The claim deserves to be stated in its strongest form. Classical Christianity does not say that Jesus is a human person alongside a divine person. It says that the eternal Son, the second person of the Trinity, assumed a complete human nature. In the language of Chalcedon, Christ is "one and the same Son" acknowledged "in two natures," without confusion or division. The "who" is the person of the Son; the "what" is divine and human. On this account, when Jesus prays, grows, suffers, dies, or says "my God," these are not denials of his deity. They are true acts and experiences of the incarnate Son according to the human nature he assumed.
This is not a weak or evasive argument. It belongs to the central grammar of orthodox Christology, and it has been defended by major Christian theologians from Athanasius and Augustine to Thomas Aquinas, Calvin, and modern Nicene and Chalcedonian theologians. It also arises from real biblical pressures. The New Testament does not merely present Jesus as a prophet who speaks for God. It also contains texts that are naturally read in a very high Christological way: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (John 1:1); Thomas addresses the risen Jesus, "My Lord and my God" (John 20:28); Hebrews 1:8, in its dominant rendering, says of the Son, "Your throne, O God, is forever and ever"; Titus 2:13 has a Greek construction that gives real grammatical support to the reading "our great God and Savior Jesus Christ"; and Romans 9:5 is a genuinely significant text, because its most straightforward construal in many translations calls Christ "God over all, blessed forever," though the punctuation and referent of the doxology are debated. Any reading of the "God of Jesus" texts that ignores these passages is incomplete.
The classical argument
The argument is usually framed like this. Jesus Christ is one uncreated divine person who has taken to himself a real human nature. As man, he worships, obeys, prays, suffers, and dies. As God, he is the eternal Son, the Word through whom all things were made. Therefore, statements such as "my God" belong to the incarnate economy: the Son speaks as man, or with respect to his human nature, without ceasing to be God.
This distinction is used to explain a wide range of New Testament data. Luke says Jesus "increased in wisdom and in stature" (Luke 2:52). Mark 13:32 says that concerning the day or hour, "no one knows," not even the Son. Hebrews says he "learned obedience through what he suffered" (Hebrews 5:8). On classical terms, these are not statements about the divine nature becoming ignorant, mutable, or dependent. They are statements about the incarnate Son living a genuinely human life.
The same logic is then applied to texts where Jesus identifies the Father as his God. In John 20:17, the risen Jesus says, "I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God." In Revelation 3:12, the exalted Christ repeatedly says "my God." Paul blesses "the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ" (2 Corinthians 1:3; Ephesians 1:3), and prays to "the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory" (Ephesians 1:17). Peter likewise speaks of "the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Peter 1:3). The classical reply is that these statements are true because the Son has truly become man. The Father is the God of Christ according to Christ's assumed humanity, while the Son remains, according to his divine nature, consubstantial with the Father.
There is a real strength here. The New Testament itself distinguishes between what is said of Christ in humiliation and what is said of him in exaltation. Philippians 2:6-11 says that Christ was "in the form of God," yet took "the form of a servant," was obedient unto death, and was then highly exalted. Hebrews 2:14-17 says that he shared in flesh and blood and was made like his brothers in every respect. If these texts are read together with John 1:14, "the Word became flesh," then the Christian has a serious textual basis for saying that the incarnate Son can speak and act from within a real human condition.
What the argument establishes
The argument establishes at least this: the phrase "my God," by itself, does not prove that Jesus is a creature. If the incarnation is true, then it is not surprising that the incarnate Son worships and obeys the Father. A fully human life includes dependence on God. A Christ who never prays, never obeys, never trusts, and never calls upon God would not look like the New Testament's Jesus.
It also establishes that Christian theology has a principled way of reading both sets of texts: those that speak of Jesus in divine terms and those that speak of him in human dependence. The doctrine of the two natures is not invented merely to answer one verse. It attempts to account for the whole pattern: Jesus is worshiped, yet he prays; he forgives sins, yet he says he was sent; he is called God, yet he calls the Father his God; he is described as creator in texts like John 1:3 and Colossians 1:16, yet he dies.
A fair internal critique must acknowledge this. John 20:28 and Hebrews 1:8 are significant evidence for a high Christology, and Titus 2:13 and Romans 9:5 also deserve serious treatment rather than quick dismissal, even where their grammar or punctuation is debated. The "God of Jesus" texts do not automatically erase them. The question is not whether the two-natures explanation is possible within classical Christian theology. It is. The more precise question is whether it is the most natural reading of the biblical language, and what tensions remain even after the distinction is granted.
Where the reply is strongest
The reply is strongest when applied to features plainly connected with Jesus' earthly human life: hunger, fatigue, suffering, temptation, and death. The New Testament insists that the Son truly participated in human weakness. Hebrews 4:15 says he was "in every respect" tempted as we are, yet without sin. The Gospels portray him praying to the Father, submitting his will, and entrusting himself to God. In Gethsemane, he says, "Not what I will, but what you will" (Mark 14:36). On Chalcedonian assumptions, this is precisely what one would expect from the incarnate Son living obediently as man.
The reply also has force because Christian doctrine does not identify Jesus with the Father. Nicene theology says the Son is God, not that the Son is the Father. Therefore, when Jesus speaks to the Father, this is not God speaking to himself in the sense of one person pretending to address another. It is the Son addressing the Father. The New Testament's personal distinction between Father and Son is real and pervasive.
