Jesus Christ is Lord
The apostolic gospel went beyond the fact and significance of the cross and resurrection, to their purpose: ‘For to this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.’
It is well known that the earliest, shortest, simplest of all Christian creeds was the affirmation ‘Jesus is Lord’. Those who acknowledged his lordship were baptized and received into the Christian community. For it was recognized, as Paul wrote, on the one hand that ‘if you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved’, and on the other that ‘no-one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit’.
It may at first sight seem extraordinary that two Greek words, Kyrios Iēsous or ‘Lord Jesus’ (for there is no connecting verb in either of the two verses quoted in the previous paragraph), could possibly be a satisfactory basis for identifying and welcoming somebody as a genuine Christian. Are they not hopelessly inadequate? Is this not theological reductionism at its worst?
The answer to these questions is ‘no’. For the two words concerned, which sound like a minimal Christian confession, are pregnant with meaning. They have enormous implications for both Christian faith and Christian life. In particular, they express both a profound theological conviction about the historic Jesus and therefore a radical personal commitment to him. This conviction and this commitment are the subjects of this chapter.
Theological conviction
Perhaps the best way to investigate the doctrinal overtones of calling Jesus ‘Lord’ is to take a fresh look at Philippians 2:9–11. These verses form the climax of what is sometimes called Carmen Christi, ‘the song of Christ’. For Paul is probably quoting an early Christian hymn about Christ. In doing so, he gives it his apostolic seal of approval. He affirms that Christ, although he shared God’s nature and enjoyed equality with him, emptied himself of his glory and humbled himself to serve, becoming obedient even to death on a cross (verses 6–8). Paul continues:
Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.
(verses 9–11)
As a Christian hymn, used by the church and endorsed by the apostle, it indicates how the early Christians thought of Jesus. Three points stand out.
First, Paul gave Jesus a God-title. That is, Paul referred to Jesus as ‘Lord’. It is true, of course, that kyrios was used with different meanings in different contexts. Sometimes it meant no more than ‘sir’, as when Mary Magdalene thought the risen Jesus was the gardener or when the priests asked Pilate to have the tomb made secure. But when used by Jesus’ disciples in relation to him, kyrios was more than a polite form of address. It was a title, as when they called him ‘the Lord Jesus’ or ‘the Lord Jesus Christ’. The meaning becomes clear against the background of the Old Testament.
When the Old Testament came to be translated into Greek in Alexandria around 200 bc, the devout Jewish scholars did not know how to handle the sacred name Yahweh or Jehovah. They were too reticent to pronounce it; they did not feel free to translate or even to transliterate it. So they put the paraphrase ho kyrios (‘the Lord’) instead, which is why ‘Yahweh’ still appears in most English versions as ‘the Lord’.
What is truly amazing is that the followers of Jesus – knowing that in Jewish circles ho kyrios was the traditional title for Yahweh, Creator of the universe and covenant God of Israel – nevertheless chose to apply the same title to Jesus. They did not see any anomaly in this, even though it was tantamount to saying that ‘Jesus is God’.
Second, Paul transferred to Jesus a God-text. In Isaiah 45:23 Yahweh had said of himself,
By myself I have sworn,
my mouth has uttered in all integrity
a word that will not be revoked:
Before me every knee will bow;
by me every tongue will swear.
Now Paul, or the hymn-writer he is quoting, has the audacity to lift this text out of Isaiah and reapply it to Jesus. The implication is unavoidable. The honour, which the prophet said was due to Yahweh, the apostle says is due to Christ. And it is an honour which is universal, involving ‘every knee’ and ‘every tongue’.
A similar example is the New Testament use of Joel 2:32. The prophet had written that ‘everyone who calls on the name of the Lord [i.e. God] will be saved’. On the Day of Pentecost, however, Peter reapplied this promise to Jesus, urging his hearers to believe in Jesus and be baptized in his name. Similarly, Paul wrote later that the Lord Jesus ‘is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”’ Thus, the saving power of Yahweh to Israel has become the saving power of Jesus to Jewish and Gentile believers alike.
