Jesus the Son of God: The Eternal Love That Goes Deepest

From the sermon preached on May 24, 2026

Jesus claiming to be the Son of God is not a polite religious title or a figure of speech. It is a statement of divine equality with the Father, a claim so total that it either demands everything or collapses into absurdity. Pastor John Starke opened this passage from John 5 by pressing a simple question: if Jesus is the Son of God in the way this text describes, how does that change not just what you believe about him, but how you actually live with him?

For most people who have spent any time around Christianity, the phrase "son of God" registers as a familiar title without a sharp edge. But in John 5, when Jesus says "My Father is working until now, and I am working" (verse 17), the crowd does not nod along. They are furious. They understand immediately that Jesus is claiming something far more specific than piety or moral excellence. Jesus claiming to be God is the plain reading of the text, and the religious leaders in the room hear it exactly that way.

Pastor John Starke traced the background of son-of-God language through the Old Testament to clarify what makes Jesus' claim categorically different. In Exodus 4, God calls Israel his son because the nation is given a vocational calling: represent my character to the nations, be holy as I am holy. In Psalm 2 and 2 Samuel 7, David is called God's son because he is tasked with ruling with the kind of justice that belongs to God alone. These are communicable attributes, qualities of God that human beings can model, however imperfectly. Holiness. Justice. Peacemaking. Jesus himself says in Matthew 5 that peacemakers will be called sons of God, precisely because peacemaking reflects the character of the Father.

But in John 5, Jesus is doing something else entirely. He is not claiming to reflect God's character. He is claiming to share God's nature. In verse 21, he says that just as the Father raises the dead and gives life, so the Son gives life to whom he will. In verse 22, the Father has given all judgment to the Son. In verse 25, the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and live. These are not communicable attributes. No human being can speak the dead out of their graves. No human being speaks with the authority of God's own word. Jesus claiming to be God is not an exaggeration or a metaphor. It is the precise claim the text is making, and it is the claim that ultimately gets him killed.

One honest step today: sit with the weight of that claim before you move past it. Write down one sentence answering this question in your own words: "If Jesus actually has the authority he claims in John 5, what does that ask of me?" Do not answer it quickly.

John Starke named three specific acts in John 5 that constitute Jesus divine authority as something no human prophet, teacher, or moral exemplar could share. First, the power to raise the dead with his voice. Second, the authority to speak the word of God without qualification. Third, the right to execute divine judgment over all humanity. Each of these marks a line that divides Jesus' claims from every other religious figure in history.

On the matter of divine speech, the difference is clarifying. The prophets prefaced their most important words with "thus says the Lord" precisely because they knew they were transmitting a message that did not originate in themselves. Jesus never does this. When he wants to emphasize the gravity of what he is about to say, he does not invoke God's authority above him. He says "truly, truly, I say to you." The authority is not above him. It is him. Every word Jesus speaks carries the weight of the word of God, not because he is a good teacher, but because he is the Son of God in the full sense John 5 is describing.

This is where the text presses on the reader personally. It is possible to admire Jesus, to appreciate his ethics, to find his social vision compelling, and still to treat him as a figure among figures. John Starke put it plainly: if you do not honor and worship Jesus and acknowledge his divine authority in your life, you may have a kind of spirituality shaped by Jesus, but it is not the life Jesus is calling for. Jesus’ divine authority is not a theological abstraction. It is a claim on the whole of your existence, on who you answer to, on what you are ultimately for.

The sermon does not stop at Jesus' claims about himself. It moves into something harder to hold and harder to let go: the eternal love that has existed between the Father and the Son from before creation, and the staggering invitation that love extends to every person who comes to Christ. This is where the deeper life with Jesus finds its ground.

In John 5:26, Jesus says the Father has granted the Son to have life in himself. Pastor John Starke pressed carefully on what this means. The Father did not create the Son. The Son is not dependent on the Father for his existence in the way a creature depends on a creator. And yet the Son does not exist independently of the Father either. They are one God, one nature, two persons in an infinite and eternal relationship of mutual knowing and love. The Son's life is self-existent but never self-contained. This is the beginning of what the church has always called the Trinity.

Central to that relationship is love. In John 5:20, the Father loves the Son and shows him everything he is doing. John Starke walked the congregation through a thought exercise: imagine the greatest and deepest love you have ever witnessed. Now remove every limitation. Remove the beginning, the fear of loss, the imperfect knowing, the need to be loved in order to feel complete. What remains is a love that has been going on from all eternity, before the first moment of creation, with no fear, no limitations, no hidden places. John 17:24 captures it: "You loved me before the foundations of the world."

That love is what you are being invited into. When you pray, you are not reaching across a distance to get God's attention. You are stepping into a room where the Father and Son have been in communion forever, and the door is open. A deeper life with Jesus is not an advanced spiritual technique. It is waking up, again and again, to the fact that you have already been welcomed into that love. The practical step: pray this week not as someone asking for things, but as someone entering a conversation that has been going on forever. Listen more than you speak.

The passage below draws together the two movements of John 5:19-26: the deep life of Jesus (who he is) and the deep life with Jesus (what that means for you).

This sermon was preached on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, but the longing it addresses is not local. From East Harlem to Morningside Heights, from Washington Heights and Hamilton Heights to the Upper West Side, New York City runs on transactional love, competitive love, and the quiet exhaustion that comes from loving people from an empty place. Apostles Church Uptown gathers each Sunday at Regis High School to hold this reality together: there is a love that does not run dry, and it is available to anyone who is willing to go deep enough to find it. Whether you are a longtime New Yorker or new to the city entirely, you are not too far from a community working to live from that love rather than for it.

Pastor John Starke closed the sermon with an image that stays with you: an ocean diver going down until the pressure starts to get to you. That is the invitation of John 5. Go deep enough into who Jesus is, deep enough into the eternal love between the Father and the Son, and you will not find a wall. You will find a world. The same love the Father has poured on the Son from all eternity is the love now aimed directly at you. Do not keep it at arm's length. Do not let your life with Jesus stay on the surface, because a superficial life with Jesus produces superficial joy and superficial love for everyone around you.

To stay connected to the teaching and life of the church each week, the newsletter is a good place to start. Sign up here.
If you are new to Apostles Church Uptown and want to know what to expect, plan your visit below.