Remnant Seventh Day Adventist Church
Remnant Seventh Day Adventist Church
"And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God [Father] was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory." 1 Timothy 3.16
Our heavenly Father is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. Jesus Christ is a separate and distinct person. He is not a spirit; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as does Jesus. Yet, great is the mystery of godliness! Jesus Christ is our heavenly Father in human flesh. Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature. He came from heaven to show the Father to the entire universe. Colossians 1:15; 1 Timothy 3:16. Our Father loves us, not because of Jesus Christ, but He gave Himself to humanity in Jesus Christ because He loves us. None but God Himself could accomplish our redemption. According to 2 Corinthians 5:18-19, the Father not only redeemed us Himself in Jesus Christ, but has linked Himself with human beings by ties that are never to be broken. Jesus Christ bears His humanity before our Father's throne throughout eternal ages, "for which cause He is not ashamed to call us brethren" Hebrews 2:11
Human beings are near kinsman to one another of our human family. "And now it is true that I am thy near kinsman: howbeit there is a kinsman nearer than I." Ruth 3:12
Through disobedience, mankind was made captive by Satan, and would have forever remained as such had not a kinsman nearer than all specially interposed. Genesis 3:15 and Matthew 10:34-39. Jesus is our Sacrifice (Leviticus 17:11), our Advocate (Matthew 10:32), and all this that you may be treated as He deserves. What value has been placed on our humanity! By assuming our human nature, Jesus Christ elevated humanity to divinity. This thought has a subduing power upon the soul and brings the mind into captivity to the will of God.
For by Him were all things created...And He is before all things, and by Him all things consist. And He is the head of the body, the church...that in all things He might have the preeminence. For it pleased the Father that in Jesus Christ should all fulness dwell. Colossians 1.16-19. If Christ made all things, He existed before all things. Jehovah Immanuel, the eternal, self-existent, uncreated One, Himself the source and sustainer of all, is alone entitled to supreme reverence and worship. Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved. Acts 4.12. Jesus says, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man comes unto the Father, but by me. John 14.6.
The humanity of the Son of God is everything to us. It is the golden chain that binds our souls to Christ, and through Christ to God. This is to be our study. God was a real man; He gave proof of His humility in becoming a man. When we approach this subject, we would do well to heed the words spoken by Christ to Moses at the burning bush, "Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place where on thou standest is holy ground." You must come to this study with the humility of a learner, with a contrite heart. And the study of the incarnation of Christ is a fruitful field, which will repay the searcher who digs deep for hidden truth!
Divinity and humanity were mysteriously combined, and man and God became one. That God should thus be manifest in the flesh is indeed a mystery; and without the help of His Holy Spirit you cannot hope to comprehend this subject. The most humbling lesson that man has to learn is the nothingness of human wisdom, and the folly of trying, by your own unaided efforts, to find out God.
Jesus voluntarily assumed human nature. It was His own act, and by His own consent. He clothed His divinity with humanity. He was all the while as God, but He did not appear as God. He divested Himself of the form of God, and in its stead took the form and fashion of man. He walked the earth as man. For our sakes He became poor, that we through His poverty might be made rich. He laid aside His glory and His majesty. He was God, but the glories of the form of God He for awhile relinquished. He yielded up His life a sacrifice, that man should not eternally die. He died, not through being compelled to die, but by His own free will.
Not even by a thought could Christ be brought to yield to the power of temptation. Satan finds in human hearts some point where he can gain a foot-hold; some sinful desire is cherished, by means of which his temptations assert their power. But Christ declared of Himself, "The prince of this world cometh, and has nothing in Me." The storms of temptation burst upon Him, but they could not cause Him to swerve from His allegiance to God. He shared the lot of man; yet He was the blameless Son of God. His character is to be ours. Entire justice was done in the atonement. In the place of the sinner, the spotless Son of God received the penalty, and the sinner goes free as long as he receives and holds Jesus Christ as his personal Savior. Though guilty, he is looked upon as innocent. Christ fulfilled every requirement demanded by justice.
Many claim that it was impossible for Christ to be overcome by temptation. Then He could not have been placed in Adam's position; He could not have gained the victory that Adam failed to gain. If we have in any sense a more trying conflict than had Christ, then He would not be able to succor us. But our Saviour took humanity, with all its liabilities. He took the nature of man, with the possibility of yielding to temptation. We have nothing to bear which He has not endured.... In man's behalf, Christ conquered by enduring the severest test. For our sake He exercised a self-control stronger than hunger or death.
"God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son." John 3:16. He gave Him not only to bear our sins, and to die as our sacrifice; He gave Him to the fallen race. To assure us of His immutable counsel of peace, God gave His only-begotten Son to become one of the human family, forever to retain His human nature. This is the pledge that God will fulfill His word. "Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon His shoulder." God has adopted human nature in the person of His Son, and has carried the same into the highest heaven.
If men reject the testimony of the inspired Scriptures concerning the deity of Jesus Christ, it is in vain to argue the point with them; for no argument, however conclusive, could convince them. "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." 1 Corinthians 2:14. None who hold this error can have a true conception of the character or the mission of Christ, or of the great plan of God for man's redemption.