Third, Paul demanded for Jesus God-worship. Paul says every knee will bow before Jesus in worship. Prayer is regularly addressed to Jesus in the New Testament, especially when Paul links ‘God our Father’ and ‘our Lord Jesus Christ’ as together being the source of grace and the object of prayer. One is reminded too of Hebrews 1:6: ‘Let all God’s angels worship him.’ It is assumed in the New Testament that grace flows from Christ and that worship is due to him. Indeed, Christolatry (the worship of Christ) preceded Christology (the developed doctrine of Christ). But Christolatry is idolatry if Christ is not God. Athanasius saw this clearly in the fourth century. He faced the heresy of Arianism, which claimed Christ was merely a created being. One of the ways Athanasius countered this was to point to the long-established practice of worshipping Jesus.
Here, then, are three important data contained in the Christian hymn Paul was quoting. The early Christians gave Jesus a God-title (‘Lord’), transferred to him God-texts (regarding the salvation he grants and the honour he deserves) and offered him God-worship (the bowed knee). These facts are incontrovertible, and they are all the more impressive for being uncontrived and almost casual.
It is also significant that the New Testament writers did not argue the rightness of making the daring identification that Jesus is God, for there was no need for them to do so. Paul fiercely defended the gospel of justification by grace through faith because it was being challenged. But he did not debate the divine lordship of Jesus, which must mean it was not being disputed. So already, within a few years of the death and resurrection of Jesus, his deity was part of the universal faith of the church.
The confession that ‘Jesus is Lord’ has a second theological inference, namely that he is Saviour as well as God. There is a tradition in some evangelical circles to distinguish sharply between Jesus the Saviour and Jesus the Lord, and even to suggest that conversion involves trusting him as Saviour without necessarily surrendering to him as Lord. The motive behind this teaching is good, namely to safeguard the truth of justification by faith alone and not introduce self-salvation by the back door. Nevertheless, this position is biblically indefensible. Not only is Jesus ‘our Lord and Saviour’, one and indivisible, but his lordship implies his salvation and actually announces it. That is, his title ‘Lord’ is a symbol of his victory over all the forces of evil, which have been put under his feet. The very possibility of our salvation is due to this victory. It is precisely because he is Lord that he is also able to be Saviour. There can be no salvation without lordship. The two affirmations ‘Jesus is Lord’ and ‘Jesus saves’ are virtually synonymous.
Radical commitment
The word kyrios or ‘Lord’ could be used, as we have seen, as no more than a respectful term of address. But it was most commonly used of owners, whether of land, property or slaves. Possession carried with it full control and the right of disposal. It is with this understanding that Paul, Peter and James began their letters by calling themselves ‘slave of Jesus Christ’. They knew that he had bought them at the cost of his own blood, and as a result they belonged to him and were entirely at his service.
This personal ownership by Christ, and commitment to Christ, is to penetrate every part of the lives of his disciples. It has at least six dimensions.
First, it has an intellectual dimension. I begin with our mind because it is the central citadel of our personality and effectively rules our lives. Yet it is often the last stronghold to capitulate to the lordship of Jesus. The truth is that we rather like to think our own thoughts and vent our own opinions. And if they conflict with the teaching of Jesus, so much the worse for him!
But Jesus Christ claims authority over our minds. ‘Take my yoke upon you and learn from me,’ he said. His Jewish hearers will immediately have understood him. For they commonly spoke of ‘the yoke of Torah’ (the law), to whose authority they submitted. Now Jesus spoke of his teaching as a yoke. His followers were to become his pupils, to subject themselves to his instruction, and to learn from him. Nor need they be afraid of this. For on the one hand, he was himself ‘gentle and humble in heart’, and on the other, his yoke was ‘easy’. Under its light discipline they would find ‘rest’ for their souls. In other words, true ‘rest’ is found under Christ’s yoke (not in resisting it), and true freedom is found under his authority (not in discarding it). The apostle Paul was later to write something similar, when he expressed his resolve to ‘take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ’.
