God! John calls Him the Word, or the Logos in Greek. This is because He has always been the Spokesman for God, representing the Father’s will and the Father’s word. Jesus says this in John 12:

“For I have not spoken on My own authority; but the Father who sent Me gave Me a command, what I should say and what I should speak” (John 12:49).

Jesus plainly knew who He was—one of the two divine members of the God Family. During His ministry, he made numerous statements illustrating this—so clearly that Jewish authorities sought to stone Him for what they saw as blasphemous claims.

In John 8, for instance, Jesus speaks of the ancient patriarch Abraham, beginning in verse 56:

“Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.”

Then the Jews said to Him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?”

“Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM” (John 8:56-58).

There should be no doubt about this statement! Jesus did NOT say, “Before Abraham was, I was.” He said “before Abraham was, I AM.” That otherwise-ungrammatical statement is a direct call-back to God’s statement to Moses:

“And God said to Moses, ‘I AM WHO I AM.’ And He said, “Thus you shall say to the children of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you’” (Exodus 3:14).

The Jews of Jesus’ day understood His claim and sought to stone Him for it. Later, He makes a similar claim of His own divinity. We see this in John 10:

“I and My Father are one.”

Then the Jews took up stones again to stone Him.

Jesus answered them, “Many good works I have shown you from My Father. For which of those works do you stone Me?”

The Jews answered Him, saying, “For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy, and because You, being a Man, make Yourself God” (John 10:30–33).

Yes, Jesus knew who He was—and the religious leaders of His day understood exactly what His claims meant!

Not only did Jesus understand who He was, His first century followers did, as well. And if He is anything less than God, then the core beliefs, practices, and truths of Christianity become a lie.

God Created All Things Through Jesus Christ—His Son, the Word, the Savior.

In Colossians 2:2, the Apostle Paul referred to “the mystery of God, both of the Father and of Christ.” Yes, the godhead consists of the Father and Christ—the two members of the God family.

Speaking of Jesus Christ, Paul writes earlier in Colossians 1, beginning in verse 16:

For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist (Colossians 1:16–17).

Such words echo what we read earlier from John chapter 1, that “all things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.” That is a very thorough statement!

Henry Ford is properly credited with creating the “Model T” in America, but others were the hands that accomplished the work. So, too, God the Father is our Creator, yet the Bible makes plain whose hands, as it were, did the work: those of the One who became Jesus Christ! All was created through Him and for Him.

Jesus Christ is, in a real way, our Creator, just as the Father is! Together, they are the reason that Genesis 1:26 says, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness….” Because there were TWO God beings speaking! In fact, the Hebrew word translated “God” in this passage, Elohim, is unusual for being a singular word that is plural in form—another hint that there is more to “God” than meets the eye!

Paul is just as blatant in Ephesians 3 and verse 9, where he says he seeks “to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ.”

These passages and others make it clear that Jesus Christ is not an angel, not even the archangel Michael. Note Hebrews 1 and verse 5,

For to which of the angels did He ever say: “You are My Son, today I have begotten You”? And again: “I will be to Him a Father, and He shall be to Me a Son”? (Hebrews 1:5).

And, too, verse 13,

But to which of the angels has He ever said: “Sit at My right hand, till I make Your enemies Your footstool”? (Hebrews 1:13).

These are rhetorical questions, because the answer is meant to be obvious: To NONE of the angels has God ever said this! They have only been spoken to the Father’s co-creator, who was with God and who was God—the one we now call Jesus Christ.

In fact, all the vital truths at the very heart of the faith of the Bible depend on the truth that Jesus is God.

Consider, how is it that Jesus Christ has standing to die in our stead for our sins? He has that standing because, as our Creator, He can take that responsibility on Himself.

And how is it that His life is sufficient to pay for all of our sins? It is because, as God, His life is worth infinitely more than all of our lives combined—an eternal life given as the payment for the eternal death we’ve earned.

And so, our Creator became a human being, born of a woman, to be able to die and pay that penalty. In explaining this, the Apostle Paul, again, explains just who Jesus really is. Read with me in Philippians 2, where some translations don’t always communicate the fullness of what Paul is saying [vv. 5–8]:

Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross (Philippians 2:5–8).

