Christ Jesus referred to God as his Father, and as the Father of all who followed him. This claim of divine sonship infuriated the orthodox religionists of his day. They used this part of his teaching as a reason to have him crucified; they said Jesus claimed he was equal with God. This was not true. Jesus himself said that God was the Father and greater than the son.
But Jesus did recognize that it is necessary for each individual to learn his true relationship to God and then to work to prove it. The proof of sonship is won by struggling to conquer the errors that constitute mortal, material selfhood—which seems to the material senses to be our identity—and by establishing in thought and action our real nature, the spiritual likeness of our divine Parent. Victory over a supposed mortal nature is necessary and inevitable, and in Christian Science we understand this step-by-step progress into our perfect inheritance to be the atonement, the actual demonstration of our eternal unity with God.
Jesus taught that in reality man is always the safe, fully satisfied heir to the spiritual kingdom, to the unbounded goodness of God. He demonstrated this teaching by destroying conditions of sin and sickness. He even raised the dead. This theme recurred in Jesus' teachings: God, our Father, is good and loving, and man is the perfect likeness of the one and only creator; there is no other creator or creation.