Contemporary Christians may be anxious to respond sensitively to the challenges of the modern world, but we cannot jettison the authority of Jesus Christ to do so. Disciples have no liberty to disagree with their divine teacher. What we believe about God, about humanity, male and female, made in God’s image, about life and death, duty and destiny, Scripture and tradition, salvation and judgment, and much else besides, we have learned from him. There is an urgent need in our day, in which wild and weird speculations abound, to resume our rightful position at his feet. ‘Only the person who follows the command of Jesus without reserve,’ wrote Dietrich Bonhoeffer, ‘and submits unresistingly to his yoke, finds his burden easy, and under its gentle pressure receives the power to persevere in the right way. The command of Jesus is hard, unutterably hard, for those who try to resist it. But for those who willingly submit, the yoke is easy and the burden is light.’
Second, radical commitment to Jesus Christ has a moral dimension. All round us today moral standards are slipping. People doubt whether there are any moral absolutes left. Relativism has permeated the world and is seeping into the church.
Even some evangelical believers misrepresent Scripture on the subject of the law. They quote the apostle Paul’s well-known statements that ‘Christ is the end of the law’ and ‘you are not under the law’, turn a blind eye to their context, and misinterpret them as meaning that the category of law has now been abolished. As a result, they suppose we are no longer under obligation to obey it and are instead free to disobey it. But Paul meant something quite different. He was referring to the way of salvation, not the way of holiness. He was insisting that for our acceptance with God we are ‘not under law but under grace’, since we are justified by faith alone, not by works of the law. But we are still under the moral law for our sanctification. As Luther kept saying, the law drives us to Christ to be justified, but Christ sends us back to the law to be sanctified.
The apostle is quite clear about the place of the law in the Christian life. He insists that both the atoning work of Christ and the indwelling presence of the Spirit have in view obedience to the law. Why did God send his Son to die for our sins? Answer: ‘in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who . . . live . . . according to the Spirit’. And why has God put his Spirit in our hearts? Answer: in order to write his law there. God’s Old Testament promise of the new covenant could be expressed as ‘I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts’ and ‘I will put my Spirit in you and move you . . . to keep my laws’.
So Jesus Christ calls us to obedience. ‘Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.’ The way to prove our love for Christ is neither by loud protestations of loyalty like Peter, nor by singing sentimental songs in church, but by obeying his commandments. The test of love is obedience, Jesus said, and the reward of love is a self-revelation of Christ.
Third, Christian commitment has a vocational dimension. That is to say, it includes our life work. To say ‘Jesus is Lord’ commits us to a lifetime of service. Every single Christian is called to ministry; indeed, we are all called to give our lives in ministry. If this strikes you as extraordinary, it is probably because you are thinking of ‘ministry’ in terms of ordained pastoral ministry. But pastoral ministry is only one of many ministries. My point is that we are all called to ministry or service of some kind. The reason it is possible to say this is that we are followers of one who assumed ‘the very nature of a servant’, insisted that he had ‘not come to be served, but to serve’, and added, ‘I am among you as one who serves.’ If we claim to follow Jesus, therefore, it is inconceivable that we should spend our lives in any way other than in service.
This means we must be able to see our job or profession in terms of service. Our daily work is meant to be a major sphere in which Jesus exercises his lordship over us. Beyond and behind our earthly employer we should be able to discern our heavenly Lord. Then we will be ‘working for the Lord, not for human masters’, since ‘it is the Lord Christ [we] are serving’.
