the shadow of the cross

To identify with Jesus creates a divide between two opposing worlds.  Even before his birth this divide was signalled.  An angel came to Mary, a virgin betrothed to Joseph, and said,

Luke 1:28-33 (ESV)
“Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!” But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.” 

Mary’s response to the angelic announcement is submissive faith

Luke 1:38 (ESV)
“Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.”

She rejoices in her privilege and in faith exults that future generations will call her blessed.  How much she grasped at this point that her own generation would despise  her as a fornicator is not clear but despise her they did.  Thirty odd years later people still remembered that Jesus was born ‘of fornication’ (Jn 8:31).  Mary’s reputation was in tatters and would never really recover.  Joseph too would forever be a cuckold husband.  In a shame culture (foreign to us today) such ignominy was hard to live with, especially for godly people innocent of wrongdoing.

But such is ever the cost of the Christ.  He forces a choice between reputation on earth and reputation in heaven.  He presses upon those he calls a divide between the approval of two opposing worlds.   His call always costs this world for those who submit.  Mary’s (and Joseph’s) world was turned upside down.  The shadow of the cross was over them before the son who would die upon it was even born.  The message to all who would follow Mary’s Son by faith accepting his Messianic identity was plain – do so and the world will always look at you askance.

Mary embraced the shame and like her son and Lord despised it.  She did so because of the joy of the coming Kingdom that she saw by faith.  She was content to be of no reputation for God had exalted her  And so her soul magnifies the Lord.  She believes his promises and rejoices in his salvation.  She treats as realized what is yet to come.

Luke 1:46-55 (ESV)
And Mary said, ​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​“My soul magnifies the Lord, ​​​ ​​​​​​​​and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, ​​​ ​​​​​​​​for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant. ​​​​​​​For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed; ​​​ ​​​​​​​​for he who is mighty has done great things for me, ​​​​​​​and holy is his name. ​​​ ​​​​​​​​And his mercy is for those who fear him ​​​​​​​from generation to generation. ​​​ ​​​​​​​​He has shown strength with his arm; ​​​​​​​he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts; ​​​ ​​​​​​​​he has brought down the mighty from their thrones ​​​​​​​and exalted those of humble estate; ​​​ ​​​​​​​​he has filled the hungry with good things, ​​​​​​​and the rich he has sent away empty. ​​​ ​​​​​​​​He has helped his servant Israel, ​​​​​​​in remembrance of his mercy, ​​​ ​​​​​​​​as he spoke to our fathers, ​​​​​​​to Abraham and to his offspring forever.” ​​​

In the face of a cold disapproving world this is ever the way to stand firm and triumph – the assertions of faith.  This is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith (1 Jn 5:4).  Faith gives assurance of things hoped for and  evidence of things not seen (Hebs 11:1).  In the words of Peter,

2Pet 1:3-4 (ESV)
His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.

in the likeness of sinful flesh… (1)

Matt 11:27 (ESV)
All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father…

For some reason, blogs I’ve been dropping into recently often seem to be discussing the humanity of Christ.  Unfortunately, most conversations are unsatisfactory.  There are a couple of reasons for this.

• A lack of basic reverence

The first thing that needs to be remembered by all of us when considering the person of Christ is we are reflecting on what is most holy.  Yes, it is possible to be unduly unctuous, however, this is not our modern failing.  Some comments I read by evangelicals are less than respectful.  Many are quite gung-ho in speculating about our Lord’s person in a way that the NT writers’ clearly would have considered presumptuous, if not prurient or profane.

The modesty of   Jesus was stripped from him at the cross to his great shame, it is a tragedy if  out of sassy speculation or in the interests of a provocative one-liner we are  just as happy to expose him.   And so, I repeat, let’s make sure we treat Christ with reverence and respect; he is not our mate but our Lord.  He is not a specimen to examine but a divine person to worship and fear.   Let’s be chary in discussing personal and private aspects about him we would be slow to discuss about ourselves.  Let’s remember Moses was commanded to take off his sandals at the burning bush; he was on holy ground.  In the OT, casual attitudes to holy things (non-levites touching the ark even for a supposed good reason) led to instant death.    And if, as Jude informs us, false teachers face trouble for speaking out of turn about Satan (Jude 8,9) we can be sure indelicacy about Christ will not pass unjudged.

