Is Jesus the Eternal or Begotten Son of God? by David K. Bernard Podcast recording (no venue stated in the delivered transcript) Kind: teaching Scripture: Colossians 2:9, Luke 1:35, Galatians 4:4, Hebrews 1, John 3:16, 1 Timothy 3:16, John 20:28, John 20:31, Deuteronomy 6:4 Source: https://acts238.life/repository/sermons/david-k-bernard--is-jesus-the-eternal-or-begotten-son-of-god Published by Acts 2:38 Life from the sermon transcript on that page. Free to copy and share with attribution. ------------------------------------------------------------ we have to go to scripture for our answer when we go to the Bible the word of God we find that Jesus Christ is God manifest In the Flesh according to Colossians 2:9 in him Jesus Christ dwells all the fullness of the godhead bodily so the key is to understand first first of all bodily Jesus was a real human being as a human he had a beginning he was conceived in the womb of the Virgin Mary who was his mother his biological mother and she bore him and brought him to birth and so on his human side he had a beginning he was conceived and born but at the same time he was God manifest in flesh so the one spirit of God is eternal of course God has no beginning God has no ending he is eternal he stands above and beyond time so viewing Jesus as a human uh he had a beginning in his humanness viewing Jesus as God he is eternal he is both at the same time now when you talk about the term Son by definition the term son implies a beginning a beting and it's interesting the Bible does speak of the begotten son and in normal human speech begotten means a beginning the ACT of the father in causing a child to be conceived that's what it means to be begotten and so the term begotten and the term son in normal human speech would clearly indicate a beginning but it would be a beginning according to the Flesh in fact we find this exact statement in Luke 1:35 and this is the Angel Gabriel speaking to Mary the mother of Jesus before Jesus was conceived and and the angel tells her what's going to happen and I'm reading here from the new King James version and and here's what the angel told her the holy spirit will come upon you and the power of the highest will overshadow you therefore also that Holy one who is to be born will be called The Son of God here we have a scriptural definition of why Jesus is called the Son of God it doesn't say he's the Incarnation of an eternal second person whose name is son it says he will be called The Son of God because the spirit of God caused his conception the word therefore because God's spirit overshadowed his mother and miraculously caused the baby to be conceived therefore he's called the Son of God so I have three children I have two sons they're called my son because I'm the one who caused conception no one else Jesus was not not conceived Naturally by Joseph he was not conceived by any other human man but he was conceived by the miraculous power of God's spirit so therefore literally God caused the conception he is the Jesus that baby that child is the Son of God the son of Mary and the Son of God by a miracle so here we find the the New Testament using the term son in the very same way we would use the term and speak speaking of the begetting of the Sun in the very same way that we would use that so when we hear begotten son we think according to the flesh according to the humanity uh Galatians 4:4 says when the fullness of time was come God sent forth his son made of a woman made under the law so the son is not Eternal the son had a beginning the son was made of a woman Mary made during the time of the law not from eternity P so if you're going to posit an eternal son you would have to have an eternal mother and you'd have to have an eternal law both of those are incorrect now uh Hebrews 1 which quotes from a prophecy from Psalms God says to the son Thou Art my son this day have I begotten thee so the begetting of the sun occurred at a certain point of time Hebrews is not talk about a pre a conversation between two pre-existent persons it's a prophecy from Psalms that's fulfilled in Jesus Christ when Jesus was born as a baby he was literally begotten by the power of God then there's a further usage that when Jesus arose the dead he was the first human being to be raised from the dead with a glorified human body so therefore it's spoken of as him being begotten from the dead the first begotten or firstborn from the dead but in either case you're talking about a specific point in time the Bible never says Eternal son it says only begotten son the Bible never says God the son as if son were a Divine title it says the Son of God it's a human title it signifies the term Son of God literally signifies that Jesus is God manifested In the Flesh but that title of son always has reference to the Incarnation it refers to the whole person who Jesus Is God manifest in the flesh but it's given in the context of time and humanity and Incarnation now in John 3:16 only begotten son many Greek Scholars will say well the the focus is not on um on the act of be getting but unique one of a kind and that's fine but the point is if you're going to put a time to it begetting is a point in time it relates to the Incarnation now in trinitarian theology they teach that there are three Eternal persons Father Son and Holy Spirit so they say that the son is eternal and the son is eternally being begotten by the father now one of the big debates in church history was if you have two persons the godhead and one person begets the other person then the second person is inferior is not Eternal is subordinate gets his Source from the first person and so they're not equal and that's what Aras taught in the 400s and so the counsil of NAA and then later the counsil of Constantinople went against that to say no Jesus didn't have a beginning he's not a secondary being and so they had to come up with this idea begotten relates to Eternity so then you ask well what is this if it's not a point in time and if it's not the flesh God begets another God one person begets another person and this is eternal happening it's always been happening uh what what does that even mean and so the answer of theologians is we can't say what it means as part of the mystery of the godhead what does it mean to say one person begets another person we can't explain that what does it mean to say it's been happening eternally and it's still happening and it always will happen we can't say that we don't know what it means but they they end up saying whatever it means begetting is what makes the second person different from the first person so then you ask well how do you know they're two persons because the father is unbegotten the son is begotten so that they're they're different in fact in ch in in trinitarian theology that is the only absolute difference between the first and the second person that the father is unbegotten the son is begotten but then you ask what is does that mean the answer is well it's what makes the two different so they're arguing in a circle cuz when you ask what does begetting mean it's what the father does to be different from the Son Well what what you know why do you think their father and the son are too different because one is unbegotten the other is begotten so you basically just argued in a circle and you the whole thing is mysterious it has no objective meaning I don't think that's what the Bible is saying the Bible is not a philosophical conundrum that makes no objective sense to normal human beings but the Bible is very clearly saying in the beginning there is the Eternal God God became incarnate In the Flesh no human being could be the father of that child God himself through a miracle not a carnal conception but the spirit of God overshadowed Mary caused the baby to be born and therefore Jesus is the only begotten Son of God in a very real tangible sense the term relates to time the term relates to Incarnation but let me summarize this uh by showing you the term Son of God relates to the Incarnation of course we have 1 Timothy 3:16 which says God was manifest in the flesh but more specifically in John chapter 20 uh after Jesus arose from the dead and appeared to his disciples and uh then uh Thomas wasn't there and didn't believe so Jesus appeared a second time to the disciples with Thomas present showed himself uh to be real raised from the dead Thomas answered this classic statement in John 20: 28 and Thomas answered and said to him my Lord and my God he recognized now Thomas is a Jew who believ believed Deuteronomy 6:4 here o Israel the Lord our God is one Lord so when he said you are my Lord and you are my God literally in the Greek the way the possessive is constructed the Lord of me the god of me not just a lord not just my person God on the side but the one Lord of Deuteronomy 64 the one God of Deuteronomy 64 that's who you are and of course Jesus accepted that said he was blessed and pronounced a blessing on everyone else who would believe the same thing even though they hadn't seen him so that's us so Jesus commended that and commended us if we believe the same verse 29 and then verse 30 Jesus did many other signs and then then the writer John under the inspiration of the spirit summarizes the whole thing in verse 31 but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ that's the Messiah the anointed king prophesied from the Old Testament that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ the son of God and that believing you may have life in his name so when Thomas confessed Jesus standing before him in the flesh the resurrected body you are God John says I wrote all this to prove that Jesus is the son of God so by saying that John is not saying oh a lesser de he he's saying the god that appeared to Thomas in the flesh is called the Son of God so the ultimate meaning of Son of God is truly the one God who has come in human identity as the Lord Jesus Christ