In November 1940 the city of Coventry was devastated by aerial bombardment, including its fourteenth-century cathedral. After the war the ruins of the old cathedral were preserved, while a new cathedral was built beside it. From medieval times the old cathedral had around its walls a series of guild chapels (e.g. for the smiths, the drapers, the mercers and the dyers), symbolizing the close link between the church and these trades. These chapels were destroyed, but in their place ‘hallowing places’ have been set round the ruined walls, expressing the implications of the prayer, ‘Hallowed be your name’:
In industry, God be in my hands and in my making.
In the arts, God be in my senses and in my creating.
In the home, God be in my heart and in my loving.
In commerce, God be at my desk and in my trading.
In healing, God be in my skill and in my touching.
In government, God be in my plans and in my deciding.
In education, God be in my mind and in my growing.
In recreation, God be in my limbs and in my leisure.
Fourth, the lordship of Christ has a social dimension. This means that the followers of Jesus have social as well as individual responsibilities, for example, to family, firm, neighbourhood, country and world. But it means more than this.
There is a sense in which to confess ‘Jesus is Lord’ is to acknowledge him as Lord of society, even of those societies or segments of society that do not explicitly acknowledge his lordship. Consider this dilemma which the New Testament sets before us. On the one hand, we are told that Jesus is Lord. He has dethroned and disarmed the principalities and powers, triumphing over them in the cross. God has exalted him to his right hand and put everything under his feet. As a result, he can claim that all authority has been given to him. On the other hand, we continue to struggle against the principalities and powers of darkness. They may have been defeated, even deprived of power, but they are still active, influential and unscrupulous. The apostle John even goes so far as to declare that ‘the whole world is under the control of the evil one’. In fact, this dilemma is well summed up in Psalm 110:1, which was quoted by Jesus and several New Testament writers:
The Lord says to my lord:
‘Sit at my right hand
until I make your enemies
a footstool for your feet.’
Within the compass of this one verse the Messiah is depicted both as reigning at God’s right hand and as waiting for the overthrow of his enemies.
How can we reconcile these two perspectives? Is Jesus Lord, or is Satan? Is Christ reigning over his enemies, or waiting for them to surrender? The only possible answer to these questions is ‘both’. We have to distinguish between what is de jure (by right) and what is de facto (in fact or reality). De jure Jesus is Lord, for God has exalted him to the highest place. De facto, however, Satan rules, for he has not yet conceded defeat or been destroyed.
How does this tension affect our discipleship? Because Jesus is Lord by right, that is, by divine appointment, we cannot settle for any situation that denies it. We long that he who is Lord should be acknowledged as Lord. This is our evangelistic task. But even in a society which does not specifically acknowledge his lordship, we are still concerned that his values prevail, that human rights and human dignity be accorded to people of all races and religions, that honour be given to women and children, that justice be secured for the oppressed, that society become more just, compassionate, peaceful and free. Why? Why do we care about these things? Because Jesus is Lord of society by right, and because he cares about them. This is not to resurrect the old ‘social gospel’ of theological liberalism, which made the mistake of identifying a caring society with the kingdom of God. It is rather to take seriously the truth that Jesus is Lord of society and therefore to seek to make it more pleasing to him.
It was during his inaugural address at the opening of the Free University of Amsterdam in 1880 that Abraham Kuyper, who was later to become Prime Minister of the Netherlands, said, ‘There is not one inch in the entire area of human life about which Christ, who is Sovereign of all, does not cry out “Mine!”’ Similarly, Dr David Gill of New College, Berkeley, has written, ‘Jesus is Lord not just of the inner life, afterlife, family life and church life, but of intellectual life, political life – all domains.’
Fifth, a radical commitment to Christ has a political dimension. We need to remember that Jesus was condemned for both a political and a religious offence. In the Jewish court he was found guilty of blasphemy because he called himself the Son of God. But in the Roman court he was condemned for sedition because he called himself a king, and Rome recognized no king but Caesar. Thus, the claims of Jesus had inescapable political implications. His statement that we are to ‘give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s’ may have been deliberately enigmatic. But it certainly implied that there are areas over which God is Lord and into which Caesar may not intrude.
