A couple of weeks ago, Carl was asked during his teaching on man and
woman to define Gnosticism. Unfortunately Carl’s teaching on the doctrine of
man and woman went longer than expected and with the baptism scheduled directly
afterwards he did not have time to give a clear definition. So for completeness I will state the
definition here before I start since it fits rather well with today’s topic of
Jesus being fully God and fully man.
Gnosticism was a second century heresy
claiming that salvation
could be gained through secret knowledge. Gnosticism is derived from the Greek
word gnosis, meaning "to know." Gnostics
also believed that the material world (matter) was evil and that only the
spirit is good. They constructed an evil God and the Old Testament to explain
the creation of
the world (matter), and they considered Jesus Christ
a wholly spiritual God.
Gnostics were divided on Jesus. One view held
that Jesus only appeared to have human form but
that He was actually spirit only. The other view contended that Jesus’ divine
spirit came upon His human body at baptism
and departed before the crucifixion.
Christianity, on the other hand, holds that Jesus was fully man and fully God
and that His human and divine natures were both present and necessary to
provide a suitable
sacrifice for humanity's sin.
Be careful to not confuse the term Gnostic with
the term Agnostic. Whereas Gnostics
believed in an evil God and that the material world was evil and only the
spirit was good, Agnostics on the other hand claim that they do not know whether
any gods exist or not.
Now let’s move on to the doctrine of Jesus
being fully God and at the same time being fully man.
First we’re going to see what the Bible has to
say about Jesus being fully God. Paul
says that all things came into being through Jesus:
Yet for us there is but one God, the
Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one
Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live. – I
Cor. 8:6
Jesus
said that He was before Abraham:
“I tell you the truth,” Jesus answered, “before
Abraham was born, I am!”—John 8:58
Jesus also
said:
“Behold, I am coming soon! My reward is
with me, and I will give to everyone according to what he has done. I am the
Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.
“Blessed are those who wash their robes,
that they may have the right to the tree of life and may go through the gates
into the city. Outside are the dogs, those who practice magic arts, the
sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters and everyone who loves and
practices falsehood.
“I, Jesus, have sent my angel to give you
this testimony for the churches. I am the Root and the Offspring of David, and
the bright Morning Star.”—Rev. 22:12-16
The
apostle John claimed that Jesus was God when he wrote the first chapter of John:
In verse 1 he says, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God
and the Word was God.” John goes on to
say in verse 14, “and the Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us and
we beheld His glory, glory as the only begotten of the Father full of grace and
truth.”
Jesus refers to Himself 84 times in the
gospels as the Son of Man. This name refers to the prophet Daniel’s vision:
In my
vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a Son of Man, coming
with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into
his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples,
nations and men of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting
dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be
destroyed. – Daniel 7:13-14
And, we read the following in Acts:
But
Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God,
and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. “Look,” he said, “I see heaven open and
the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.”—Acts 7:55-56
Jesus had
the power to change the atomic structure of matter. He demonstrated this by turning
water into wine.
Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars
with water”; so they filled them to the brim. Then He told them, “Now draw some
out and take it to the master of the banquet.” They did so, and the master of
the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize
where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then
he called the bridegroom aside and said, “Everyone brings out the choice wine
first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink;
but you have saved the best till now.” This, the first of his miraculous signs,
Jesus performed at Cana in Galilee. He thus revealed His glory, and His
disciples put their faith in Him. –John
2:7-11
Jesus
also had power over the wind and the waves:
The disciples went and woke him, saying,
“Master, Master, we’re going to drown!” He got up and rebuked the wind and the
raging waters; the storm subsided, and all was calm. “Where is your faith?” he
asked his disciples. In fear and amazement they asked one another, “Who is
this? He commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him.”—Luke
8:24-25
Finally, Jesus had the power to forgive
sins and to read people’s minds and hearts:
When
Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”
Now some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, “Why
does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God
alone?” Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were
thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, “Why are you thinking these
things? Which is easier: to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or
to say, ‘Get up, take your mat and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of
Man has authority on earth to forgive sins ….” He said to the paralytic, “I
tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.” –Mark 2:5-11
Before we go on to see what the Bible has to say about
Jesus also being fully human I wanted to note that just about every major
religion in the world other than Christianity believes and teaches something
about Jesus. However, they don’t believe
and teach that He is the only God and that it is by faith in Him alone that a
person can be forgiven of their sins and have eternal life.
For example: Jews don’t believe that Jesus is God. Muslims don’t believe Jesus is God. Buddhists
don’t believe that Jesus is God. Jehovah Witnesses don’t believe that Jesus is
God. Mormons who follow the teachings of Joseph Smith don’t believe that Jesus
is God. Hindus view Jesus as just one more Avatar of God but they don’t’
believe that he is the one and only God. The people who are affiliated with the
Christian Science religion founded by Mary Baker Eddy don’t believe that Jesus
is God. The people that believe in Armstongism founded by Herbert W. Armstrong
(Philadelphia Church of God, Global Church of God and the United Church of God)
all deny the trinity and the original teachings say Jesus did not have a
physical resurrection). The Unification Church founded by Sun Myung Moon in
1954 don’t believe that Jesus is God. The members of the Church of Scientology
founded by L. Ron Hubbard in 1954 don’t believe that Jesus is God. (Top Gun and Mission Impossible actor Tom
Cruise was a big proponent of this religion until recently.)
