Argument

Sent One Cannot Be God Objection Defeater

Intro

A common challenge sounds simple: "The Bible says God sent Jesus. If God sent him, he cannot be God. You do not send yourself." Unitarian Christians, Muslims and many skeptics use it, and it can feel like a knockout because the Bible really does say, again and again, that the Father sent the Son.

The challenge works only if being sent proves you are a lesser kind of being. Ask whether that is true anywhere else. When a king sends his son to make peace, the son is still fully as human as the king. The sending tells you there are two people and one mission. It does not tell you what kind of being the son is. That has to be learned from what else is said about him, and the Bible says a great deal: the one who was sent "came out from the Father" (John 16:28), shared the Father's glory "before the world was" (John 17:5), and "came down from heaven" (John 6:38). You can only be sent from heaven if you were there first.

Fra Angelico, The Annunciation, fresco, c. 1440s, north corridor of the Convent of San Marco, Florence. Gabriel, "sent from God" (Luke 1:26), announces the moment when "God sent forth his Son, born of a woman" (Galatians 4:4). Image: public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

◎ See this page's graph and discover linked topics →

Cheatsheet

The 30-second reply:

Your argument needs one more premise: "whoever is sent by God cannot be God." Where does Scripture say that? Sending shows two persons and one mission, which is exactly what the Trinity teaches: the Father sends, the Son is sent. What the Son is comes from the rest of the text, and the rest of the text says he was with the Father before creation and came down from heaven. A man sent from God is still a man. A Son sent from God is what he was before he was sent.

The 60-second answer:

The Bible uses the same verbs for sending John the Baptist, the disciples, an angel and the Son. So the verb cannot by itself tell you the nature of the one sent; John the Baptist was fully human, and his being sent did not make him less human. The question is what the sent Son was before the sending. John answers it: the Son came out from the Father, came down from heaven, and asks for the glory he had with the Father before the world existed. Paul says God sent forth his Son and sent forth the Spirit of his Son. The parable of the tenants puts servants and the son in one sending sequence and still sets the son apart as the heir. If the Father sending the Son proves the Son is not God, then the Father loving the Son proves it too, and the Father giving the Son glory, and the Father speaking to him. You have proved two persons. The Trinity already teaches two persons, and a third.

Fast facts:

1. Hidden premise. "Whoever is sent cannot be God" appears nowhere in Scripture. The objection assumes it.
2. Same verbs, different natures. John 1:6 (a man sent from God), Luke 1:26 (an angel sent from God), John 20:21 (disciples sent), John 3:17 (the Son sent). Sending does not fix nature.
3. Sent from somewhere. John 6:38, "I am come down from heaven"; John 16:28, "I came out from the Father, and am come into the world"; John 17:5, glory "with thee before the world was."
4. The Spirit is sent too. Galatians 4:4 and 4:6 use the same verb for the Son and the Spirit; John 14:26 and 15:26.
5. Equal honour for the sent one. "That all may honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He that honoreth not the Son honoreth not the Father that sent him" (John 5:23, ASV). The sending clause and the equal-honour clause sit in one verse.

Counter-moves:

• If they say "a sender is always greater": a sender has the authority to send; that is an order of relation, and Trinitarian theology affirms it (the Father sends, the Son is sent). It does not show a difference of nature. See Father-Son Authority Asymmetry.
• If they cite John 17:3, "the only true God, and him whom thou didst send": see Unitarian Oneness Binitarian Objection Defeater, entry 4, and note the same prayer asks for the Son's pre-creation glory two verses later.
• If they invoke agency ("the agent is like the one who sent him"): agency explains why the Son speaks with the Father's authority. It cannot explain why the agent existed with the sender before the world, made the world, or receives the sender's honour.

Concessions:

• Granted: the Father sent the Son, and the Son did not send the Father. The order is real.
• Granted: the Son speaks of doing the will of the one who sent him (John 6:38). That is the obedience of the incarnate Son on his mission.

Closing line:

You have shown that the Father and the Son are two. Christians agree. Now show me where sending makes the Son something other than what he was in the Father's presence before the world began.

