“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning” John 1:1.
We are now in Easter week – the greatest week of the Christian’s year. The Son of God suffered as sinless man on the cross in our stead. We don’t follow a creed of a denomination or a religious system – we follow a person – Jesus Christ. How important to have a balanced perspective on who he is! The bible describes him as fully human but also describes him as fully God. Through church history, people have swung to both sides – some seeing him as only man, some as only God and some as a combination of the two resulting in a third entity. Entire movements are committed to these kinds of interpretations and history has recorded much discussion, heresy, church splits and religious wars.
The bible describes Jesus as fully human. Born of a virgin as a human baby, he grew tired and experienced the full range of emotions from anger to tears. He was hungry, he agonized, he bled and he died on a cross. In every way he was truly human like you and I are. The difference was that he lived without sin.
But the bible also describes Christ as divine. Jesus said that ‘before Abraham was, I am’ John 8:58. He could heal people and he could calm the storm with a word. In fact, the reason he was put to death was because of his claim to divinity (“They all asked, ‘are you the son of God?’ He replied, ‘You are right in saying I am.’ Then they said, ‘Why do we need any more testimony? We have heard it from his own lips” Luke 22:70,71).
These two natures reside fully in him – they do not combine and form some kind of third nature. He is fully God and fully man at the same time. This is called the hypostatic union(hypostasis = existence, reality). Certainly this enters the realm of mystery – we can’t explain it fully.
But we do know that if Jesus was only human, born of the seed of man, then he was born in sin and was unqualified to restore humankind’s lost dominion. He would fall and Satan would retain his dominance over the human race through sin.
If he was only divine, he was also unqualified to retrieve humankind’s freedom from sin, for as it was lost by a human, it could only be restored by a human. “…just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous” Romans 5:18,19.
His two natures are described in his name: Jesus Christ. Jesus is a human name – a derivative of Joshua meaning ‘he saves.’ There are many people named Jesus in the world today – always be clear on who you are praying to! Christ is a divine name – the Greek equivalent of Hebrew Messiah – the anointed one – the promised Saviour.
Our Alliance statement of faith says this: "JesusChrist is true God and true man. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He died upon the cross, the Just for the unjust, as a substitutionary sacrifice, and all who believe in Him are justified on the ground of His shed blood. He arose from the dead according to the Scriptures. He is now at the right hand of the Majesty on high as our great High Priest. He will come again to establish His kingdom of righteousness and peace.”
CHRIST IS RISEN! HE IS RISEN INDEED!
Pastor Leon Throness