The early Christians faced a continuing conflict between Christ and Caesar. During the first century the emperors manifested ever-increasing megalomania. They had temples erected in their honour and demanded divine homage from their subjects. These claims came into direct collision with the lordship of Christ, whom Christians honoured as king, indeed as ‘the ruler of the kings of the earth’. Pliny, the early second-century governor of Bithynia, described in a letter to the Emperor Trajan how he brought before him in court those Christians he suspected of disloyalty, and how he discharged only those who ‘offered invocation with wine and frankincense to your [i.e. the Emperor’s] image’. But how could believers say ‘Caesar is Lord’ when they had confessed that ‘Jesus is Lord’? They went to prison and death rather than deny the lordship of Christ.
The deification of the state did not end with the Roman Empire. Still today there are totalitarian regimes which demand from their citizens an unconditional allegiance that Christians cannot possibly give. The disciples of Jesus are to respect the state, and within limits submit to it. But they will neither worship it, nor give it the uncritical support it desires. As a result, discipleship sometimes calls for disobedience. Indeed, civil disobedience is a biblical doctrine, for there are four or five notable examples of it in Scripture. It arises naturally from the affirmation that Jesus is Lord. The principle is clear, even though its application may involve believers in agonies of conscience. It is this. We are to submit to the state, because its authority is derived from God and its officials are God’s ministers, right up to the point where obedience to the state would involve us in disobedience to God. At that point our Christian duty is to disobey the state in order to obey God. For if the state misuses its God-given authority, and presumes either to command what God forbids or to forbid what God commands, then we have to say ‘no’ to the state in order to say ‘yes’ to Christ. As Peter put it, ‘We must obey God rather than human beings!’ Or in Calvin’s words, ‘obedience to man must not become disobedience to God.’
In 1957 Hendrik Verwoerd, then Minister of Native Affairs in South Africa, announced the ‘Native Laws Amendment Bill’. It contained a ‘church clause’, which would have prevented any association of different ethnic groups in ‘church, school, hospital, club or any other institution or place of entertainment’. The Archbishop of Cape Town at the time was a gentle scholar called Geoffrey Clayton. He decided, with his bishops, albeit with reluctance and apprehension, to disobey. He wrote to the Prime Minister to say that if the Bill were to become law, he would be ‘unable to obey it or to counsel our clergy and people to do so’. The following morning he died, perhaps under the pain and strain of threatened civil disobedience. The Bill was amended, but in a mischievous way which would have penalized the black worshippers rather than the church leaders. After it became law, a letter was read out in every Anglican church, calling on the clergy and people to disobey it.
Sixth, commitment to Christ has a global dimension. To affirm ‘Jesus is Lord’ is to acknowledge his universal lordship. For, according to Philippians 2:9, God has ‘highly exalted’. The word Paul uses occurs nowhere else in the New Testament, and may even have been coined by Paul. It is hyperypsoō, which could translate as ‘super-exalted’. It means God raised Jesus ‘to the loftiest heights’. And God’s purpose in doing so was that every knee should bow to him and every tongue confess him Lord. We have no liberty to place any limitation on the repeated word ‘every’. Therefore, if it is God’s desire that everybody acknowledge Jesus, it must be our desire as well. Hindus speak of ‘the Lord Krishna’ and Buddhists of ‘the Lord Buddha’, but we cannot accept these claims. Only Jesus is Lord. He has no rivals.
There is no greater incentive to world mission than the lordship of Jesus Christ. Mission is neither an impertinent interference in other people’s private lives, nor a dispensable option which may be rejected. It is an unavoidable deduction from the universal lordship of Jesus Christ.
The two-word affirmation Kyrios Iēsous sounded pretty harmless at first hearing. But we have seen that it has far-reaching ramifications. Not only does it express our conviction that Jesus is God and Saviour, but it also indicates our radical commitment to him. The dimensions of this commitment are