Regrettably, all too often online reflections about the humanity of Christ by evangelicals are not only inappropriate they are also inaccurate.

• starting from a wrong base

When reflecting on Christ’s humanity commonly commentators start from one of two assumptions; Christ had either a fallen humanity, like us, or an unfallen humanity, like Adam, before he sinned.  To be fair, among evangelicals, fewer voices declare that Christ had a fallen humanity like us even though, as Donald McLeod observes, ‘It has become a virtual truism of recent scholarship that ‘Christ’s human nature was indeed the same fallen human nature as ours’.  Some evangelical scholars of course do, especially those influenced by Karl Barth.  Barth (and Edward Irving a century before him) believed that although Christ remained sinless (and Barth with Irving is emphatic on this) his humanity was nevertheless fallen.   It must be so, they reasoned, if he is to be ‘like us in every respect apart from sin’.

More commonly, among evangelicals, the assumption is that Christ’s humanity was like Adam’s before the fall, unflawed but fallible.   Of course, those who so assume also assume they understand what unfallen fallible humanity was really like, a rather presumptuous assumption.   However, it is quite wrong to assume Christ’ humanity was either fallen or unfallen (or fallible).  Scripture certainly never so describes it.

Now I hear the sirens alerting us to the danger of docetism, not a  ‘hard docetism’ (that Christ’s humanity was merely phantom), but ‘soft docetism’ , a kind of evangelical docetism, where Christ’s divinity, as one blogger puts it, ‘eclipses his humanity’.  This is definitely a warning to heed, nevertheless I suspect there is also a bit of a bogey-man at work here that is in danger of allowing all sorts of edgy and erring notions about Christ’s humanity to invade evangelical thinking out of fear that objecting may brand us as docetic.  Docetism, in my view, is hardly the danger for educated evangelicalism today, quite the opposite.

I don’t intend at this point to delve greatly into these assumptions about Christ’s humanity.  Only to repeat that in my view both are mistaken.  Paul takes great care to point out that  Christ did not come in sinful flesh (fallen humanity) but in the ‘likeness’ of sinful flesh (Roms 8:3).   His humanity was similar to ours but not identical to ours.  Paul tells us the natural man  (the fallen man)  cares nothing for the things of God.  They are foolishness to him (1 Cor 2:14).  His mind is hostile to God’s God and will not submit to God’s law , indeed it cannot (Roms 8:7,8).  The fact is, a fallen nature by biblical definition means a corrupt nature, a nature inherently sinful.  The suggestion that such was/is the core humanity of Christ is blasphemy and the exact opposite of the clear statement of Scripture which tells us Christ’s delight was to do the will of the one who sent him (Ps 40:9, Hebs 10:5-8).  Christ we must affirm was not merely free of actual sin, he was free of inherent sin, of original sin.

But what of an ‘unfallen’ human nature, Adam’s before he sinned?

On the face of it, it seems much more plausible to identify the humanity of Christ as that of Adam before he sinned.  After all Christ is a son of Adam (Lk 3:28).  There is and must be real continuity between Adam and Christ.  He is ‘the seed of the woman’ (Gen 3:15) who at the time God ordained was  ‘born of a woman’ (Gals 4:4).  To accomplish salvation he had to be ‘made like his brothers in every respect’ and so  ‘as the children share in flesh and blood he took part in the same’ (Hebs 2:14).  If Christ’s humanity is not the same as Adam’s after the fall  then surely it must be Adam’s before he sinned?

