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Did Jesus have a God?

 Submitted: 2/5/2013
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Question: One man on Youtube who claims to have once believed Oneness said that since Jesus called YHWH his God, that even Jesus had a GOd over him and was not God. Obviously he knows about the doctrine of the Oneness of the Godhead and explained that he did. However, his idea was for anyone to explain the meaning of this verse as if Jesus himself had a Godhead. It seems like an Arian/Jehovah Witness position. Please give some insight. I know that Jesus was filled to the max with the Holy Spirit of God and created by him (in the flesh). Yet he was and had the eternla Spirit. Simular to when a person takes a cup of water from the ocean. Anyhow, thank you for your time and again remember we are talking about someone who embraced the truth but either is proud or doubtful. However, I would still like affirmation on what to say should I meet such. Thanks and God bless.
Answer: Your question seems to be, how are we to reconcile the verses that indicate that Jesus had a God with the verses that identify Him as God? This is where it is critical to distinguish between deity and humanity. On the one hand Jesus was a fully human man, born of a woman like all the rest of us. As a man, He said, 'I am ascending to My Father and your Father, and to My God and your God' (John 20:17). This language indicates that Jesus indeed had a God. But what does this mean. To understand we must keep in mind that He was speaking as a man. This is clear from His statement that He would soon be ascending. It was the man who ascended; God is already everywhere. One the other hand, when we read that in Jesus dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily, we understand that He was more than a man; He was in fact 'god manifested in the flesh' (Colossians 2:9, 1 Timothy 3:16).

The point is this: during the days of His flesh Jesus prayed to and depended on the Spirit for guidance and power, just as we must do. He also spoke about His inferiority to God, whom He called His Father. In this respect, we can make a disctinction between His humanity and His deity; which is to say, His humanity was fully submitted to His deity. But we must never separate His humanity from His deity. Jesus was at all times both fully man and fully God. He was, and is, the Almighty God Himself, manifested in genuine human flesh.


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