In full

The objection is an enthymeme. Stated fully: (1) God sent Jesus; (2) whoever is sent by God is not God; (3) so Jesus is not God. Premise (1) is common ground. Premise (2) carries the whole argument and is never defended from Scripture. It also trades on an equivocation in the word God: if "God" names the Father as a person, then "the sent one is not the sender" is trivially true and is Trinitarian doctrine; if "God" names the divine nature, then "whoever is sent lacks the divine nature" is the very point in dispute.

The positive case against premise (2) comes from the sending texts themselves. The Johannine sending language is paired throughout with descent and origin language (John 3:17; 6:38; 8:42; 16:28; 17:5), and Paul's exapesteilen in Galatians 4:4 is paired with a sending of the Spirit in 4:6 and, in Philippians 2:6-7, with a prior existence "in the form of God." Simon Gathercole (The Preexistent Son, 2006) argues that the Synoptic "I have come" sayings carry the same implication of prior existence. The patristic tradition from Augustine onward (De Trinitate II-IV) treats the missions of the Son and Spirit as the temporal extension of their eternal relations: the one who proceeds from the Father is the one who can be sent by him. On that account the sending reveals the divine persons in their eternal order.

The objection is also answerable on its own terms. The Second Temple principle of agency, "a man's agent is like himself" (Mishnah Berakhot 5:5), explains how a sent one can carry the sender's authority. Unitarian writers use it to show that Jesus can speak for God without being God. The principle is real and relevant, and it explains less than the texts require: an agent does not exist with his sender before creation (John 17:5), create the world (John 1:3; Hebrews 1:2), or receive the honour due the sender (John 5:23).

Grammar and hermeneutics

1. The sending verbs do not encode rank or nature. The Fourth Gospel uses two verbs, apostellō and pempō, more or less interchangeably for sending. John uses apostellō of John the Baptist ("a man, sent from God," John 1:6) and of the Son ("God sent not the Son into the world to judge the world," John 3:17). John 20:21 uses both verbs in one sentence: "as the Father hath sent me, even so send I you." A verb applied to a man, to disciples and to the Son cannot by itself establish the nature of the one sent.
2. Origin language travels with sending language. John 6:38 joins the sending to a descent: "I am come down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me." John 8:42 joins it to origin: "I came forth and am come from God; for neither have I come of myself, but he sent me." John 16:28 gives the whole arc: "I came out from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go unto the Father." The sent one has a location before the sending.
3. Galatians 4 sends two. Paul uses exapesteilen, "sent forth," of the Son (4:4) and again of "the Spirit of his Son" (4:6). If being sent forth proves non-deity, the Spirit of God is not God either, which the objector would need to accept.
4. The parable distinguishes servants from the son. In Matthew 21:34-38 the owner "sent his servants," then "other servants," then "afterward he sent unto them his son." The tenants recognise him as "the heir." One verb covers all three sendings, and the narrative still sets the son in a category the servants never occupy.
5. Equal honour sits in the sending verse. John 5:23 commands honour for the Son "even as" (kathōs) for the Father, and in the same breath calls the Father "the Father that sent him." The text holds sending and equal honour together without strain.
6. Read John 17:3 with 17:5. The prayer that calls the Father "the only true God" and Jesus "him whom thou didst send" asks two verses later for "the glory which I had with thee before the world was." An interpretation of 17:3 that rules out the Son's deity has to account for 17:5 in the same prayer.

Argument structure

Master objections

MO1: "The sender is always greater than the one sent. Jesus himself says the Father is greater (John 14:28)."

• A sender has the authority to send, and the Father's sending of the Son reflects a real order in the Trinity: the Son is from the Father, the Father is from no one. Order of origin is a relation between persons who share one undivided nature. John 14:28 has its own treatment in Unitarian Oneness Binitarian Objection Defeater (entry 6) and Father-Son Authority Asymmetry.

MO2: "Muslims also say Jesus was sent. The Quran calls him a messenger, and so does John."

• The Quran calls the Messiah "a messenger of Allah" (Quran 4:171). John's Gospel calls the sent Son the Word who "was God" (John 1:1), through whom "all things were made" (1:3), whom the Father glorified "before the world was" (17:5). The two sources share a word and disagree about the one it names. "Sent" settles nothing between them; the rest of the text does. See Muslim Objections to the Divinity of Christ.

MO3: "Trinitarians are reading preexistence into ordinary prophetic language. Prophets 'come from God' too."