But unfallen humanity will not measure up either.  Laying aside for a moment the whole question of our Lord’s deity (if this is even possible) we are still confronted with a humanity that is not merely Adam’s in the garden.  Adam, for example, had no ‘knowledge of good and evil’, but Jesus did.  Adam was not indwelt by the Holy Spirit, but Jesus was.  He was conceived of the Spirit (Matt 1:18); baptized in the Spirit (Matt 3:11); led by the Spirit (Matt 4:1); anointed by the Spirit (Matt 12:18); empowered by the Spirit (Matt 12:28); his words were words of the Spirit (Jn 6:63); he offered himself to God as a sacrifice by the eternal Spirit (Hebs 9:14).   He had the Spirit without measure (Jn 3:34).  Indeed he ‘sends’ the Spirit to others (Jn 15:26; 20:22).  And as I say, this is to say nothing of the fact that he is a divine person, the Word made flesh.  The NT invites us to distinguish between Christ’s incarnation and exaltation but it never tries to distinguish  his humanity and his deity (while distinct they are indivisible).  In Scripture these are a seamless robe.  Quite simply, to categorise Christ’s human nature as merely unfallen humanity is grossly inadequate.  Jesus’ humanity is connected to Adam but is not a mere copy of Adam.

There are about Christ’s humanity distinctions that imply discontinuity as well as continuity.  As Paul says,

1Cor 15:47-48 (ESV)
The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven. As was the man of dust, so also are those who are of the dust, and as is the man of heaven, so also are those who are of heaven.

I do not hesitate to say that any ‘theory’ about the humanity of Christ that does not take into account along with continuity this Pauline discontinuity has not sufficiently grappled with what the Bible reveals about the identity of the Christ.  The correlation between Adam and Christ is not precise.  Their correlation is that continuity/discontinuity story that dominates Scripture, the story of promise and fulfilment.   Christ is not a mere Adam, he is the ‘last Adam’ that is the final Adam.  Adam is the ‘type’ of which Christ is the ‘antitype’.  Adam is the anticipation of a humanity of which Christ is the realization.  Adam is the first creation and Christ is new creation. Christ is the new beginning.  He is from ‘outside’ from ‘heaven’.  It’s fair to say that the problem with much modern theology is it does not give sufficient weight to the issue of discontinuity, continuity has virtually eclipsed discontinuity, and the person of Christ is no exception.   Yet right at the outset, the virgin birth profoundly signals continuity and discontinuity must both be held in proper proportion and regard if we are to honour Christ.

But how can we find this proportion?

I entitled this section ‘starting from a wrong base‘ for a couple of reasons.  Firstly, to indicate that defining Christ’s humanity as merely Adamic humanity, either unfallen or fallen, is wrong, but secondly, and importantly, to signal  a ‘false base’ hermeneutically.  Mistakes are made about the person of Christ because theologians start with man-made assumptions, speculations and philosophies about the nature of Christ’s humanity rather than starting from what the Bible actually reveals.  Our task as Christians, in all areas of theology is to listen to revelation and nowhere is this more important than when considering the unfathomable enigma of he that ‘no-one knows but the Father‘ (Matt 11:27); if we are to know anything about Christ at all then we must listen carefully to what the Father says.  We must resist idle speculation, specious rationalization and submit humbly to revelation.

The problem with much modern theologizing about the humanity of Christ is that it is all too human, too fallen.

In a future blog we will consider the human Christ Scripture presents to us.

he shall save his people from their sins…

Matt 1:20-21 (ESV)
But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

Matthew places right at the heart of the Christmas story or incarnation its purpose, ‘He shall save his people from their sins’.  A plea to all preachers this Christmas, don’t stop at the cradle… get to the cross and the resurrection.  Show with hallelujahs how he saves his people from their sins.  Nothing less is gospel.

following the star and finding the king

Isa 60:1-22 (ESV)
Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.  ​​​​​​​​For behold, darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples; but the Lord will arise upon you, and his glory will be seen upon you.  ​​​​​​​​And nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising…  ​​​​​​​​Then you shall see and be radiant; your heart shall thrill and exult, because the abundance of the sea shall be turned to you, the wealth of the nations shall come to you… ​​​​​ They shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall bring good news, the praises of the Lord… ​​​​​​  ​​​​​​For the coastlands shall hope for me, the ships of Tarshish first, to bring your children from afar, their silver and gold with them, for the name of the Lord your God, and for the Holy One of Israel, because he has made you beautiful…

