The Worship Given to the Lord Jesus in the NT [Part 1]

 

In the Gospels written about our Lord Jesus, we have several places where people worship Him. The interesting thing is that Jesus never objected to this worship, thus showing that Jesus understood Himself (rightly) to be the eternal Son of God.

"When he came down from the mountain, great crowds followed him. And behold, a leper came to him and knelt before him  [προσεκύνει], saying, “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.” And Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, “I will; be clean.” And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus said to him, “See that you say nothing to anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a proof to them.” (Matthew 8:1-4)

"First, he kneels (a posture appropriate for adoration), then he calls Jesus “Lord,” which by Matthew’s time regularly referred to Christ’s divinity. The leper himself did not likely worship Jesus or acknowledge him as God in the way Christians later would, but Matthew no doubt saw these gestures as appropriately foreshadowing more explicit discipleship." (Craig Blomberg, The New American Bible Commentary - Matthew, pg. 138)

Now we will move on to a story from the Gospel of Luke:

"On the way to Jerusalem he was passing along between Samaria and Galilee. And as he entered a village, he was met by ten lepers, who stood at a distance and lifted up their voices, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.” When he saw them he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went they were cleansed. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice; and he fell on his face at Jesus' feet, giving him thanks. Now he was a Samaritan. Then Jesus answered, “Were not ten cleansed? Where are the nine? Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” And he said to him, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well.” (Luke 17:11-19)

The expression "fell on his face" is used elsewhere in the Scriptures to indicate a sense of worship, adoration, and reverence:

"Then Abram fell on his face. And God said to him, ... " (Genesis 17:3)

"Now as Solomon finished offering all this prayer and plea to the LORD, he arose from before the altar of the LORD, where he had knelt with hands outstretched toward heaven." (1 Kings 8:54)

"And the twenty-four elders who sit on their thrones before God fell on their faces and worshiped God [προσεκύνησαν], " (Revelation 11:16)

"Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the LORD, our Maker!"  (Psalms 95:6)

Thus, we can see that this posture of kneeling is often used for worshipping the LORD in the Old Testament. I might also add that in 1 Kings 19:18, the Scripture seems to say that "bowing" to any other God  (Baal) is forbidden, thus viewing "bowing" as a pledge of adoration and service. 

To be fair, there were places in the OT (such as 1 Samuel 24:8) where people bowed before someone who was not God. However, in the contexts in which people bowed down before the Lord Jesus, they clearly recognized His power to heal and save them, which they would not have done if they did not consider Him to be God in the flesh. 

One thing to notice in many of these NT passages is that the Greek word proskuneo is used. NT scholar Richard Bauckham says the following concerning this issue:

"The evidence, therefore, suggests that Matthew uses proskunein in a semitechnical way for the obeisance that is due to Jesus, and emphasizes that it expresses the proper response to Jesus. It is true that the word proskunein, as well as the gesture it describes, could be used of reverence for human beings without any implication of idolatry (Matt. 18:26; Rev. 3:9; LXX Gen. 18:2; 19:1; 23:7,12; 33:6-7;1 Kgdms. 28:14; 3 Kgdms. 2:19; Isa. 45:14, etc.). But a large majority of Septuagintal uses of the word refer to the worship of God or false gods, and the gesture had become highly suspect to Jews in contexts where the idolatrous worship of a human being or an angel might be implied (Add. Esth. 13:12-14 [cf. Esth. 3:2]; Apoc. Zeph. 6:14-15; Philo, Decal. 64; Legat. 116; Matt. 4:9; Luke 4:7; Acts 10:25-26; Rev. 19:10; 22:8-9; cf. also Mart. Pol. 17:3). Thus, whereas in Mark and Luke the gesture of obeisance to Jesus is probably no more than a mark of respect for an honoured teacher, Matthew's consistent use of the word proskunein, and his emphasis on the point, show that he intends a kind of reverence which, paid to any other human being, he would have regarded as idolatrous. This is reinforced by the fact that his unparalleled uses tend to be in epiphanic contexts (Matt. 2:2, 8, 11; 14:33; 28:9, 17). Combined with his emphasis on the presence of the exalted Christ among his people (18:20; 28:20), Matthew's usage must reflect the practice of the worship of Jesus in the church." (Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel: God Crucified and Other Studies on the New Testament's Christology of Divine Identity, pg. 131, link)

In particular, Matthew 4:10 shows that proskuneo was for God alone [this is in the story of Jesus being tempted by Satan in the wilderness]:

"Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written, “‘You shall worship [προσκυνήσεις] the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.’” (Matthew 4:10)

This is Part 1 of our discussion. In our next article in this series, we will examine some texts displaying prayers and doxologies being given to Jesus or in His name further showing that the early Christians clearly viewed Jesus as Yahweh God incarnate.