The New King James’ phrasing here about not considering it “robbery to be equal with God” and “making Himself of no reputation” is awkward, and other translations take it differently.

For instance, the English Standard Version translates verses 6 and 7 this way, saying that Christ, “though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.”

Although He existed in glory with God from eternity past, He did not consider that something He had to desperately cling to, but, instead, was willing to empty Himself of His divine prerogatives and become just like us, His creation, to serve us with His life and death.

The awe-inspiring truth of Jesus Christ—the Word, the divine Spokesman of the God Family—is truly humbling to consider. He lowered Himself from glory to become like us, all so that He might one day lift us up to join Him and His Father in that same glory!

But understanding this profound truth about the identity of Jesus is more than an academic exercise.

The God of the Old Testament and the Son of God Are One and the Same.

When we understand who Jesus really is, it is no wonder that the Apostle Thomas, upon seeing the resurrected Christ, called Him “my Lord and My God!” And it is also no wonder that those living under the Family of God in the Millennial reign of the Kingdom of God will refer to Him as “Mighty God” (Isaiah 9:6).

The Word, the Logos, the divine Spokesman for the God Family willingly set aside the indescribable glory, power, and majesty He had eternally shared with the Father to live a perfect human life, set us an example of righteousness, and become our perfect sacrifice so that we might be cleansed of our sins. Then, three days and three nights later, after His death, He was, in the words of Paul, “declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead” (Romans 1:4).

Yet, many who claim to be Christians seek to avoid the full implications of Jesus’ identity as God.

For instance, many write off the God of the Old Testament as cruel and heartless—unlike Jesus, who is seen as loving and merciful. And God’s commandments are often slandered as too restrictive and harsh.

Yet, consider—who was it who thundered the Ten Commandments to ancient Israel on Mount Sinai and served as the Commander of the Army of the Lord, as He called Himself to Joshua?

The Apostle Paul makes the matter clear. We see this in 1 Corinthians 10, beginning in verse 1:

Moreover, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware that all our fathers were under the cloud, all passed through the sea, all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ(1 Corinthians 10:1–4).

Yes, it was Jesus Christ—as the divine Logos or Spokesman—who thundered the Ten Commandments!

Consider: Exodus 33 and 34 explain that Moses saw God from behind with His own eyes. And the account of Exodus 24 is even more explicit:

Then Moses went up, also Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel, and they saw the God of Israel. And there was under His feet as it were a paved work of sapphire stone, and it was like the very heavens in its clarity (Exodus 24:9–10).

Note, it says plainly “they saw the God of Israel.” Yet compare that to John 1:18, which says, “No one has seen God at any time,” and Jesus’ words of John 6:46:

“Not that anyone has seen the Father, except He who is from God; He has seen the Father.”

Yes, the elders of Israel saw God, but they did not see the Father. Rather, the Member of the God Family they saw was the One who would become the Son, the divine Logos!

So, if it was Jesus Christ who spoke those Ten Commandments, including the Sabbath command, should they not mean more to followers of Jesus Christ than they seem to mean to most self-proclaimed Christians today?

And consider, too, our ultimate destiny. In 1 John 3 and verse 2, note what the Apostle writes to us:

Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is (1 John 3:2).

If we are to become like Christ is now, and Christ now possesses the glory He had with the Father before the world was, then what does that say about the glorious future existence ahead for those who await His return? And what does it say about Jesus’ prayer on His last Passover that His followers may one day be one, just as He and his Father are?

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[The text below represents an edited transcript of this Tomorrow’s World program.]

Why and How to Seek God

We live in stressful times. In a world of political chaos, warfare, pandemics, and civil unrest, we need a source of stability, calm, and peace that is bigger and greater than all of our concerns. That source is God.

A deep and profound relationship with the One who created you, loves you, and has a purpose for your life really IS possible. Join us today as we reveal “Five Keys to Knowing God.”

Seeking God Will Bring Peace of Mind

The world as we know it seems to be unraveling at the seams. Our streets see growing unrest. Our halls of government are alternately filled with either incompetence and gridlock or chaos and conflict. Wars and conflicts rage as our leaders seem increasingly incapable of managing the growing number of crises around the globe.

