Excerpt from Ch. 13 – New: Wineskins and the Simple Words of Christ

A false doctrine again creeping into the Church states the God of the Old Testament is not the same as the God of the New Testament. I say it is creeping in again because it’s well documented that during the second century, a man named Marcion was denounced as a heretic for promoting that and other Gnostic teachings.3 Oftentimes, people who are holding to this ancient heresy will say that while they don’t believe in the God of the Old Testament, they do believe in Jesus and the God of the New Testament.

It’s quite interesting, though, if you read the New Testament, how often Jesus identifies Himself with the God of the Old Testament. 


 

Maybe you’ve heard that Jesus never claimed to be God. That’s simply not true. He absolutely claimed to be God; He just did it in a Jewish way, since He was a Jew. …

In Isaiah 6, the prophet writes:

In the year of King Uzziah’s death I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of His robe filling the temple. Seraphim stood above Him, each having six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called out to another and said, “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of His glory.”

And the foundations of the thresholds trembled at the voice of him who called out, while the temple was filling with smoke. Then I said, “Woe is me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.”

Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a burning coal in his hand, which he had taken from the altar with tongs. He touched my mouth with it and said, “Behold, this has touched your lips; and your iniquity is taken away and your sin is forgiven.”

Then I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” Then I said, “Here am I. Send me!” He said, “Go, and tell this people: ‘Keep on listening, but do not perceive; keep on looking, but do not understand.’ Render the hearts of this people insensitive, their ears dull, and their eyes dim, otherwise they might see with their eyes, ear with their ears, understand with their hearts, and return and be healed” (verses 1-10).

In verse 1, Isaiah said he saw the Lord on the throne, lofty and exalted. The Hebrew word used here for “Lord” is Adonai. So, Isaiah testified he saw the Lord, Adonai, high and lifted up on the throne. Second, in verse 5 Isaiah says he is in deep trouble because he is a man of unclean lips and his eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. This is the same Lord of hosts the Seraphim said was “Holy, Holy, Holy” in verse 3. The phrase “Lord of hosts” in Hebrew is Yahweh Sabaoth; or, if you’d prefer, Jehovah Sabaoth. Therefore, we are able to easily deduce that Isaiah saw a manifestation of Yahweh in his vision recorded in Isaiah 6.

Now we will move back to the New Testament. In John 12, we find Jesus in the last week of His life. He has already raised Lazarus from the dead and is popular with most of the people. But the leaders of the Jews are plotting to kill both Him and Lazarus. John writes:

Though He had performed so many signs before them, yet they were not believing in Him. This was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet which he spoke: “Lord, who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?” For this reason they could not believe, for Isaiah said again, “He has blinded their eyes and He hardened their heart, so that they would not see with their eyes and perceive with their heart, and be converted and I heal them.” These things Isaiah said because he saw His glory, and he spoke of Him. Nevertheless many even of the rulers believed in Him, but because of the Pharisees they were not confessing Him, for fear that they would be put out of the synagogue; for they loved the approval of men rather than the approval of God (verses 37-43).

John quotes Isaiah 6 and then writes that Isaiah said these things because he saw “His glory, and he spoke of Him.” Who is the “Him” whom John says Isaiah saw? The answer is found in verses 37 and 42, where John says even though Jesus was performing many signs the Jews refused to believe in Him, and the ones who did believe wouldn’t confess Him because they were afraid of being put out of the synagogue.

No one would get put out of the synagogue for confessing belief in Yahweh. All Jews confessed that truth every time they said the Shema (see Deuteronomy 6:4-5). But a person would get put out of the synagogue for confessing the truth that Jesus was Yahweh. Many of them were seeing, yet they weren’t believing. Isaiah, however, saw His glory and believed. He saw Yahweh. So, once again, John tells us Jesus and Yahweh are one.

After Isaiah saw the pre-incarnate Jesus, his life was never the same. As his old wineskins were burst, he was filled with an excitement and boldness to do anything for the Lord God no matter the cost. Just as Isaiah’s life was turned rightside up when he actually saw the Lord God after serving Him for so many years, my world was rocked when I began to discover how the entire Old Testament was designed to point us to Jesus. It changed everything. Many of my old wineskins were burst, which helped me make sense of so many things in the Old Testament that had troubled me in the past.