Crowds Inspired

The crowds which observed Jesus believed that God was at work in him. In Christ they saw a man who was anointed by God and they praised God for what they saw in that man, Jesus.

They glorified God because it was obvious that Jesus was not acting alone. They were certain he was sent and empowered by the Almighty—and they were right!

Those crowds joined the people Jesus healed, and they worshipped God. They were often inspired to praise God by the gratitude of those who received the miracles. In the following example, Jesus resurrected a man--and as a result, the crowds praised God.

The dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him back to his mother. They were all filled with awe and praised God.

‘A great prophet has appeared among us,’ they said. ‘God has come to help his people’ (Luke 7:15-16).

Crowds Praised God

Did the crowds praise Jesus? No. They did not.

If you read carefully, you’ll observe that they praised the God who sent Jesus. These were monotheistic Jews who had no doubts that there was One God. And they knew without a doubt that no man had ever seen God. Jesus was standing right in front of them, visible to the naked eye.

Notice that the Jews did something nobody seems to do today. They ‘praised God’ for sending Jesus as a ‘great prophet.’ No Christians call Jesus a prophet these days, although he was. And Jesus, for the Jews, was a prophet. He was a man. It didn't cross their minds that Jesus might be God--the One God.

And Jesus didn’t push back. He had no qualms with their interpretation of his ministry. He didn't say "I'm not just a prophet, but the God you are praising." No. Rather, Jesus was happy that they were giving God the glory he deserved.

God Was in Christ

So, then what did the people mean when they said ‘God has come to help his people’?

Well, they meant that God was in Jesus. Paul the Apostle wanted Christians to know that ‘God was in Christ.’ That's why Paul wrote:

... God was in Christ reconciling the World to Himself... and he has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God (2 Corinthians 5:19–20).

So, that's what the people of Nain were thinking when they said 'God has come to help his people.' They meant that God was in Christ. They meant that the Spirit of God was in Jesus to empower him.

And, remarkably, in the same breath through which Paul says 'God was in Christ,' he also says that 'God was making an appeal through us.' So, Paul believed that God could also speak through us, those who serve him. He did not believe that God spoke only through Jesus.

Leading the Blind

Now, this is where it gets personal. Are you ready? It's like this: God is at work through us just as he was at work through Jesus. To see this experiential Christianity at play, consider how the instant Jesus healed a man of blindness, the man immediately praised God. He gave glory to the Father!

Follow that example.

The people who saw the man healed of blindness took his cue, and the Scriptures tell us that ‘they also praised God.’ Won’t you?

The Bible reports to us:

Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus, praising God. 

When all the people saw it, they also praised God (Luke 18:43).

What was going on there? Did people think that Jesus was God Himself? Of course not. It's sad to say that that's the astoundingly ignorant interpretation of many so-called "Christians" today.

Spontaneous Trinitarians?

Is it possible that out of nowhere, the observers of the healing suddenly began to subscribe to the theology that Yahweh, the One God they had always worshipped, was not the One Being they were taught he was? Did , but had always been a being of “three Persons in One Essence”?

No, that’s definitely not what happened. Observers did not suddenly become convinced that Jesus was “the Second Person of the Holy Trinity.” As popular as it is, to believe the Trinitarian formula is to throw out all rules of sound Bible interpretation.

Let's not surrender all reason and common sense. Let’s not make the science of hermeneutics a farce. The Bible is not a children’s game.

Was Jesus, in an unannounced split-second theological revelation showing himself as “coeternal and coequal” with the Father and the Holy Spirit? Well, that’s what very confused Trinitarians might argue—but no. Absolutely not.

Jesus simply performed miracles in the power God gave him. It’s as simple as that.

The people who ‘praised God’ simply had the common sense and the childlike faith to recognize that God was working through Jesus. In other words, they understood that God had empowered Jesus to do what no man can do in his own strength. Do you have that same common-sense faith?

Do you have that simple faith—the one called ‘faith in God’? It is the second doctrine on the list of the fundamentals (Hebrews 6:1-2). You’ll need it. We all do.

Demon-Free

And what about when Jesus delivered a boy from a demon and observers responded with amazement not at Jesus, but at God for his ‘greatness’? Here’s what the Bible tells us:

Jesus rebuked the impure spirit, healed the boy and gave him back to his father.

And they were all amazed at the greatness of God (Luke 9:42-43).

Hmm. What does it mean to be ‘amazed at the greatness of God’? Well, it certainly does not mean that those folks credited Jesus with the deliverance. Rather, they were amazed that God would do such wonderful things through a human vessel—the vessel being the body of the man Jesus.

Don’t forget, the first words out of Peter’s mouth on the day of Pentecost, when he preached the sermon that sparked the formation of the first and greatest Christian church in history were these:

Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him (Acts 2:22-24).

Do you believe that message? Those who believed it on Pentecost were baptized in water and the Spirit and integrated into the +3,120-member congregation, pastored by the Twelve Apostles because the passage goes on to tell us:

Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day (Acts 2:41).

Guidance from Jesus

So, the message that Jesus was ‘a man accredited by God to’ us ‘by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did… through him’ is the original message of the Church. And don’t forget that people responded with amazement at God’s greatness in Jesus’ miracles because Jesus gave them that orientation.

The Lord, in humility, led them to believe that it was God. Jesus taught the people to glorify God for his marvels. For example, look at what Jesus said to the man he healed in Gadara.

The Bible says:

As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed begged to go with him.

Jesus did not let him, but said, ‘Go home to your own people and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you’ (Mark 5:18-19).

This approach of encouraging people to glorify God was characteristic of Jesus. And it is the complete opposite of the Antichrist’s approach. It is not the practice of the Antichrist to steer people to God so that they might glorify God.

Contrast: Christ vs. Antichrist

Instead, the Antichrist will perform signs and wonders (just like Jesus), and he’ll come back from the Dead (just like Jesus), but he won’t teach people to give glory to God. On the contrary, the Antichrist will sit in the Temple. And there, in that most holy of all sanctuaries, he will call himself “God.”

The Antichrist, just as Lucifer did more than 6,000 years ago, will take God’s place and will seek his own glory--despising, trampling underfoot, and desecrating God’s glory.

If you read your Bible carefully, you’ll notice that Jesus never called himself “God” nor did he ever ask anyone to call him “God.” He never took a seat in the Temple. He went there to worship, but he never sat down in it to be the object of people's attention.

Now, Jesus certainly could have taken a seat in the Temple, especially after God resurrected him from the Dead! He could have marched directly into the Temple from the tomb. Nobody would have been able to kill him a second time and he would have been right to claim what rightfully belongs to him: the Throne of David.

However, the timing would have been off. Our blessed Lord Jesus only wishes to do the will of his Father. That's his primary way of glorifying God. His time has not yet come to rule. But it will. Just wait.