
Jewish believers in Jesus (
Yeshua) often struggle with a theological question that other Christians may not find difficult. It has to do with whether it is proper to say, "Yeshua is God," without any qualifying remarks.
We are not speaking here of His divinity. Everyone accepts His divinity. He is the eternal Son of God, the only Lord, and the fullness of God dwelling in bodily form (Colossians 2:9). He is the Immanuel, meaning God with us (Matthew 1:23). Of these there is uniform agreement.
The question comes that if you say, "Yeshua is God" in a context with religious Jews who say they do believe in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, but do not believe in Yeshua, are you misrepresenting what the New Testament has to say?
To highlight the sensitivity, looking at it from the other side - we could ask, if it is proper to say, "Yeshua is God," and since Yeshua is Jewish, would it also be proper to say, "God is Jewish?"
Another problem with the statement "Yeshua is God" is that it does not deal with the New Testament position that Yeshua is portrayed as being submitted unto the Father who is "greater" than Yeshua (John 14:28, I Corinthians 15:28, Acts 1:7).
The word "God" is found over 1200 times in the New Testament. In many instances, there are inferences to the divinity of Yeshua, such as the "I Am" statements in John's gospel, the use of the title "Lord," the authority of His name, references to His existence before creation, His "oneness" with the Father, and so on.