Mark Tabata’s Weekday Devotionals
Friday, October 16 2026
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Matthew 24:24-For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.
One of the great teachings of the Bible is that Jesus is the Son of God. This has been made abundantly clear in both the Old and New Testaments.
Proverbs 30:4-Who has ascended into heaven, or descended? Who has gathered the wind in His fists? Who has bound the waters in a garment? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is His name, and what is His Son’s name, If you know?
Isaiah 9:6–For unto us a Child is born, Unto us a Son is given; And the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
John 3:16-For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
1 John 4:9-10-In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
When studying with our Muslim neighbors, it is important to realize what they believe the phrase “Son of God” means when disciples of Christ use it.
Ibn Kathir understood Muhammad’s teachings. Muhammad taught that Christians held the doctrine that God took Mary as His wife or concubine, impregnated her, and as a result she later gave birth to Jesus. The Quran challenges, “Allah could not have had a son because he took no wife.” Later in Medina, Muhammad, still not understanding the Christian doctrine of Jesus’ sonship, continued to speak out against the idea that God had fleshly relations with Mary: And they say: Allah hath taken unto Himself a Son. Be He glorified! Nay, but whatsoever is in the heaven and the earth, His. All are subservient unto Him. The Originator of the heavens and the earth! When He decreeth a thing, He saith unto it only: Be! and it is (2: 116-117). Again Ibn Kathir comments on the Quran’s rejection of Jesus’ sonship: This and the following Ayat refute the Christians, may Allah curse them, and their like among the Jews and the Arab idolators, who claimed that the angels are Allah’s daughters. Allah refuted all of them in their claim that He had begotten a son… All creatures are Allah’s servants and are owned by Him. Therefore, how could one of them be His son? The son of any being is born out of two comparable beings. Allah has no equal or rival sharing His grace and greatness, so how can He have a son when He has no wife? 8 Ibn Kathir refers to a union of flesh to produce offspring. Since there was no woman comparable to Allah then Allah could not have taken a wife to have relations with. Note here that in all of these verses a physical union (with Mary), is presented and rejected by the Quran. Muhammad countered that concept and said that Allah only needed to speak “Be” and in that fashion Mary conceived miraculously. Muhammad did not understand the very essence of Christianity. His knowledge of Christianity seems to be flawed and inaccurate, that is, that a follower of Jesus believes that God had sex with Mary! This is contrary to what the Bible teaches. We believe that Jesus, in eternal relationship with God, took upon Himself human form. (Josh McDowell, Jim Walker, Understanding Islam and Christianity: Beliefs That Separate Us and How to Talk About Them, 66-67 (Kindle Edition): Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers)
What does the phrase “Son of God” actually mean? The answer lies in recognizing that the phrase “son of” often had a metaphorical use in the Bible.
(b) huios is used metaphorically to denote membership of a particular group of people (e.g., “heirs [lit., sons] of the prophets,” Acts 3: 25; “son of a Pharisee,” 23: 6). “Son of man” can denote membership in the human race (Mk. 3: 28; Heb. 2: 6; see “ho huios tou anthrōpou, the Son of Man,” below). huios can denote participation in a greater whole: “children of the resurrection” (Lk. 20: 36), “sons of the kingdom” (Matt. 13: 38), “sons of light” (Jn. 12: 36; cf. 1 Thess. 5: 5), “sons of the evil one” (Matt. 13: 38), “child of the devil” (Acts 13: 10), and “Sons of Thunder” (Mk. 3: 17). (Verlyn D. Verbrugge, New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology: Abridged Edition, 569 (Kindle Edition): Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan)
Rhodes provides more detail.
Such an understanding is based on a faulty conception of what “Son of…” meant among the ancients. Though the term can refer to “offspring of” in some contexts, it carries the more important meaning, “of the order of.”[ 23] The phrase is often used this way in the Old Testament. For example, “sons of the prophets” meant “of the order of prophets” (1 Kings 20: 35). “Sons of the singers” meant “of the order of singers” (Neh. 12: 28). Likewise, the phrase “Son of God” means “of the order of God,” and represents a claim to undiminished deity. Ancient Semitics and Orientals used the phrase “Son of…” to indicate likeness or sameness of nature and equality of being.[ 24] Hence, when Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, his Jewish contemporaries fully understood that he was making a claim to be God in an unqualified sense. Benjamin B. Warfield affirms that, from the earliest days of Christianity, the phrase “Son of God” was understood to be fully equivalent to God.[ 25] This is why, when Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, the Jews insisted: “We have a law, and according to that law he [Christ] must die, because he claimed to be the Son of God” (John 19: 7, insert mine). Recognizing that Jesus was identifying himself as God, the Jews wanted to put him to death for committing blasphemy (see Lev. 24: 16). Scripture indicates that Christ’s Sonship is an eternal Sonship.[ 26] It is one thing to say that Jesus became the Son of God; it is another thing altogether to say that he was always the Son of God. We must recognize that if there was a time when the Son was not the Son, then, to be consistent, there was also a time when the Father was not the Father. If the first person’s designation as “Father” is an eternal title, then the second person’s designation as “Son” must be so regarded. Seen in this way, Christ’s identity as the Son of God does not connote inferiority or subordination either of essence or position. (Ron Rhodes, Christ Before the Manger: The Life and Times of the Preincarnate Christ, 29-30 (Kindle Edition); Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock Publishers)
Saying that Jesus is “the Son of God” means that He is of the same Nature as God, not that He is the biological offspring of God via sexual intercourse.
Lord Jesus, thank You for revealing Yourself as the Son of God to mankind. We praise You! Help us to reach out with these truths to our Muslim friends and neighbors. Amen.
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