Why was
Jesus sent to earth, what was he sent to do?
You will tell me, and rightly so, that Jesus was sent to die for our
sins, to provide a way to mankind to get to God so that we can have eternal
life. This is very true. But so far, I have found two other missions,
both ancillary to this prime mission in very interesting ways, and I’m not even
including to heal the sick, perform miracles, and bring glory to the Father, as
I consider those to be a means to support these three objectives. (And perhaps you will tell me you found more.)
The first
and primary mission I’ve already mentioned, and I don’t think I need to provide
proof for that; there are tons of verses that state outright that Jesus came to
die for our sins, and many, many more that support it without stating it directly.
Jesus’
second objective, or more accurately, his first supporting objective, was to
wind up the forces of Satan so that they would kill him. For this I refer to the
work of Michael S. Heiser, who I strongly recommend anyone reading this to
check out. “Is it worth it?” you may ask. Well, I don’t consider anything I
have ever written, nor ever will write, to be of any worth or value in
comparison to Heiser’s Supernatural
or The Unseen Realm. In these, among making
sense of many other mysteries he explains how Jesus made the public declaration
starting at his baptism and running throughout his ministry that he was the
promised Messiah, and was there to take the earth back from the forces of
evil. Jesus revealed just enough
information about who he was to stir up these evil forces against him, but he
kept secret the fact that his death would be his victory and their downfall. So
Satan thought that by killing Jesus, they would rid the world of God’s presence
and win dominion over this realm once and for all. This, of course, was exactly
what God wanted Satan to think, and ultimately worked towards fulfilling God’s plans. This was The Greatest Deception. Heiser provides all the biblical references for this, so I won’t attempt to
repeat them here.
Jesus’
other supporting objective was to fully convince his disciples that he was of
the Father. I’ll get into why this is important in a minute, but you can find
references to this when Jesus asks his disciples “Who
do you say that I am?” as relayed in Matthew 16:15, Mark 8:29, and Luke
9:20. But John shows it much more
explicitly in Jesus’ prayer to the Father:
“I have revealed you to the ones you gave me from the world. They were always yours. You gave them to me,
and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything I have is a gift
from you, for I have passed on to them the message you gave me. They accepted
it and know that I came from you, and they believe you sent me.” (John 17:6-8)
Here, Jesus
accounts to the Father that he has completed the task of passing on the message
and knowledge that he (Jesus) is from the Father. Why is this important?
Because these twelve, or eleven of them, would be the foundation for the
Church, the very ones who are responsible to take the message in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends
of the earth. (Acts 1:9) These
disciples, along with others, would suffer greatly and be persecuted for
spreading the Good News, so it was imperative that they were convinced that
Jesus was the real deal, that he came from, and spoke for, the Father.
Once Jesus
had convinced both polar opposite parties that he was the Messiah, with the
result of driving Satan and his forces into a bloodlust frenzy on the one hand,
and on the other, fully convincing and comforting his supporters that he was
making a way for them, he tells his Father that he has completed the work he
was sent to do, and is ready for the end, to complete his final and ultimate objective. (John 17:4)
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