Even outside of government, the institutions at the heart of civilization seem to reveal themselves on a weekly basis as untrustworthy at best and agenda-driven at worst.

Our educational institutions often seem more devoted to indoctrinating and programming our children than they are to actually educating them. Many fields of science increasingly seem to be driven more by social agenda and political activism than a sincere desire for truth and a devotion to reality.

The chaos of our world isn’t merely abstract or academic, and it doesn’t stay within the pages of our newspapers. It impacts our lives. Our food and other staples of life seem to cost increasingly more money, even as we seem to have less money to spend. Parents look at their children and understandably wonder what sort of world they will inherit.

And while there are always ups and downs, Bible prophecy reveals that the trend is exactly as it appears: things really will get far worse before they get fundamentally better. Nations that were once sources of global stability in the world, such as the United States or Great Britain, will continue their decline, and no change in the presidency or premiership of these nations is going to completely halt the decline and solve the growing chaos. Because that decline and that growing chaos is fundamentally not due to policies or politics or economic plans or anything of the sort.

The chaos and decline is due to the sin of these nations. And unless there is fundamental national repentance on the part of the people themselves and a turning of their hearts to the laws of their Creator, then expect that chaos and decline to continue!

So, what can we do to find peace of mind and stability in a world so lacking in peace and stability?

In fact, there is only one source of such reassurance and hope: The God who created you, who loves you, and who has a remarkable plan for your life.

On today’s program, we are going to give you five keys to truly knowing God—five keys you can use to unlock a deep and profound relationship with the Eternal God who very much wants to build a relationship with you.

Far from being a God who is far away and inaccessible to us, our Creator is near and very accessible. But we must do our part to seek Him. God explains this through the prophet Jeremiah, encouraging His people,

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart (Jeremiah 29:11–13).

But every search has to start somewhere! And if you are willing to take advantage of these five keys, you will find yourself well on your way to a deeper and more invigorating walk with your Creator.

1. Know God by Spending Time in Nature

The first key you can use to know God is creation.

The entire world around us is the work of the master Creator of all things, and He tells us in His word that we can come to know Him better by spending time soaking in His Creation.

In Romans 1:20, the Apostle Paul addresses the ridiculous denial of those who look at the Creation around us and deny the reality of God:

For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse….

Indeed, so many of God’s invisible attributes can be clearly seen and understood by the things that are made—including his eternal power and Godhead, or His divinity and deity.

Regrettably, in our world today, most of us are increasingly separated from the natural world. We live much of our lives with concrete under our feet and fluorescent lights above our heads. But if you would like to really know God, consider spending some time with His Creation.

Take a walk at a local park, if you can—get outside, in natural surroundings. Look up on a clear night sky and let your eyes wander through the stars. Consider the astonishing variety of complex lifeforms that make their home with us on Planet Earth. The Creation is a physical, living hymn that praises its Creator with a beautiful clarity for those who are willing to listen to its song.

The consistent and dependable order of the world and the cosmos tells us that God is orderly and lawful. Its complexity and design speaks to His unimaginable intelligence. The variety we see around us speaks to a God who loves creativity and beauty. For those who long to know their Creator, the Creation, itself, is one of the best-kept secrets around.

If you want to know God, then take advantage of the key of creation, and let His craftsmanship teach you about who He is and your relationship to Him. As King David, the Warrior Poet of ancient Israel, wrote in Psalm 19:1, “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament shows His handiwork.”

2. Know God by Studying the Bible

Our first key is the creation.

The second key to knowing God is the Bible—God’s sacred word.

If you really want to know the real God, this key is absolutely crucial. Too often today, people say they “know” God, but they don’t. What they think of as “God” is a product of their imagination—it’s what they imagine God to be. But if God is real—and He is—then we want to know the real God. The One who created the universe. The One who has the power to work in our lives.

And that God has given us His word to help us do that. The Bible is like God’s mind in print. When we read it, we discover how He thinks, what matters to Him, what makes Him happy or angry, what His plans and desires are—both for the world, and for you. Reading the Bible is a key to unlocking these things for us.

