How to Begin to Show Young Children That Jesus is God

There is a story that may help you begin to expose a young child to the reality that Jesus was not just a good man or teacher but God.  Read Mark 2:1 – 12.  There are at least two things happening in this passage that points to Christ being divine.

First, in verse 8 Christ knows what the scribes were reasoning in their hearts.  He did not guess, he knew, it was not intuitive, the Greek is emphatic.  The word translated “knew” here is the same word translated “true knowledge” three times in 2 Peter 1:3 – 10.  You can ask your child how Christ could know what they were thinking in their hearts.  Then you can reinforce this with Psalm 139:4, God knows what we are going to say before we say it, He knows what we are thinking.  Since Christ did that with the scribes, He must be God.  Further, it is not the only place in scripture that Christ demonstrated this divine attribute.  In John 1:43 – 51, when Jesus met Nathanael, He told Nathanael that He had seen him when he was not present with Christ.  At that point Nathanael knew that Christ was God for the same reason stated above.

Second, the dialog on forgiving sins.  In verses 5 – 10 the scribes are scandalized because Christ forgave the sins of the paralytic.  They stated correctly that only God could forgive sins, and they held incorrectly that Christ was not God.  To prove that He was and that He had that authority, He healed the paralytic.

In this short story from the first part of Christ’s ministry are two clear evidences that Christ is God.  Additionally there are other interesting facets of Christ’s nature that one can share with one’s child, compassion, boldness, fearlessness, to name a few.