The sun shall be no more your light by day, nor for brightness shall the moon give you light; but the Lord will be your everlasting light, and your God will be your glory.  ​​​​​​​​Your sun shall no more go down, nor your moon withdraw itself; for the Lord will be your everlasting light, and your days of mourning shall be ended.  ​​​​​​​​Your people shall all be righteous; they shall possess the land forever, the branch of my planting, the work of my hands, that I might be glorified.

Isaiah 60 is a glorious vision of a future Zion.  Jerusalem was in ruins because she had been judged by God for her sins.  Israel was in exile.  Isaiah’s prophecy sees a day of coming glory and joy for Jerusalem, for Zion, for Israel.  It is a day when Jerusalem will no longer be despised and a disgrace but all the nations of the earth will bring their wealth to her like the Queen of Sheba brought her gifts to Solomon. Jerusalem will be glorious for the Lord himself will be her glory and her light.

Revelation shows us that the complete fulfilment of this prophecy awaits the Second Coming of Christ and the establishing of his final everlasting Kingdom.  John has a vision of this glory in Revelation 21.

Rev 21:1-27 (ESV)
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God…  Then came one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues and spoke to me, saying, “Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.” And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal…

And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be shut by day-and there will be no night there. They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations.

But Isaiah’s prophecy, like all OT prophecies that speak of the End, has a fulfilment in history.  For the End rightly began 2000 years ago.  The salvation of God that will result in a renewed universe suffused with the presence of God arrived with the birth of Immanuel, God with Us: then Israel’s light dawned; then the glory of the Lord appeared in her midst; and then the nations of the earth began to be drawn to this light and glory.

Matthew’s gospel makes this clear.  Matthew presents Jesus as Messiah, Israel’s King and Lover, the source of her glory.  In other gospels the Glory of Israel is first seen by Shepherds.  But Matthew does not mention the shepherds.  It is the wise men who are the first to come to Jesus.  It is the nations of the world who are first to recognise his arrival and come to worship.  Matthew writes,

Matt 2:1-12 (ESV)
Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him; and assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea, for so it is written by the prophet:

“‘And you, O Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.’”

Then Herod summoned the wise men secretly and ascertained from them what time the star had appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, “Go and search diligently for the child, and when you have found him, bring me word, that I too may come and worship him.” After listening to the king, they went on their way. And behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by another way.

In fact, while Israel is poised to reject and kill him if possible, the gentiles come to worship and rejoice at the birth of Israel’s glory, of Zion’s King first indicated in a rising star.  They announce to Israel the ‘good news’ of his birth (Isa 60:6).  They bring their wealth to him… gifts of gold and frankincense… and they rejoice in his birth.

Matthew’s narrative is a template for the course of history.  For though he comes to his own, his own do not receive him.  They, like Herod, wish to kill him, and eventually succeed.  Messiah is first worshipped and adored by gentiles.  It is the nations of the world who today delight in Immanuel and place their gifts of homage at his feet.  Meantime his own people continue to reject him.  Only when the full number of gentiles has been saved will Israel turn again in faith and rejoice in her deliverer (Roms 11).  Then Jew and Gentile together, Israel and the nations of the world, will be part of that city, the New Jerusalem, the bride of Messiah radiant with the ‘glory of God’.

All this is the inscrutable wisdom of God who decides that the last shall be first and the first shall be last.

Let’s make sure that we like the first gentile converts, the wise men, make every effort to find and worship the new-born King for therein lies our joy, our glory, and our salvation.

flesh and spirit in romans, and beyond (1)

We cannot properly understand Romans until we learn  it describes two realms of existence.  In fact, the Christian gospel, which is of course the theme of Romans, has not been truly grasped until it is seen as the story of two distinct and deeply different worlds.