The
Seventh Day Adventists founded by so called prophetess Ellen G White teach that
Jesus and the Archangel Michael are one and the same. They distort the passage in Jude 1:9 that
talks about the Archangel Michael not daring to rebuke Satan while arguing of
the body of Moses. People who are affiliated with the New Age movement don’t
believe Jesus is God. Roman Catholicism actually teach that Jesus is God but
they also teach that you have to do certain good works plus believe in Jesus to
inherit heaven and eternal life. As was stated earlier Gnostics didn’t believe
that Jesus was God and Agnostics don’t know what to believe so they simply say
that they don’t know if any gods exist. (It
should be noted that strong Agnostics go on to say that no one can know if God
exist.)
In
addition to being fully God, Jesus is fully man.
Jesus was born by way of a human mother.
This
is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be
married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with
child through the Holy Spirit.—Matt 1:18
Jesus grew up as every human does.
Jesus
increased in wisdom and stature in favor with God and man.—Luke 2:52
Jesus was tempted in all things.
Therefore,
since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus the
Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a
high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one
who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. Let us
then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy
and find grace to help us in our time of need.
– Heb 4:14-16
Luke 4:1-13
provides us with some details about some but not all of these temptations:
Jesus,
full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in
the desert, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing
during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry. The devil said to him,
“If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.”
Jesus
answered, “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone.’”
The devil
led him up to a high place and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the
world. And he said to him, “I will give you all their authority and splendor,
for it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to. So if you
worship me, it will all be yours.”
Jesus
answered, “It is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.’”
The devil
led him to Jerusalem and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. “If
you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down from here. For it is written: “‘He will command his
angels concerning you to guard you carefully; they will lift you up in their
hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’”
Jesus
answered, “It says: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
When the
devil had finished all this tempting, he left him until an opportune time.—Luke
4:1-13
Wayne Grudem, in his book Systematic Theology addresses the
question of “Were the temptations real?” with this response: “Many theologians
have pointed out that only he who successfully resists a temptation to the end
most fully feels the force of the temptation.
Just as a champion weightlifter who successfully lifts and holds over
head the heaviest weight in a contests feels the force of it more fully than he
who attempts to lift it and drops it, so any Christian who has successfully
faced temptation to the end knows that that is far more difficult than giving
in to it at once. So it was with Jesus
every temptation he faced, He faced to the end, and triumphed over it. The temptations were real, even though He did
not give into them. In fact they were
more real because He did not give into them.”
Although this is not a perfect analogy I think the
weightlifter analogy is a good one. I
have actually looked up the rules for weightlifting competitions and the rule that
stood out to me was the rule that says the lifter must hold the bar steady and
motionless in all parts of his body overhead with his feet in line with the
plane of the trunk until the Judges give the down signal. Similarly Jesus had to be tempted in the
dessert to the maximum in all things until God the Father the Judge gave him
the down signal. This took 40 days for
Jesus but more temptation was to come the night He was betrayed and the day
that He was crucified.
Jesus got tired from traveling and sat
down to rest in John 4:6:
Jacob’s
well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the
well. It was about the sixth hour.
Additionally, Jesus was regarded by people
in his home town as only a man
Coming to
his hometown, he began teaching the people in their synagogue, and they were
amazed. “Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers?” they
asked. “Isn’t this the carpenter’s son? Isn’t his mother’s name Mary, and
aren’t his brothers James, Joseph, Simon and Judas? Aren’t all his sisters with
us? Where then did this man get all these things?” And they took offense at
him. But Jesus said to them, “Only in
his hometown and in his own house is a prophet without honor.” And he did not
do many miracles there because of their lack of faith.—Matthew 13:54-58
Jesus also became thirsty just like we
do.
Later,
knowing that all was now completed, and so that the Scripture would be
fulfilled, Jesus said, “I am thirsty.” –John 19:28
Jesus had a soul and His soul left His
body after He died the same way our soul will leave our body after we die.
A jar of
wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a
stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus’ lips. When he had received
the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave
up his spirit. –John 19:29-30
Jesus’s soul was reunited with his body
when He was raised on the third day. This body, although now immortal, was a
real body of flesh and blood like ours are (and will be). Jesus even ate fish in
order to show the disciples He was not a ghost.
He also showed them the holes in His hands and in His feet.
They were
startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. He said to them, “Why are
you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my
feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones,
as you see I have.” When he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet. And
while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked
them, “Do you have anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled
fish, and he took it and ate it in their presence. –Luke 24:37- 42
Now
Thomas (called Didymus), one of the Twelve, was not with the disciples when
Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!” But he
said to them, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where
the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe it.” A week
later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though
the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with
you!” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out
your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.” –John 20:24-27
Thomas
said to him, “My Lord and my God!” Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen
me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have
believed.” Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of his
disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you
may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you
may have life in his name. –John 20:24-31
Let’s pray.
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