In a July blog post, I wrote that we are here on earth to seek Jesus. This search matters because it is only through relationship with Jesus that we are able to find and live out our true purpose in life.

As we seek to know Jesus, we begin to understand how deeply Jesus desires to know us – both our minds and our hearts. At some point, He asks each of us to answer this question:

“”But what about you?’, He asked. ‘Who do you say I am?’” Matthew 16: 15

Jesus poses this question to His disciples in the region of Caesarea Philippi, shortly before the Passover and His subsequent Crucifixion. Simon Peter immediately replies: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Matthew 16: 16

Why is Jesus asking this question of His disciples? These men have walked away from their lives to follow Him. Doesn’t this outward behavior confirm that they believe Jesus is the Christ? Have the disciples not already professed their faith in Him? Yes, and yes!

But Jesus wants to go deeper with His disciples – and with us. He is keenly aware that while some people may honor Him with their lips and by following the Commandments, their hearts remain far from Jesus. (Matthew 15: 8-9)

Consequently, Jesus wants to know what each one of us believes about Him, deeply and privately within our minds and our hearts. Hence His very personal question, “Who do you say I am?”

Jesus was completely human – religious and non-religious scholars agree that He physically existed on earth. But Jesus also claimed to be the Divine Love of God made flesh:

“’I and the Father are one.’” (John 10: 30)

And Jesus proclaimed to be the resurrection:

“Jesus said to her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?’” John 11: 25-26

It is His Divinity that Jesus asks each one of us to contemplate. Do I believe He is the Son of God?

As the venerable C. S. Lewis observes, Jesus intends for each one of us to answer this question with decisiveness:

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’ That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic – on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg – or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God; or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that door open to us. He did not intend to.”1

If you are unable to decisively answer Jesus’ question today, let this be the moment that you resolve to find your answer.

Jesus tells us that our eternal destiny hinges on how we answer His question:

“But He [Jesus] continued, ‘You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. I told you that you would die in your sins; if you do not believe that I am the one I claim to be, you will indeed die in your sins.’” John 8: 23-24

Stay near to Jesus and make time to answer His question. This will change your life in unexpected and profound ways.

Pray for us, O Holy Mother of God, that we may draw ever nearer to Jesus. Breathe into us, O Faithful Holy Spirit, a full comprehension of who Jesus is, and enable us to receive the precious gift of eternal life that Jesus offers to each one of us.

1 C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (California: HarperCollins San Francisco, a Division of HarperCollins Publishing, 2001), 52.