• Prophets are sent from God in the sense of commission. John's Son is sent from heaven (6:38), from beside the Father (16:28), and returns to the glory he had with the Father before creation (17:5). Isaiah's commission ("Here am I; send me," Isaiah 6:8) begins on earth. The Son's begins in the Father's presence.

P1, the objection depends on an unstated premise

Affirmative case

1. Formalise the argument. "God sent Jesus, so Jesus is not God" is valid only with the premise "whoever is sent by God is not God." Without it the conclusion does not follow.
2. No text states the premise. The objector can produce texts that say the Father sent the Son. None says that sending excludes deity.
3. The premise fails in the human case. A human sent by a human remains human. Sending does not change the kind of being the one sent is.

Anticipated objections

1. "It is obvious. You cannot send yourself."
2. "The premise is implied by monotheism. If there is one God, and the Father sends, the one sent is someone else."

Rebuttals

1. Correct, and Trinitarian doctrine agrees. The Father does not send himself; the Father sends the Son. That establishes two persons. The objection now needs the further step from "someone else" to "something less," which is the unproved premise.
2. Monotheism counts gods. One God in three persons means the one sent is a distinct person sharing the one divine nature. The objection assumes that "one God" means "one person," which is the question at issue, so it begs the question. See Trinity.

Live-cite kit

• Scripture: John 1:6 (a man sent, still a man); John 20:21 (the Son sends as he was sent).
• Scholarly: Augustine, De Trinitate II-IV, on the sending of the Son and the Spirit.
• Aphorism: Sending counts the persons. The rest of the text names what they are.

Tactical notes

• Lead by writing the objection as a syllogism on the spot. The missing premise becomes visible.
• Do not let the conversation slide from "distinct from the Father" to "not God." Name the slide.
• What not to defend: that the Father and Son are the same person. That is Oneness teaching, and the sending texts count against it.

P2, sending establishes distinct persons and a mission

Affirmative case

1. The two-sense table.

2. Trinitarian doctrine predicts sending language. If Father and Son are distinct persons, one can send the other. Scripture's sending language is what the doctrine expects to find.
3. The reductio from love and speech. The Father loves the Son (John 3:35), speaks to the Son, glorifies the Son. Each relation requires two persons. If sending proves non-deity, so does loving, which no one argues.

Anticipated objections

1. "Sending implies subordination, and subordination implies inferiority."
2. "You are using later creeds to rescue the text."

Rebuttals

1. Obedience belongs to role; nature is a further question. A son who obeys his father is fully human. The Son's obedience on his mission (John 6:38) belongs to his role in the work of salvation; John 5:18 records that the same Son was heard as "making himself equal with God."
2. The distinction is in the text. John 1:1 already says the Word was "with God" (a second person) and "was God" (sharing deity). The creeds formalised what the prologue states.

Live-cite kit

• Scripture: John 1:1; John 5:18; John 5:23; John 3:35.
• Scholarly: Gregory of Nazianzus, Orations 29-30, on texts of sending and obedience.
• Aphorism: If sending proves he is not God, so does being loved.

Tactical notes

• Draw the two-sense table on paper if you can. The equivocation is easier to see than to hear.
• Pair the concession "the Father is the sender" with John 5:23 immediately, so the order and the equal honour arrive together.

P3, the sending texts presuppose preexistence

Affirmative case

1. Descent. "For I am come down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me" (John 6:38, ASV).
2. Origin and return. "I came out from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go unto the Father" (John 16:28, ASV).
3. Pre-creation glory. "And now, Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was" (John 17:5, ASV).
4. Paul's sequence. "God sent forth his Son, born of a woman" (Galatians 4:4): the Son is sent, then born. Philippians 2:6-7 supplies the before: "existing in the form of God, ... emptied himself, taking the form of a servant."

Anticipated objections

1. "Preexistence can be notional. Jewish texts speak of things existing in God's plan before creation."
2. "Coming from God is a way of saying 'commissioned by God,' as with John the Baptist."

Rebuttals

1. Notional preexistence does not ask for its glory back. A plan does not pray to be restored to "the glory which I had with thee." John 17:5 is first-person speech about a shared past.
2. John distinguishes the two. The Baptist is "a man, sent from God" (1:6); the Son "came down from heaven" (6:38) and "came out from the Father" (16:28). John 3:31 sets "he that cometh from above" over "he that is of the earth."