Different images are used in the Bible to describe this distinction: nature and grace; natural and spiritual; old man and new man; Adam and Christ; ‘in Adam’ and ‘in Christ’; and especially, creation and new creation.  Romans does not use the more absolute and dramatic language of ‘new creation’ (Gals 6:15; 2 Cor 5:17) but does develop another way of saying pretty much the same; it speaks of  ‘flesh’ and ‘Spirit’.  This distinction is first mooted in the opening verses of the book.

Rom 1:1-4 (ESV)
Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord.

This text is clearly significant.  Paul signals, right at the outset of Romans, in this compressed summary of the gospel, that it centres on Christ and his two stages of humanity, flesh and Spirit.  By ‘flesh’ and ‘Spirit’, Paul is is not referring to Christ as he is essentially, that is, in his hypostatic union of humanity and deity, nor is he referring to Christ anthropologically, that is, psychosomatically, in his human composition as body and soul, rather he is referring to Christ redemptive-historically, that is, in his two spheres of existence as incarnate ‘Messianic-Son’, namely, his humiliation and exaltation; before resurrection, Christ is Son ‘according to the flesh‘ and upon resurrection, he is Son ‘according to the Spirit‘.

If we are to make any sense of the flesh/Spirit divide so important to Paul (and other NT writers) we must first consider it as Romans does, that is, Christologically, in terms of  Jesus.

Christ ‘in the flesh’

In doing so, however, a complication must be addressed.  For the distinction between old creation and new creation that applies to us does not apply in direct parallel with Christ. The parallel exists, but only with qualifications and contrast (rather like Roms 5:12-21).

• Firstly, in one profoundly important sense, Christ was from incarnation ‘new creation’.  He was always, not ‘Adam’ but ‘Christ’ (Roms 5), not ‘the First Man’ but ‘the Second Man’ (1 Cor 15:47).
• Secondly, although he came as the First of a New Creation he was also truly ‘ in the flesh’ (Jn 1:4; 6:51; Roms 8:3; 9:5; 2 Cor 5;16; Col 1:22; Hebs 2:14; 5:7; 10:20; 1 Pet 3:18; 1 Jn 4:2).  In a very real sense he was our ‘flesh and blood’.
• Thirdly, he was not ‘flesh’ in precisely the way we are.

‘Flesh’ in Scripture can convey a number of ideas.  Two are especially important.  One conveys the idea simply of being part of the first creation even in its primal state.  Animal and human life is simply ‘flesh’ (Gen 2:21; 1 Cor 15:39).  In this sense it conveys the weakness and frailty of humanity, whether living in Eden or beyond Eden (Ps 78:39; Roms 6:19).  However, ‘flesh’ often conveys the idea of fallen and rebellious humanity, humanity in opposition to God and under the power of sin, Satan, and death.  Christ became ‘flesh’ in the first sense but not in the second sense (though, as we shall, see even here some qualifications must be made).

Thus, although Christ is from incarnation God’s new creation humanity, ‘The Second Man, the Lord from Heaven’, yet he entered truly into our first creation humanity.  Scripture establishes this in a number of ways.  He is,  ‘the seed of the woman‘ (Gen 3:15) who ‘takes hold of the seed of Abraham‘ (Hebs 4:16), and is ‘born of a woman‘ and ‘under the Law‘ (Gals 4:4).  Significantly, we discover in each text cited he embraces our humanity that he may save humanity.  He became ‘the seed of the woman‘ that he may ‘bruise the head of the serpent’, that is, that he may overthrow Satan (Gen 3:15).  He lays ‘hold of the seed of Abraham’ for the same reason.

