Did the Apostles Pray to Jesus as Lord?
After Jesus ascended, the apostles stunned both Jew and Roman by proclaiming Jesus as “Lord”.2 Both the apostles and early Christians did the unthinkable and worshiped Jesus, even praying to him as if he was God. Stephen prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit” as he was being stoned to death (Acts 7:59).
Other believers soon joined Stephen, who even while they were facing death, “never ceased for a single day…to teach and to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus” (Acts 5:42). The apostles, most of whom were martyred, passed on their knowledge of Jesus to church fathers who carried their message onto the next generation.
Although letters from early church fathers were written too late to be included in the New Testament, they strongly emphasize the apostles’ teaching that Jesus is both God and man.
For example, Ignatius, a disciple of the apostle John, wrote about Jesus’ 2nd coming, “Look for him that is above the times, him who has not times, him who is invisible.” In a letter to Polycarp, who was also a disciple of the apostle John, Ignatius states, “Jesus is God”, “God incarnate,” and to the Ephesians he writes, … “God Himself appearing in the form of a man, for the renewal of eternal life” (Epistle of Ignatius to the Ephesians 4:13). Clement of Rome in AD 96 also taught Jesus’ deity, saying, “We ought to think of Jesus Christ as of God” (2nd Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians 1:1).
So, the idea that belief in Jesus’ deity was invented by the church decades after the apostles were dead simply doesn’t agree with the historical facts. It’s clear that the early church was merely continuing the apostles’ belief in Jesus’ deity.
As the early church grew, Gnostics and other cults began teaching that Jesus was a created being, inferior to the Father. This came to a head in the fourth century when Arius, a popular preacher from Libya, persuaded many leaders that Jesus wasn’t fully God.
Then in AD 325, at the Council of Nicaea, church leaders met to resolve the issue of whether Jesus is the Creator, or merely a creation.3 Over 300 church leaders overwhelmingly affirmed the long-held Christian conviction and New Testament teaching that Jesus is fully God.4
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