But we have to read it RIGHT. In Isaiah 28, God inspires the prophet to speak about understanding the divine message:

Whom will he teach knowledge? And whom will he make to understand the message? Those just weaned from milk? Those just drawn from the breasts? For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little (vv. 9–10).

We have to be willing to put it all together.

Read the Whole Bible: Old Testament and New Testament

You can’t just read part of the Bible—say, only the New Testament or the Old. You have to be willing to consider the entire book, as a whole, to get an accurate understanding of the mind of God.

Consider owning a large collection of letters written by a great-grandfather who died before you were born. Reading only one or two letters wouldn’t really give you a full picture—and might even give you a wrong idea or cause you to draw a conclusion about him without enough context.

Many people do this with the Bible, being fooled into thinking they understand God by studying only the New Testament, perhaps, or throwing in the Psalms or a few other Old Testament books.

But in 2 Timothy 3:16, we’re told the following:

All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness….

The Scripture—all Scripture—is “given by inspiration of God”—or, as some translations have it, is “God-breathed.”

If you find the idea of studying the entire Bible intimidating, then I’d recommend you start by visiting our website at TomorrowsWorld.org. We have a number of free resources to help you begin, including today’s free DVD.

Yet, simply reading and studying is not enough. Knowledge, by itself, does nothing but make us prideful. We must act on what we learn!

3. Know God by Keeping His Commandments

That brings us to our next key to knowing our Creator: keeping God’s commandments.

God’s word contains His Law and His commandments—the Ten Commandments.

It’s too easy (and wrong) to simply think of God’s commandments as a list of “dos and don’ts” when they are so much more. God’s laws represent a way of life that forms an integral part of the journey to eternal life. They also help us to understand the mind and character of God. But they only reveal that mind and character to those who do more than read about them—they must be obeyed and lived. As verse 10 of Psalm 111 says, “A good understanding have all those who do His commandments.”

Unknown to most of mankind is the purpose of God, which involves His reproducing His own character inside us. Paul pointed to an element of this purpose when he wrote in Philippians 2:5,

Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus….

Seeking to live by the commands of God is a part of the process by which God duplicates the mind and character of Jesus Christ in us. It is how we learn how God and Jesus see right and wrong, how They want to be worshiped, and how They want us to interact with Them and with others. And obeying those commands is how we begin to make Their character our own.

But it can’t be just an academic pursuit. It isn’t just a matter of learning to know God through what we read with our eyes or hear with our ears. It’s a very personal matter of getting to know Him through what we choose to do with our hands and where we choose to go with our feet.

Keeping God’s commands is so crucial to knowing God that He inspired the Apostle John to warn us very clearly:

Now by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He who says, “I know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him (1 John 2:3–4).

Those are strong words, straight from your own Bible! Anyone seeking to know God must keep His commandments, and that includes you and me.

4. Know God by Praying Wholeheartedly

Let’s review our first three keys.

First, we pointed you to creation, encouraging you to truly open your eyes to all you can learn about the God who made you by taking the time to soak in the majesty and design of the world around you.

Next, we directed you to God’s word, the Bible. The Holy Scriptures represent God’s own mind in print—telling us His thoughts, plans, and purposes. Though our world is increasingly forgetting the miracle this book represents, it remains a powerful and necessary key to understanding the God who inspired it.

Third, we highlighted the necessity of keeping God’s commandments. The Bible strongly declares that those who claim to know God but who do not keep His commandments are liars—whether they know they are liars or not. God’s character and heart is taught to us by not just knowing His commandments, but by keeping them ourselves.

Our fourth key today to knowing God, personally and intimately, may seem increasingly difficult in a busy world that demands more and more of our time, from the second we wake up to the moment we collapse on our beds for a short night of sleep before we start all over again. But this key is a necessity, and we cannot come to know God without it.

The fourth key is the practice of regular prayer.