Heb 2:14-17 (ESV)
Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

He must identify with us if he is to deliver us.  And so he was born of a woman and under the Law to ‘redeem those who were under the law and all their lives subject to bondage’ (Gals 4:4,5). Scripture therefore takes great care to affirm that he was really part of our humanity – his body would weary, his mind tire and be troubled, and his emotions be in turmoil.  He even subjected himself  in some ways to the powers and authorities that rule ‘flesh’ – he lived in a world where the power of Satan, sin, death, and Law were active all around.  In various ways these impinged on him  – in temptation, weariness, opposition,  suffering, submission as a Jew to the Law, and finally submission to sin and death in the sense that he became sin and entered death (Roms 6:9,10; 2 Cor 5:21).   Yet, he was himself ‘without sin‘ (Hebs 4;14) and ‘knew no sin‘ (2 Cor 5:21).  Romans 8 sums up the ambiguity of the mediator’s ‘flesh’ well

Rom 8:3 (ESV)
For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh. (Cf Phil 2:7,8)

Notice again, his identification with us in ‘flesh’ is redemptive in aim.  Christ came in flesh, yet not sinful flesh, that in flesh, his crucified flesh, ”sin in the flesh’, may be condemned and die.  This is the profound mystery of the incarnation.  God’s Son, Israel’s  promised ‘seed of David’, the Mighty Warrior-King destined to destroy God’s and his people’s enemies came in flesh.  Yet the enemies he must destroy were far greater than Israel ever imagined; the greatest enemy was not outside the people, it was inside the people, it was the people itself.

‘Flesh’ itself, was the enemy that must be eliminated, the rebel that must be executed.  ‘Flesh’ must die for only in its death and the death of the old order of which it was an integral part was salvation possible.  And in Christ, that is precisely what happened.  He became real flesh, the only righteous flesh, that he may in death represent flesh, rebellious flesh, and so revoke flesh.  In his death the history of ‘flesh’ is finished.  But it is finished that a better humanity, a better life, and a better world may be born.  A world, humanity and life existing not in the weak realm of ‘flesh’ but in the powerful realm of ‘Spirit’.  Romans 1:3,4 is compressed further and echoed in the words of 2 Corinthians and of 1 Peter

2Cor 13:4 (ESV)
For he was crucified in weakness, but lives by the power of God.

1Pet 3:18 (ESV)
For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the Spirit.

Death is the transition of Christ from humiliation to exaltation, from flesh to Spirit, from weakness to power.  The two biblical realms of existence, ‘flesh’ and ‘Spirit’ find their bridge in Christ.  In flesh, incarnation, he came down to where we are in our weakness and death; in Spirit, resurrection and exaltation, he raises us to where he is in power and life.

And that is the subject of the next blog on this topic.

Mary’s love

John 20:11-17 (ESV)
But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”

It is the first day of the week.  During the Sabbath, the old covenant sign,  Messiah lay in a tomb, dead.  A more eloquent signal of the futility and finality of Judaism is hard to imagine.  But a new day has dawned.  The first of a new week, the first of a new creation.  And in the damp freshness of the breaking dawn two disciples and Mary Magdalene arrive at the tomb.

I won’t linger over the two disciples.  They find Jesus no longer there and leave.  They believe he is risen.  Mary stays.  She is disconsolate that the body of Jesus has gone.  When Jesus died all his disciples were bewildered and broken.  They had thought, as the two on the road to Emmaus said,  ‘it would be he who would restore the Kingdom to Israel’.  Dreams of restored national pride were shattered.  More personal and less worthy ambitions of position in the coming Kingdom died with their crucified leader.  The hearts of many were revealed.

Mary’s heart was true.  Mary loved Jesus.  She loved him not because he promised the arrival of God’s Kingdom in himself; not because he had cast from her seven demons, though those freed from much love much; not because Jesus honoured women in a culture which didn’t; and not because of what she stood to gain from him.  No doubt all these things made loving him easier but they don’t make sense of a forlorn woman beside the cross and a distraught woman looking for a missing body.  These reveal the heart of Mary.

Mary loved Jesus for himself.