Live-cite kit

• Scripture: John 6:38; 8:42; 16:28; 17:5; Galatians 4:4; Philippians 2:6-7.
• Scholarly: Simon Gathercole, The Preexistent Son (2006), on the "I have come" sayings.
• Aphorism: You can only be sent from heaven if you were there first.

Tactical notes

• John 17:5 is the strongest single text; quote it slowly.
• What not to defend: that every "sent" text in the Synoptics proves preexistence by itself. Let John and Paul carry that weight. See Kenosis on Philippians 2 and why the emptying is a taking-on, which the codex holds against the strong kenotic theories.

P4, the agency model explains less than the texts say

Affirmative case

1. What agency explains. "A man's agent is like himself" (Mishnah Berakhot 5:5): a commissioned agent carries the sender's authority. This fits the Son speaking the Father's words (John 12:49).
2. What agency cannot explain. An agent does not share the sender's glory before creation (John 17:5), create the world (John 1:3; Hebrews 1:2-3), or receive the honour due the sender (John 5:23).
3. John's own audience. In John 5:18 and 10:33 the hearers understand Jesus to be claiming equality with God, and the text does not correct them.

Anticipated objections

1. "An agent can be honoured as the sender. Honouring the ambassador honours the king."
2. "Hebrews 1:2 means God made the ages for the Son, or through his plan for the Son."

Rebuttals

1. John 5:23 asks for the honour paid to the king himself. It commands that all honour the Son "even as they honor the Father." Isaiah 42:8 reserves God's glory: "my glory will I not give to another." An agent who receives equal honour is either more than an agent or the recipient of what God withholds from others.
2. Hebrews 1:3 rules out the weaker reading. The same Son is "the effulgence of his glory, and the very image of his substance, and upholding all things by the word of his power." A plan does not uphold all things.

Live-cite kit

• Scripture: John 5:23; John 1:3; Hebrews 1:2-3; Isaiah 42:8.
• Scholarly: Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel (2008), on creation and rule as marks of the divine identity.
• Aphorism: An ambassador carries the king's seal. He does not sit on the throne before there was a kingdom.

Tactical notes

• Grant agency first; it is a real feature of the texts. Then show its limit with John 17:5 and Hebrews 1:3.
• See Cumulative Case for the Deity of Christ, master objection 3, for the agency objection against the Old Testament case.

A note on Zechariah 2 and Isaiah 48

Two Old Testament texts are often cited as a divine sender and a divine sent one. In Zechariah 2:8-11 the speaker says "Jehovah of hosts hath sent me" and also "I will dwell in the midst of thee, saith Jehovah." In Isaiah 48:16 the speaker says "the Lord Jehovah hath sent me, and his Spirit." The identity of the speaker is disputed in both: many interpreters read the prophet himself, or the Servant, as the one speaking. They are useful supporting texts, best offered with that caveat, and the case above does not depend on them. See Two Powers in Heaven and Angel of the LORD for the wider Old Testament pattern.

Tactical opening and closing

Opening line: "Let's write your argument down. God sent Jesus. Whoever is sent by God is not God. So Jesus is not God. Where does the Bible teach the second line?"

Closing line: "Sending tells us there is a Father who sends and a Son who is sent. Scripture tells us where the Son was sent from: from the Father's side, from heaven, from the glory he shared before the world. That is the Son Christians worship."

Scholarship

Published academic works this page draws on, each matched to a publisher, index or library catalog record.

• Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel (2008). Open Library
• Simon J. Gathercole, The Preexistent Son: Recovering the Christologies of Matthew, Mark, And Luke (2006). Open Library

See also

• Cumulative Case for the Deity of Christ, the full case, including the agency objection
• Unitarian Oneness Binitarian Objection Defeater, John 17:3, John 14:28 and the other unitarian proof-texts
• Father-Son Authority Asymmetry, order of relation within the one divine nature
• Jesus Has a God Therefore Not God Objection Defeater, a sister objection built on the same person and nature confusion
• How Can Jesus Be God Objection Defeater, five predication objections with the same diagnosis
• Eternal Generation, the eternal relation that the temporal sending reveals
• Kenosis, Philippians 2:6-7 and what the emptying was
• Muslim Objections to the Divinity of Christ, the messenger objection in its Islamic form
• Trinity, one God in three persons