We are gods

Image above from Flickr.Com

It's with a small "g," gods. I'm sure God didn't mean to say we are Gods like him, or we are gods like pagan idols. But he did say it. He told sons of the Most High, "You are gods," [Psalm 82]. And we are sons and daughters of the Most High in Christ, aren't we?

Yet he also told them they'd die like mortals because they understood nothing---particularly, nothing about God's will on justice. They sided with the unjust and wicked. They did nothing about the weak and needy, the oppressed and the fatherless.

I've read expert commentaries that said this statement was just God's mock at those who claimed to be God's people and yet disobeyed his will. So it was just God's joke, as it were, and we shouldn't take the, "you are gods" seriously.

But then, somewhere in the Gospel, Jesus made it clear (and took it seriously) that there was nothing wrong if the Jews thought he was claiming to be God. The Jews were furious when Jesus said he and the Father were one. He then quoted this verse in Psalms. Would he back up his ministry with a "joke"? He even said Scripture cannot be "set aside" or "broken," Psalm 82.6 included. Here's the whole passage:

Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I have said you are “gods”’? If he called them ‘gods,’ to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be set aside—what about the one whom the Father set apart as his very own and sent into the world? Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said, ‘I am God’s Son’?

The Word of God came to God's people so he called them "gods." But they ignored the Word so they lost their god status. If they hadn't, they would've lived as real "gods" and enjoyed the concomitant perks of Deity on the earthly level by the mere fact that God's Word came to them. Ordinary people read the bible, but it's a different thing when God's Word "comes" to you, as when "the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah," [Jer. 33.19] or when "the word of the Lord came to Samuel" [1 Sam.15.10].

People without relationship with God read the bible the way they read newspapers. But the word of the Lord comes to true servants of God. Ordinary folks have to read the bible to get the Word, but God's true servants enjoy the Word even without bibles. They declare God's Word sharply and accurately even without sermon outlines while ordinary preachers get rattled with organizing their thoughts in written or printed outlines. 

Hence, prophets who obeyed God and did his will enjoyed performing signs and wonders only God could do. They were given or lent "god status" because the Word came to them---the Word from God's mouth is accomplished only with God's raw power. A lot of things in church today are accomplished with human efforts. But only the Word released from God's own mouth is accompanied with tremendous supernatural power when obeyed.

In fact, we were supposed to be the "god of this world" before Satan tricked Adam and Eve and stole the title from them. God had created Adam and Eve in God's own image and likeness (and God wasn't joking when he did this) and let them have "dominion" over all creation on earth. That's nothing short of being god of this world. Google sees "dominion" as sovereignty. Dominion means in complete control of creation on earth.

But we lost all that in the Fall. 

Now, Jesus Christ took back that title from Satan when he "disarmed the spiritual rulers and authorities" through the cross, says Colossians. So today, in Christ, we call God our own Father, which to the Jews meant being "equal with God," [John 5.18]. Here's the passage:

For this reason they tried all the more to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.

Well, the Jews had different ideas about God to the point that they hated and killed God without knowing it. At one time, Herod's bible scholars failed to pinpoint the exact location of the boy Jesus. They thought he was in Bethlehem when in fact the boy Jesus was in Nazareth (as an infant he was in Bethlehem, but as a boy he was in Nazareth). The wise men who were pagans and sought the boy Jesus through astrology found him. 

Thus, to Jews at the time, calling God your Father made you equal with God. That's what they thought. But actually, the idea wasn't new. God had been insisting that he was a Father to Israel but they just wouldn't listen. He told Israel, "..because I am Israel's father, and Ephraim is my firstborn son," [Jeremiah 31.9]. And Isaiah called God "Father" when he prayed, "Yet you, Lord, are our Father," [64.8]. 

We are NOT equal with God when we call him our own Father, but with that relationship our god status is restored in Christ. Paul said we are no longer "mere men." Here's the passage:

For since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly, and are you not walking like mere men? [1 Cor.3.3]

We are not mere men or humans in Christ. So what have we become? We have become sons and daughters of God with God's very own power full-packed in us and God's own authority at our bidding through the Name (or nature) of Jesus Christ. The same power God used to raise up Jesus from death is in us.

Jesus even promised that anyone who has faith in him "will do the same things" he was doing, and greater works shall he do.

No wonder, people started saying "The gods have come down to us in human form!" after Paul miraculously healed a lame man in Lystra. Mind you, Paul merely said, "Stand up on your feet!" without saying "in Jesus' name." Why this? It was because in Christ you are endowed a god status. It's the result of having Jesus Christ living in you 100 percent. It's no longer you who live but Jesus Christ who lives in you.

We are gods, says the bible. But don't go around saying that. Just imitate and live like God. Let people see God in you and say, "you are god." And that's when you say, "I'm only human," as Paul and Barnabas did.