Our world, corrupt as it is, sullies where it can.  We are told Mary’s love was sensual and romantic.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  When the angels ask why she weeps she replies, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” Jesus is not Mary’s lover, he is her Lord. Jesus in turn reveals his acute sense of who he is and his relationship with Mary when he says to her,

“Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”

On the face of it a strange statement but actually highly instructive.  Later Jesus will invite Thomas to touch him, here he warns Mary not to cling.  He is teaching Mary she must begin to relate to him in a different way.  She had known him as ‘Lord’ in his humiliation, his earthly life, now she must understand that this relationship has changed.  She will continue to know him, but not as Lord in rejection and humiliation but Lord in exaltation and glory.  She is about to discover a new way to cling to him, the way all believers in the new covenant cling, by faith to an enthroned and reigning King seated at the right hand of God. On the first day of the week a new creation has dawned.

The disciples for the first time in John’s gospel are called ‘brothers by Jesus (go tell my brothers…).  They, like Jesus, yet still distinct from Jesus, will know his God as their God and his Father as their Father. Previously, in John, Jesus knew the Father and revealed the Father.  His works revealed as he claimed that, ‘the Father is in me and I am in the Father.’ (Jn 10:38;14:10,11;.  Now that intimate relationship that Jesus knew as the incarnate son with his Father, he shares in resurrection with his disciples.  They too will know and reveal the Father.  They too will share in this relationship of intimacy. This resurrection relationship is what Jesus anticipates in John 17 when he says:

John 17:21 (ESV)
that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.

It is a relationship impossible before resurrection for it is a relationship requiring the indwelling Spirit.  That is why a little further down John 20 when a resurrected Jesus is among his disciples we read,

John 20:22 (ESV)
Jesus breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.

It was an anticipation of Pentecost.  Jesus was announcing the new age of the Spirit had arrived in his resurrection.   Now Mary will know an intimacy with Jesus she could not know prior to his death, an intimacy with her Lord in glory.

These verses should help us to understand that our spiritual union with Christ is not with Christ in his earthly life.  No such union was possible until Jesus was the sinbearer.  Our life in the Spirit is with a resurrected and ascended Christ.  Our life is hid with Christ in God (Col 3:3).  As he is (presently at the right hand of the Father and loved by him) so are we in this world (1 Jn 4:17), holy and without blame, before him (God the Father) in love (Eph 1:3).

Our righteousness, life, and fellowship is in and with a risen glorified Christ.  This is what Mary had to learn and what we must learn too.  When Mary truly grasped this her sorrow would turn into joy and her dismay into peace; hers would be a relationship of perfect love.  Similarly with us.

1John 4:13-18 (ESV)
By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.

just the gospel

The Gospel is the ‘good news’ to a world living on the apocalyptic edge that salvation is at hand.  It is the news of rescue.  It is the news that God himself has stepped in to avert catastrophe.  That is what the arrival at Bethlehem meant that first Christmas morning.  It was the arrival of  Immanuel – God with Us.  It was the arrival in humanity by a virgin womb of the One Scripture calls, ‘the Lord from Heaven’ (1 Cor 15), of the person the world would know as ‘Jesus’ for he would save his people from their sins.  It was the arrival of the Kingdom of God.

The OT spoke frequently of the coming Kingdom of God.  It would be the time when God stepped into history to end all evil.  He would visit a sin-torn world and establish righteousness and peace.  He would rescue his people.  His people we might expect would be the good people, the kind and just people, those who deserved to be rescued.  But no.  The rescue he plans will not only save his people from the evil in others, it will save them from the evil in themselves; he saves his people from their sins.  The promised Kingdom is one which righteouses the unrighteous.  Listen to the promise:

I bring near my righteousness; it is not far off, and my salvation will not delay; I will put salvation in Zion, for Israel my glory.” Isa 46:13

or again,

Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look at the earth beneath; for the heavens vanish like smoke, the earth will wear out like a garment, and they who dwell in it will die in like manner; but my salvation will be forever, and my righteousness will never be dismayed. Isa 51:6

The Kingdom of God that arrived at Bethlehem would usher in righteousness.  In later NT language, the Kingdom of God was the good news of God’s gift of righteousness.  In Romans, Paul uses this language to describe the ‘good news’:

