Did Jesus Claim To Be God?

The Two Powers In Heaven and Implicit Claim (Part 1)

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Over the past few months, I've seen more interviews and Instagram reels either denying the deity of Christ or calling into question the validity of Christianity as a whole because of this simple but far from simplistic question:

Did Jesus claim to be God?

And to make things more precise, did he claim to be God in the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke)? We will deal with John a bit later.

I want to try to respond to this question with a bit of theological clarity and consideration. But before I jump into Scripture, I want to pose another question. Who is the greatest of all time when it comes to basketball? There are really only two options and…