What does it mean that Jesus made Himself equal with God (John 5:18)?

This pointed declaration stirred up the Jews to murderous hatred for the two reasons stated in verse 18. He had broken the sign of the covenant in which they boasted, and He had coupled with His action the assertion that God was His Father; thus claiming equality with God. Verse 18, be it noted, is John's explanation of why the Jews sought to kill Him, and not his record of the explanation furnished by the Jews — though of course it may have been the explanation which they gave. It is therefore the comment of the Holy Spirit through John, and proves that in the Sonship of our Lord there is no thought of any kind of inferiority to the Father. On the contrary it is the assertion of equality.

Both the Father and the Son were working, not resting. "For this, therefore, the Jews sought the more to kill Him, because He not only broke105 the Sabbath, but also said that God was His own Father, making Himself equal with God" (verse 18). Nor were they mistaken, in this inference at least. For as He did expressly charge the healed man to do what He knew would bring things to a rupture, so He did not deny, but confess, that God was His own Father in a sense that was true of none but Himself. This is the truth; and the truth of all truths most due to God, and the turning-point of all blessing to man. By it the believer knows God, and has life everlasting; without it one is an enemy of God, as the Jews showed themselves that day and ever since. Hardened men, perversely, fatally blinded, who, in presumed zeal for His honour, sought the more to kill Jesus, His own Son, come in infinite love to make the Father known, and to reconcile man to God. But God is wise and infinitely good in His work; for in letting them prove their malice to the uttermost, when the due time was come, in killing Jesus, He proved His own love to the full in atonement, making Christ, "Who knew no sin, to be sin for us, that we might become God's righteousness in Him." (2 Cor. 5:21.) ℵD and other authorities, followed by Tischendorf [and Blass] omit οὖν, contrary to the rest [as W. and H., Weiss].

The Jews have eyes only for the violation of the ceremonial law and cannot accept a manifest miracle from God as justifying such a violation. The man seems willing enough to play into their hands. Indeed, he had been apparently so self-absorbed as to fail to discern who had healed him. The Lord will not however leave him, but seeks to reach his conscience; the warning He gives him evidently suggesting that all was not right in his soul. At once the poor man shows where his heart is by telling of the Lord to His enemies, and they persecute the Lord because of what they call His violation of the Sabbath. The Lord simply calls attention to the fact that some one else has broken the Sabbath and not Himself. Man's sin has broken God's rest, and ever since the fall — true on the Sabbath as on every other day — "My Father worketh hitherto and I work." Their own conscience should have bowed to this and owned the truth. Instead, they hate Him still more because of His announced Sonship to the Father. Unlike modern unbelievers, they saw that such a claim meant equality with God.

Then the Lord adds, "and I work". This brings into display the glory of His Person. Very rightly the Jews interpret this word of the Lord as meaning He was "equal with God". It was the assertion of His deity, and thus the revelation of the glory of His Person. It shows the equality of the Son with the Father, inasmuch as all that the Father does the Son does likewise. Moreover the Son does not work independently of the Father. All is done in perfect agreement as moved by the same thought and affection, for "the Father loves the Son and shows him all things that himself does".

Thus what had startled the Jews — the recent miracle — was but a small thing in comparison of what would indeed awaken their wonder. The Father, they acknowledged, raised the dead and quickened them*: true, and the Son quickens whom He will. But this involves power in His hands as Judge: for to bring up really from the dead those to whom death, as with men in general, is by divine sentence, means judicial power to reverse that sentence. This leads on to a most important consequence, as we shall see directly. In fact, the Father judges no one, but has committed all (final, definitive) judgment to the Son, giving Him honor such as belongs to the Father Himself; and indeed, necessarily, he who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father either: for He has sent Him. Such is the unity of the Son with the Father. It is a unity in Godhead; or else we are taught to give to a creature the honor due to God alone.

The Lord next singles out the immense miracle of resurrection. "For even as the Father raiseth the dead and quickeneth, so the Son also quickeneth whom He will; for not even the Father judgeth any one, but hath given all the judgment to the Son; that all may honour the Son even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father that sent Him" (verses 21-23). There can be no doubt that giving life to the dead befits and characterises God; but if the Father does so, no less does the Son, and this not as an instrument, but sovereignly: "the Son also quickeneth whom He will." He is a Divine Person as truly as the Father, in full right and power. But more: He alone judges.105a Judgment as a whole, and in all its forms, is committed to the Son by the Father, Who in this sense judges none, with the express aim that all should honour the Son even as they honour the Father. And so it really is; for they honour not the Father, but do Him despite who honour not His sent One, the Son. It is the Son on Whom, by the Father's pleasure, it devolves to judge; but we shall find that there is a moral reason for this which appears afterward. As it is, we learn that the Son quickens in communion with the Father, and that only He judges. Thus is His honour secured from all men, who are either quickened if they believe, or judged if they do not.

This equality is made clear by the Lord in many of His statements in this passage. For example, the capacity to do whatever the Father does in the same way that He does it (v. 19), to be able to be shown everything that the Father does (v. 20) and sovereignly to quicken whom He will (v. 21) are all attributes of one who is God and is therefore equal with the Father.

As a consequence, all are to ‘honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He who honours not the Son, honours not the Father who has sent him’ (v. 23). It is the great privilege of Christian believers to honour the Son and to worship Him no less than they honour and worship the Father. All those who do not willingly honour Him will certainly do so when they stand before Him to be judged.

But the Jews are the more incensed against Him in murderous anger because they knew that His claim of Sonship with the Father involves His equality with God (v. 17). Some who dare to profess Christianity today will deny this blessed fact, but the Lord does not deny it. Indeed, His following words emphasize and establish it unmistakably. How absolute is His double affirmative: “Verily, verily” or “most assuredly” (v. 19). What the Son was doing was in perfect co-ordination with the Father: it was impossible, because of His very nature, for Him to do anything independently of His Father. There can be no stronger claim of His equality and unity with the Father. What the Father was doing the Son also was doing. Those who resisted the word of the Son were resisting the Father.

The context (John 5:17-21) of the Lord's utterance, "The Father loves the Son," contains most weighty testimony to the personal glory of the Son. The Lord does not deny, but confesses the charge of the Jews that He "said that God was His own Father," for "the Son can do nothing of Himself save whatever He sees the Father doing: for whatever things He does, these things also the Son does in like manner." The Son does the same things as the Father and in the same manner. There was, therefore, absolute equality without independence.

"He had deigned to take the place of man, without forfeiting for a moment His divine nature and rights; and as such He disclaims the least shade of self-exaltation, or independence of His Father" (W.K.). There was perfect communion with the Father, for He does nothing apart from the Father, but does what He sees the Father is doing. Moreover, in exercising the divine function of giving life, the Son, equally with the Father, "quickens whom He will," acting in His own right.

But we have only, so far, considered part of verse 19. It proceeds, "For whatsoever things He does, these also does the Son likewise." Here then we have two statements which may be considered separately. One, that "the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do;" the other, He can do whatever the Father does, and so these statements contain a double truth. First, we see the place the Son has ever taken in relation to the Father, and this gives us an insight into the blessed relationships existing between the Persons of the Trinity—the Son has never acted apart from the Father. Secondly, that, at the same time, there is equality; He can do whatever the Father does.