Here at Tomorrow’s World studios, we know that this program is broadcast to peoples and nations all around the world. And when I say “prayer,” many of you may have different ideas about what that means. For some, it might be memorized words or a formula that you recite, perhaps in connection with something like prayer beads. It might even involve some sort of ritualistic chant. But none of these are biblical, nor are they sufficient to help you know God.

Jesus is plain about this in Matthew chapter 6:

And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words. Therefore do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him (vv. 7–8).

No, the sort of prayer the Bible is speaking of is a wholehearted conversation with God, speaking to him about what is on your mind and in your heart.

Consider how you came to know your spouse while you were dating, or how you became close to your nearest and dearest friends. Those relationships took time and included conversation—a sharing of thoughts, ideas, concerns, hopes, and dreams. If you want to know God, you need to spend that sort of time in prayer to Him, as well.

Not many do—at least not the sort of time we’re talking about. In fact, one of God’s complaints about His people in prophecy reflects such a lack of heartfelt prayer. As the Moffat translation of the Bible renders His words in Hosea 7:14, “They never put their heart into their prayers.”

But there is so much to be gained by doing so. By humbling ourselves, kneeling before God, and pouring out our heart to Him. That sort of wholehearted contact not only invites Him to lift our burdens from us, but also opens up an avenue through which we can grow to find Him and know Him. As He said to ancient Israel, “You will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you, says the Lord…” (Jeremiah 29:13–14).

To some extent, this key of prayer can work with our second key today, the Bible, and act as a sort of electrical circuit.

If you remember your studies from high school science, you might recall that electricity needs a closed loop to flow through. For a light bulb to glow, the electricity needs to flow through the bulb, which isn’t possible when the circuit is broken. In a similar way, prayer can work with our study of the Bible. As God shows us more about Himself in His word and shares with us, then we, in turn, can talk to Him about what we are learning and how we see it reflected in our lives, and we can share with Him our questions, hopes, and concerns. Then He, in return, can share more with us.

So many who claim not to be able to find God have not truly sought to build a relationship with Him in this way. But if that relationship is what you seek, then you must turn the key of prayer.

5. Know God by Understanding Jesus Christ

The last key adds power to all the others, and without it, we can only go so far in truly coming to know God.

That last key is the Son of God, Jesus Christ, Himself.

The Bible tells us that long before this world, or this universe, ever existed, the Being we now call Jesus Christ lived in eternity past with the One we now call God the Father. In the very beginning of his gospel account, the Apostle John calls the pre-incarnate Christ “the Logos” or “the Word” of God, and he describes the intimate union between these two God Beings that they shared before the world was:

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

This member of the Godhead became flesh and blood, walking and teaching among us 2,000 years ago as the Son of God. Part of His purpose in doing so was to reveal the Father more intimately to us. As He says, Himself, in Matthew 11:27,

All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.

If we truly want to know God, then the teachings of Jesus Christ are an indispensable key. In fact, in John 14:9, He tells His disciples, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father….”

He wasn’t saying that He was the Father! Rather, Christ is saying that everything we need to know about God the Father was revealed through Him!

Jesus Christ was the perfect revelation of God to mankind. In His love, mercy, and compassion for others; in His wisdom, insight, and remarkable teachings; and in His character, example, and obedience to the laws and ways of God; Jesus Christ is the revelation we need of God’s own love, wisdom, and goodness. And having been resurrected from the grave and glorified, and reigning over His Church from heaven until His soon coming return, Jesus is alive today, right now—able to empower all who will sincerely yield to Him and come to know their Creator.

If you truly long to have a relationship with God, then Jesus Christ is the only way to fully do so! In fact, your knowledge of and relationship with God will fall far short if you do not seek the Son of God in your life, as well. As Jesus says in John 14 and verse 6, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”

Seek God With Your Whole Heart

These five keys—creation, the Bible, keeping God’s commandments, prayer, and Jesus Christ—can help start you on your way to a relationship with God that will not only carry you through today’s hard times, but right on through to the Kingdom of God for all eternity.

All of us here at the Tomorrow’s World studios work very hard to help you understand your world through the pages of your Bible.

If you’re interested in our free DVD “Claim God’s Promises,” you can get that DVD by going to TWTV.org/claim or just clicking on the link we have in the description.

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