And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness Roms 4:5

Notice the words.  ‘him [God] who justifies the ungodly’.  God who ‘righteouses the unrighteous’.  Now we might think this means, ‘God who changes the hearts of bad people and makes them into good people’.  That would be staggering enough.  But the text is much more shocking.   When he ‘righteouses the unrighteous’ he is not a spiritual heart surgeon who turns bad hearts good rather he is a judge who declares guilty people to be not-guilty.  Hear it again: the Moral Judge of the Universe passes a verdict that Evil people are Good, that the ungodly are godly; he declares unjust people to be just and declares they have no charges against them.

It seems wholly wrong.  Yet, if you think about it God must be able to do this if he is going to bring sinners into his Kingdom.  He is after all God.  He is holy, good and righteous.  However, whimsically we may hope that God could simply take evil people and work a kind of  moral transformation on them and so rescue them it simply won’t do.  What about all the evil of their past?  What about all their wrong?  What if one was a thief, or a murderer, a war criminal, or a paedophile; is it acceptable for the Universal Upholder of Justice to say, ‘forget what all these dreadful things you did, I forgive you,  I’m making you a good person now?  Can a good and just God simply forget justice?  What if those who believe and become his people have formerly been opposed to him?  What if they are people like you and me who in defiance of his rights as Creator have lived to please ourselves and ignored his claims?  Is anything more treasonous, more immoral or vile than a creature rebelling against his Maker?  If God is truly good and righteous and about to establish a righteous new world then he cannot simply forget the past and pretend it never happened.

No, what he must be able to do is deal with the past.  He must find some means by which he can declare guilty people innocent.

How he does this is the ‘good news’ story and its details must wait for another time.  But it begins with Christmas.  It begins with the incarnation.  It begins with an event so stupendous that heaven will not allow it to go unnoticed.  Luke records,

And… there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear. And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. (Luke 2:8-11)

The incarnation is the inception of God’s plan to justify the ungodly and that is ‘good news of great joy’ this Christmas morning.

the virgin birth – does it matter?

Kevin DeYoung has a very helpful blog on the importance of the virgin birth.  Give it a visit if you can.

incarnation

In his excellent book, The Person of Christ, Donald Macleod writes,

The virgin birth is posted on guard at the door of the mystery of Christmas; and none of us must think of hurrying past it. It stands on the threshold of the New Testament, blatantly supernatural, defying our rationalism, informing us that all that follows belongs to the same order as itself and that if we find it offensive there is no point in proceeding further.

the humble poor believe

The birth of Jesus occasions celebration.  At its event angelic hosts voiced their praise.  However, there were  few of earth’s mighty who celebrated.  Those with vested interest, even at his birth, were more intent on violence against him.  Luke especially among the gospel writers underlines for us it is largely the poor and insignificant who see and rejoice.  It is to shepherds, people of little consequence  in C1 Palestine, that the angel appears and the angelic host voice is revealed.  The invisible, pious old, Simeon and Anna, are those who ‘recognise’ the Christ-child and rejoice.

His soon to be aunt, Elizabeth, living in an unnamed town in the hills of Judah, rejoices.  Her unborn son, the  wilderness prophet John the Baptist who would live on locusts and wild honey expresses his delight by leaping in her womb.  Mary, his divinely-appointed mother rejoices, despite the stigma her pregnancy would inevitably bring.  Poor pious people celebrated while for others the event either passed them by or threatened.

What was then always is the way in God’s Kingdom.  It reverses all expectations.  As Mary observes in her Magnificat,

‘he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
land exalted those of humble estate;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.’ (Lk 1:51-53)

Perhaps the reason why the Gospel of the Kingdom is active and being believed in the many nations of the developing third world even as it wanes in the West lies just here.  We, the West, are the proud in thought and heart comfortable in our own conceits,  the mighty who are to be toppled, the selfishly rich who are sent away empty.