Hebrews 1 is a useful example of both strength and tension. In the dominant translation of verse 8, the Son is addressed as "God": "Your throne, O God, is forever and ever." Some interpreters have proposed the alternative rendering "God is your throne," but the direct address is the reading found in many major translations and has strong contextual support, especially because the surrounding chain of biblical quotations contrasts the Son with angels and applies royal Psalm language to him. This makes Hebrews 1:8 one of the strongest New Testament texts for the Son's divine status. Yet the next verse says, "therefore God, your God, has anointed you." The same passage can address the Son as "God" and speak of "your God." That is exactly the sort of text that drove Christians toward more careful distinctions. A simplistic reading on either side fails: verse 8 cannot be brushed aside, but neither can verse 9.
Where the reply is limited
The limitation is that the biblical text does not explicitly formulate the sentence, "The Father is the God of Jesus with respect to the human nature the Son assumed." That is a theological inference drawn from reading these passages together with incarnation texts and high-Christology texts. It may be a legitimate inference, but it is not the immediate wording of the passages themselves. In John 20:17, the speaker is the risen Jesus: "my Father and your Father, my God and your God." In Revelation 3:12, the exalted Christ says four times, "my God." In Ephesians 1:17, Paul calls the Father "the God of our Lord Jesus Christ." These are not merely statements about an abstract human nature considered apart from the person. They are statements about Jesus Christ, the Lord, in relation to God.
This matters because, in ordinary biblical grammar, natures do not pray, worship, obey, or say "my God." Persons do. Classical theologians know this, which is why they say the person of the Son performs human acts according to the human nature. But once that is granted, the question "Who is the God of Jesus?" is not simply a category error. Jesus himself uses personal language: "my God." Paul uses personal language: "the God of our Lord Jesus Christ." The question asks about a relation predicated in Scripture of the personal subject, Jesus Christ.
The category distinction can clarify how a divine person may truly live as man. It does not make the personal language disappear. The incarnate Son is the one who says "my God." The strongest Christian answer is not, "The question is meaningless," but rather, "The Father is the God of the incarnate Son according to the human nature the Son assumed." That is coherent within Chalcedonian theology. But it remains an interpretive claim placed over texts that, on their face, present the Father as the God of Jesus Christ.
There is also the issue of exaltation. Some "God of Jesus" language occurs after the resurrection and exaltation, not merely during Jesus' earthly humiliation. John 20:17 is spoken by the risen Christ. Revelation 3:12 is spoken by the glorified Christ. Ephesians 1:17 refers to "our Lord Jesus Christ" in a context that goes on to describe his exaltation above every rule and authority. This does not refute the two-natures doctrine, since classical Christianity holds that the Son remains incarnate after the resurrection. But it weakens any reply that treats "my God" language as only a temporary feature of earthly lowliness.
The Father as "God" in the New Testament
A further internal observation is that the New Testament most commonly uses "God" for the Father, while distinguishing Jesus as Lord, Son, Christ, or mediator. This is clear in passages like 1 Corinthians 8:6: "for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist." This text should be handled carefully. On one level, it preserves a distinction: "one God, the Father" and "one Lord, Jesus Christ." On another level, many Christian scholars who defend early high Christology argue that Paul is not excluding Jesus from the divine side. Richard Bauckham, for example, argues that Paul includes Jesus in the unique divine identity by placing him on the Creator side of the Creator-creature distinction; other scholars note that the language may echo the Shema while identifying Jesus with the "one Lord."
But even on that high reading, the structure remains significant: "one God, the Father" and "one Lord, Jesus Christ." The New Testament does not speak as though "God" and "Jesus" are interchangeable labels in every respect. It regularly preserves an ordered relation: the Father sends, the Son is sent; the Father gives, the Son receives; the Father raises, exalts, and glorifies the Son; the Son obeys and glorifies the Father. This observation should not be overstated, because the New Testament also gives the Son extraordinary roles in creation, judgment, life-giving, and divine honor. Classical Trinitarianism interprets the ordered pattern as eternal relation of origin and economic mission, not as creaturehood or inferiority of essence. Still, the pattern is real and should not be minimized.
What it does and does not prove
The "God of Jesus" texts do not, by themselves, prove that Jesus is a mere creature. They are compatible with an incarnational reading when they are interpreted within the two-natures framework and alongside the wider high-Christology texts. They also fit a central Christian claim: the Son truly became man, and as man he lived in faithful dependence on God.
But they do establish something important. The New Testament presents the Father as the God of Jesus Christ in repeated and personal language, including after the resurrection. The attempt to dismiss the question "Who is the God of Jesus?" as a simple category mistake is too quick. Scripture itself predicates "my God" of Jesus' own speech and "the God of our Lord Jesus Christ" of apostolic confession. The category distinction may explain how Christians can affirm this while also affirming the Son's deity, but it does not remove the fact being explained.
The result is an internal tension, not an easy contradiction. The same New Testament that gives Christians John 20:28, Hebrews 1:8, Titus 2:13, and Romans 9:5 also gives them John 20:17, Revelation 3:12, and Ephesians 1:17. Classical Christology is an intellectually serious attempt to hold these together: one person, two natures; divine Son, real man; equal in deity, dependent in incarnate mission. What it establishes is not a verbal quotation from a single verse, but a coherent theological synthesis that tries to account for all the relevant data. What it does not establish is that the biblical language itself answers the question in exactly those terms. "With respect to his human nature" is a doctrinal formulation drawn from synthesis, not the immediate wording of the "my God" texts.
For that reason, a careful critique should avoid two extremes. It should not claim that every reference to the Father as Jesus' God instantly disproves the deity of Christ. That ignores the strongest New Testament evidence and the logic of incarnation. But it should also not allow the person-nature distinction to flatten the biblical pattern. The risen and exalted Jesus can still say "my God." Paul can still call the Father "the God of our Lord Jesus Christ." Any doctrine of Christ's deity must make room for that language without explaining it away.