John 2:19-Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.
Only God can raise Himself up from the dead. Jesus said He could raise Himself up from the dead. And He did raise Himself up from the dead. That makes Him God.
I am not able to die and raise my own self up neither can you. Jesus could and did. You have to be God to be able to physically die and raise yourself up. Jesus did. That makes Him God.
I believe that we must harmonize Jesus words with other scripture. Numerous scriptures show that Jesus didn't raise himself from the dead, but that he was resurrected by YHWH God his Father.(Romans 8:11; 1 Corinthians 15:15; Ephesians 1:20)
So how I would view John 2:19 is by examining the context of John 2:13-18 which show that Jesus had cleansed the literal temple at Jerusalem, routing from it those who were making it a place of merchanised, and as a result Jesus had been confronted with this question from the Jews: "What sign have you to show us, since you are doing these things?" Then at John 2:19 Jesus told them the sign which is the basis of the question the Jews asked. The Jews continued at John 2:20-22 saying: "This temple was built in forty six years, and will you raise it up in three days?' But he was talking about the temple of his body. When, though, he was raised up from the dead, his disciples called to mind that he used to say this."
This setting shows that Jesus wasn't talking about his physical body, but "he was talking about the temple of his body." The temple in Jerusalem that Jesus cleansed represented not Jesus alone but also the body-members over which Jesus is head. Just as the temple in Jerusalem was not made up of one stone, but many stones, so "the temple of Jesus body" has many stones, with Jesus as the foundation cornerstone: "You yourself also as living stones are being built up a spiritual house for the purpose of a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ."1 Peter 2:4-7. After the Jewish religionists rejected Christ the living stone and broke him down by death, on the third day thereafter YHWH God raised him up to become the chief cornerstone of the temple of living stones then under preparation. Jesus immediately appeared to his disciples and lifted them out of their despondency, built them up spiritually so that they could "offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God." That this building of "the temple of Jesus body" started then and continued through the years that followed is shown by Peter's use of the present tense when years afterward Peter said Christ's followers "are being built up a spiritual house."
Now with this broadened view of matters I return to the consideration of Jesus’ words, “In three days I will raise it up.” I can see from scripture how Jesus did start giving attention to the building up of the temple of living stones after his resurrection on the third day of his death. Yet it can be argued with some force, that since Jesus was to be the chief cornerstone and he was the firstfruits of the resurrection, the first one to be built up for use in the construction of the spiritual house or temple, we cannot eliminate Jesus entirely from this building work and apply the expressions concerning it to his followers only. Yet we cannot say that Jesus raised himself up from the dead, because he was dead, and I know myself from research and study of the scriptures the trinity doctrine, has been proved false by so many scriptures, and so it cannot be appealed to as a basis for saying he was dead only as Christ but alive as God, and so could, as God, raise himself up. Besides, as I have previously noted, John 2:22 specifically states that “he was raised up from the dead”, not that he raised himself. Is there any way, then, that we can understand and harmonize in a reasonable way Jesus’ statement that “in three days I will raise it up”, having it embrace his own resurrection as chief cornerstone as well as the building up of his followers as living stones?
There seems to be a reasonable explanation. When Jesus said, “Break down this temple, and in three days I will raise it up,” he was speaking in a predictive sense; not that he would raise himself up, but that he predicted that three days after he was broken in death by his enemies the temple of God would begin to be raised up, beginning with him as the head member of it. There are examples of this predictive use of a term elsewhere in the Bible, where an individual says he will do something, but he actually does not do it at all. It comes about only as a result of his action.
For instance, at Isaiah 6:9, 10, where YHWH God appears to Isaiah and says, “Go, and tell this people.” And then what does he say? He says: “Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed.” God didn't mean for Isaiah to actually go and fatten their hearts and stop up their ears and close their eyes to forestall any repentance; but he was predicting that that would be the effect of the message that Isaiah had been commanded to go tell the people, that the people themselves would show closed eyes and unhearing ears and fatty hearts, that they would not repent and turn to YHWH God for healing spiritually.
A similar usage is found at Ezekiel 43:3 where Ezekiel sees the vision of Jehovah coming to the temple, and says it was “according to the vision that I saw when I came to destroy the city”. But Ezekiel did not come to destroy Jerusalem; he came only to predict the destruction of the city by the Babylonians. Yet he spoke of himself as doing it. So in the same predictive sense Jesus could speak as though he was going to raise himself, yet actually he would be resurrected by YHWH God.
Then we also have that controversial text where it says YHWH God hardened the heart of Pharaoh. He said: “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt. But Pharaoh shall not hearken unto you.” (Exodus 7:3, 4) Now, YHWH God didn't harden the heart of Pharaoh, but he was predicting that Pharaoh’s heart would be hardened as a result of the message sent to him by Moses and Aaron, and that the repeated extension of God’s mercy to him would not soften him but would cause his heart to harden even more. It is not unusual for wicked men to interpret YHWH God's long-suffering as a sign of weakness and so become more set in their evil ways, thinking the time of reckoning will never come. This is shown by Ecclesiastes 8:11: “Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.”
There are a number of other Scriptures where one person is spoken of as doing a thing, not because he actually does it, but because he predicts it or it results from some action of his. So it is at John 2:19. Jesus’ words, “In three days I will raise it up,” were merely predicting that the temple would be raised up on the third day after his death on the torture stake, and YHWH God was the one who raised up the temple by first raising up the head member of it, the Lord Jesus Christ, and from then on, from that third day on, God used him to raise up all the other members of the temple class. (Zechariah 6:12) So through the Roman military the Jews broke down the chief and initial member of God’s spiritual temple, but on the third day YHWH God raised him as a spirit creature and chief cornerstone of the spiritual temple.