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How can Jesus be God, when He said that God is a spirit?

John 4:23, 24 - But a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father is seeking such as these to worship Him. God is Spirit, and His worshipers must worship Him in spirit and in truth.”

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Titus 2:13, “…our great God and Saviour, Jesus Christ.”

Heb 1:8, “About the Son he says, ‘Your throne, O God, will last forever’”.

Matt 1:23, … and they will call Him Immanuel, which means, “the God with us”.

John 1:1, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”.

John 20:28, “Thomas said to him, ‘My Lord and my God.’”

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    The Life, the eternal, which was with the Father (a Spiritual existence) (and if with 'Father' therefore, Son) was manifested (in incarnation). 1 John 1:2. All five of your references prove the point you seem to want to dispute. Down-voted -1.
    – Nigel J
    Commented Aug 17 at 3:51
  • “God (the Father) is Spirit” (John 4:24). “The Lord (Jesus) is Spirit” (2 Cor 3:17). “the last Adam (Lord Jesus) a life-giving Spirit” (1 Cor 15:45). So, when Yahweh incarnated as Lord Jesus, He became a physical human being. Hence, when “subsisting in the form of God” or when “taking the form of a slave” (Phlp 2:5-6) He is “our great God and Savior” (Titus 2:13). Commented Aug 17 at 15:02
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    This site, BH-SE, advices to “be nice” to new contributors. It says, “take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering”. Yet, this new contributor has got -4 (down votes). So, a +1 from me. Commented Aug 17 at 15:03

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God the Father is indeed "spirit" (John 4:23, 24). By contrast, Jesus proved that He was not a spirit when He said to the disciples:

Luke 24:39 - See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.”

However, the OP's apparent contradiction involves a logical leap - just because God the Father is "spirit" does not require that Jesus be "spirit" as well; indeed, Jesus specifically denied this idea.

That is, Jesus is not the Father and the Father is not Jesus; but that does not prevent both Jesus and the Father being God.

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Jesus, while on earth, was a flesh man. He did not contain all of the qualities of God. Thus, he was not God and not equal to God (the Father). For example, Jesus did not have the same composition of God (i.e. spirit body).

  1. In John 1:1, 14, we see that his composition was changed from spirit ("was God") to flesh ("made flesh").
  2. In Philippians 2:6, we see another instance of Jesus not being equal with God by relinquishing various properties of God, namely composition.

While in the flesh, Jesus was fully man, and only fully man. He returned back to being God when the Father, through His spirit, resurrected Jesus. Romans 1:3-4 gives us a glimpse of Christ being born of the flesh by being made of the seed of David, and he was born of the spirit a Son of God by the spirit of holiness from the resurrection of the dead.

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God "condescends" to enter the world as a human man. The original sense of condescending is not one of looking down on someone, i.e. belittling or disdainful of them, but rather to simply lower oneself to their level, to abase oneself, to roll up sleeves and dirty hands, a captain working alongside his men, a king disguised as a common soldier, to share an equal part in their labor and travail. https://www.etymonline.com/word/condescend, https://www.folger.edu/explore/shakespeares-works/henry-v/read/4/1/ God "condescends" from the lofty heights of the spiritual, down into the muck and grime, yet retains all the purity and radiance of His spirit. Christ is both fully human and fully spirit, somehow, at the same time. He cannot be ONLY spirit, else he could not be tempted as we are nor suffer the horror and pain of physical torture and death. If God as omnipotent and omniscient spirit came to die for us, it would be small sacrifice, and unrelatable. Superman is hardly a commendable hero, for he has no struggle, being so far above us. And if Christ were only man, he should remain in the grave, and there would be no joy of resurrection or apparation through walls to surprise the scared and grieving. https://text.recoveryversion.bible/42_Luke_24.htm Christ is somehow a marriage of spirit and body. The best example that I can give is Gandalf replaces Saruman, returning from death at the hour of need,a transfiguration from Grey to White, a reconciliation of The Light that was broken, The White Wizard as he should be.

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    All of this is expressed as opinion, except for the reference to a whole chapter without indication of the verses implied. Your points need to be substantiated with precise scriptural references. Please see the Tour and the Help as to the purpose and the functioning of this, an hermeneutic site.
    – Nigel J
    Commented Aug 17 at 4:01
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    @Kenneth Foulke The point of this comment is to heartily agree with your theology; but then to repeat the idea Nigel has expressed: Which verses will you quote to show your working out?
    – C. Stroud
    Commented Aug 17 at 11:45

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