What Does It Mean That Jesus Is the "firstborn of All Creation"?
1) Direct answer
“Firstborn of all creation” means Jesus holds the place of preeminence and heirship over everything God made. It does not mean He is a created being. He is the visible image of the invisible God, and all things were made by Him, through Him, and for Him.
2) Scriptural explanation
- The Bible says, “Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: for by Him were all things created… and He is before all things, and by Him all things consist” (Colossians 1:15–17). If all things were created by Him and He is before all things, He cannot be one of the created things.
- It also says He is “the firstborn from the dead; that in all things He might have the preeminence” (Colossians 1:18). So “firstborn” speaks of rank and preeminence—He is Head over creation and Head of the new creation by resurrection.
- God calls the king “My firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth” (Psalm 89:27). “Firstborn” there clearly means highest place, not first one to exist.
- “God was manifested in the flesh” (1 Timothy 3:16). The body is the Son; the Life in Him is God. As to the flesh, Sonship began in time (Luke 1:35). As to the Life, He is the Word by whom all things were made (John 1:1–3,14).
- He is also called “the beginning of the creation of God” (Revelation 3:14)—the One in whom creation has its start and the One who begins the new creation by rising from the dead.
3) Simple clarifying logic
- If He created all things, He is not a creature. Creator and creation are not the same.
- “Firstborn” in Scripture often means the heir with preeminence. Israel was called God’s “firstborn” (Exodus 4:22) as a position, not because it was the first nation.
- So “firstborn of all creation” means He is the supreme Heir over it, and “firstborn from the dead” means He is the first to rise in immortality, bringing in the new creation and taking the Headship.
4) Reinforcing statement
Now notice… it’s not three persons. One God was manifested in flesh. The Son is the body God used, and in that body He took the rights of the Firstborn over all creation and, by resurrection, became the Firstborn of the new creation. That’s the mystery—preeminence, not creaturehood.
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What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
Identification
64-0216 §27
Now, this reflected his loving, noble character: God reflected in a man called Christ. He was only one that could do this. There was no other character in heaven could do it, see. It was God. He was the sinless nature. He was the Word---sinless nature of God. He was the Word expressed, which, the Word was the beginning. And if you are in the Lamb's book of life, you was God's expression from his thought. He seen you, and seen your desire, before there even was a atom or anything else. And you're his thought made wo...
An Exposition Of The Seven Church Ages
CAB 4:E-76
Look at the word, "destruction" over in II Thessalonians 1:9, "Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction." In the Greek, "destruction" positively means annihilation. And the word, "destruction", does NOT mean destroying. Now "destroying" means something going on and on in decay. So what can everlasting annihilation mean? It doesn't mean to keep on annihilating, or that would make the word "destroying", instead of "destruction". It means to destroy to the ending point. End it.
Questions and Answers on Genesis
53-0729 §10
Now, if God created man in His own image and in His own likeness, what kind of a man did He create? A spirit man. Now, if you'll notice, after He had made all the creation and created a spirit man, and close reading of this now (to the one that asked the question) we'll find this, that God gave dominion of the cattle and the fishes and everything to the man. But, in His making up there, He made man in His own image to lead the cattle, lead the beasts of the field, just like the Holy Spirit leads the believer today,...
Christ is the mystery of God revealed
63-0728 §85
Oh, if God can get Him prisoners like that! Now, that's when He can express the preeminence. You see? He's got the man or the person so that he knows nothing but Christ. You get what I mean? All right. That's secondly. First, to express Himself completely---God in Christ. Second, to have the preeminences by this in His church (which is His body, the bride) He could have the preeminence to express Himself through them. All right. And thirdly, to restore the kingdom to its rightly position that fell by sin by the fir...
An Exposition Of The Seven Church Ages
CAB 1:E-7
The importance of revelation by the Spirit to a true believer can never be over emphasized. Revelation means more to you than perhaps you realize. Now I am not talking about this Book of Revelation and you. I am talking about ALL revelation. It is tremendously important to the church. Do you remember in Matthew 16 where Jesus asked the disciples this question, "Whom do men say that I the Son of Man am? And they said, Some say that Thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets....