Jesus Christ: Fully God, Fully Man

Romans 1:3–4 KJV (WS)

3 Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh; 4 And declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead:

Sermon Idea: Jesus Christ is fully God and fully man, making Him the only perfect revelation of God and the only sufficient Savior for mankind.

Purpose: The purpose of this sermon is to help people see Jesus clearly as fully God and fully man so that they will worship Him more fully, trust Him more confidently, and respond to Him more personally.

Introduction

Attention:

A lot depends on getting Jesus right.

You can be mistaken about many things in life and recover, but if you are mistaken about Jesus Christ, you are mistaken at the very center of the Christian faith.

Some people see Him as a great teacher.

Others admire Him as a moral example.

Some speak of Him as a helper, a healer, or a religious figure from history.

But the Bible will not let us reduce Jesus to anything less than He really is.

He is not partly God and partly man.

He is not merely like God, and He is not merely like us.

He is fully God and fully man.

And unless we understand who He truly is, we will never fully understand how He reveals God, how He understands our weakness, or how He is able to save our souls.

Need:

This matters to you because you need more than a religious example or a teacher with good advice.

You need someone who can truly show you what God is like, someone who really understands the weakness and pressure of human life, and someone who can actually bring you into a right relationship with God.

In other words, you need the real Jesus.

And when you see Him clearly as fully God and fully man, you will see why He is exactly the Savior your soul needs.

History:

Very early in church history, Christians had to defend the truth of who Jesus is.

Some groups denied that He was truly God, while others denied that He was truly man.

But the church, guided by Scripture, came to confess clearly that Jesus Christ is one Person with two natures, fully God and fully man.

That conviction was formally expressed in the early centuries of the church and became a defining statement of biblical Christology.

Interrogative: Why does it matter that Jesus Christ is fully God and fully man?

Transition: Only someone who was fully God and fully man could accomplish our salvation.

Body

Division #1 - Jesus is fully God, so when we look at Him, we see God.

Explain:

Jesus is God’s Son by nature, not merely by title.

Paul begins by saying, “Concerning his Son.”

That is important, because Jesus is not just another servant sent from God or another prophet speaking for God.

He is God’s Son in a unique and eternal sense.

The gospel begins with who Jesus is.

Before Paul tells us what Christ has done, he tells us whose Son He is.

When Scripture calls Him the Son, it does not mean Jesus came into existence at some point.

It speaks of His unique relationship with the Father and of His sharing in the divine nature.

That is why in John 5:18, the Jews understood that when Jesus called God His Father, He was making Himself equal with God.

In John 10:30, Jesus said, “I and my Father are one.” And in Hebrews 1:8, the Father says of the Son, “Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever.”

So when Paul says, “Concerning his Son,” he is not giving us a small title to admire.

He is telling us that the One at the center of the gospel is truly divine.

Jesus was openly declared to be the Son of God with power.

Paul goes on to say that Jesus was “declared to be the Son of God with power.”

That word “declared” does not mean Jesus became the Son of God at the resurrection.

It means He was openly marked out, powerfully shown, publicly revealed to be who He already was.

The resurrection did not make Jesus divine.

It unveiled His identity in a way no one could ignore.

During His earthly ministry, much of Christ’s glory was veiled beneath humility, rejection, suffering, and weakness.

He was born in lowliness.

He was despised and rejected of men.

He was crucified in apparent shame.

But when He rose from the dead, God publicly and powerfully declared, “This is My Son.”

You can hear that same testimony elsewhere in Scripture.

At His baptism, the Father said, “This is my beloved Son” in Matthew 3:17.

In Acts 13:33, Paul again connects the resurrection with the public declaration of Christ’s Sonship.

The point is clear: Jesus did not start being the Son of God at the resurrection.

The resurrection confirmed and displayed who He had always been.

Jesus reveals God because He is more than a man in David’s line.

Paul refers to Him as “Jesus Christ our Lord.”

That matters, because the One born in David’s line is not merely another descendant of David.

He is David’s Lord.

The title “Lord” is not just a polite religious label.

In the New Testament, it carries the idea of authority, rule, and divine majesty.

This is the One of whom Psalm 110:1 says, “The LORD said unto my Lord…”

Jesus Himself used that verse in Matthew 22:41–45 to show that the Messiah is more than David’s son.

He is also David’s Lord.

And Philippians 2:11 says that one day every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.

So Jesus shows us God because He is not merely sent by God.

He is the Son of God with power.

He is the Lord.

When we come to Jesus, we are not looking at a mere religious teacher.

We are seeing God revealed.

Illustrate:

A rough pencil sketch may give you an idea of what someone looks like, but an official portrait captures the subject with much more fullness and accuracy.

The Old Testament gave true glimpses of God through prophets, law, temple, and sacrifice.

But in Jesus, God is not sketched.

He is fully revealed.

Jesus is not one more partial glimpse of God.

He is the fullest revelation because He is fully God.

Argue:

Only God can fully reveal God.

Jesus is declared the Son of God with power.

Therefore, Jesus does not merely speak for God; He shows us God.

Apply:

Stop settling for a small view of Jesus.

Let Scripture shape your understanding of Him, worship Him as God, and trust that in Christ you are truly seeing the Father revealed.

This especially needs to be applied by the person whose worship is cold, whose doctrine is shallow, or whose idea of Jesus has been shaped more by culture than by Scripture.

Transition: But Jesus did not only come to show us God from above; He also came to enter our world from within.

Division #2 - Jesus is also fully man, so He understands our weakness

Explain:

Jesus truly entered human history.

Paul says that Jesus was “made of the seed of David according to the flesh.”

That roots Jesus in real human history.

He was not a spirit pretending to be human.

He entered a family line, a nation, and a covenant story.

He came into the world the way human beings come into the world.

He was truly born.

The phrase “seed of David” tells us that Jesus really descended from David’s line.

This was not a small detail for the Jewish mind.

God had promised David that one from his line would reign on the throne.

You see that promise in 2 Samuel 7:12–16.

You hear it echoed in Isaiah 11:1, where the Messiah is described as a rod out of the stem of Jesse.

Matthew 1:1 opens by calling Jesus “the son of David.”

And in Luke 1:32, the angel says that the Lord God will give unto Him the throne of His father David.

So Christ did not simply appear on the stage of history.

He stepped into the very storyline God had been unfolding for generations.

Jesus took real humanity, not just the appearance of humanity.

Paul says Jesus came “according to the flesh.”

That means He took on real human existence.

He had a real body, a real genealogy, and a real earthly life.

He did not merely look human.

He became man.

That phrase does not mean Jesus had a sinful nature in the sense of personal corruption.

Scripture is clear that He was fully human and yet without sin.

John 1:14 says, “the Word was made flesh.”

1 Timothy 2:5 calls Him “the man Christ Jesus.”

Hebrews 2:14 says that He partook of flesh and blood.

And Hebrews 4:15 tells us He was tempted in all points like as we are, “yet without sin.”

That means Jesus knows human weakness from the inside.

He knows hunger, exhaustion, grief, rejection, and suffering.

He did not save us from a distance.

He stepped into the reality of human life.

Jesus became one of us so He could stand with us.

The humanity of Jesus is not an interesting side note.

It is necessary to our salvation.

If He is going to save mankind, He must truly enter mankind.

He must become one of us.

That is why Hebrews 2:17 says, “it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren.”

Galatians 4:4 says He was “made of a woman, made under the law.”

Philippians 2:7–8 says He was made in the likeness of men and humbled Himself unto death.

So when we say Jesus is fully man, we are saying more than that He had skin and bones.

We are saying that He entered our world, stood in our place, and shared our condition.

He shares our weakness because He truly came near.

Illustrate:

A leader can shout instructions safely from the rear, but the soldiers trust a commander who steps into the danger with them.

He does not remain distant.

He enters the fight himself.

Jesus did not save us from a safe distance.

He entered our world, took on flesh, faced suffering, and walked among broken people.

Christ can sympathize with us because He came where we are.

Argue:

He cannot share our weakness unless He truly became one of us.

Jesus came in the flesh from David’s line.

Therefore, His sympathy is real because His humanity is real.

Apply:

Stop carrying your weakness as though Jesus cannot understand it.

Bring your sorrow, temptation, and weariness honestly to Him, because He truly entered our condition.

This especially needs to be applied by the suffering, discouraged, ashamed, and exhausted person who feels alone in the struggle.

Transition: And once we see that Jesus is both fully God and fully man, we begin to understand why He alone is able to save.

Division #3 - Because Jesus is fully God and fully man, He is the only One who is able to reconcile God and sinners together.

Explain:

Only a human Savior could represent us.

Paul says Christ was “made of the seed of David according to the flesh.”

That means He could truly stand where we stand.

To save men, He had to become man.

A substitute must be able to identify with the people he represents.

Jesus can stand in our place because He truly joined our race.

That is why Romans 5:18–19 speaks of the obedience of one man.

That is why 1 Corinthians 15:21–22 says that by man came the resurrection of the dead.

That is why Hebrews 10:5 says, “a body hast thou prepared me.”

If Christ were not truly human, He could not represent us.

But because He became man, He can stand for men before God.

Only a divine Savior could save us with power.

Paul also says that Jesus was “declared to be the Son of God with power… by the resurrection from the dead.”

A merely human savior might inspire us, teach us, or even die as an example.

But he could not conquer sin, death, and the grave.

Only the Son of God could do that.

The phrase “with power” points to open, triumphant divine power.

The resurrection was not merely a happy ending to a sad story.

It was the public demonstration that Jesus is the powerful Son of God.

Jesus said in John 2:19–21, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up,” speaking of His body.

In John 11:25, He said, “I am the resurrection, and the life.”

In Revelation 1:18, He says that He is alive for evermore.

So as man, He could die.

But as God, death could not hold Him.

Only a divine Savior could save us with that kind of power.

The God-man is the heart of the gospel.

Romans 1 begins by saying the gospel is “concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.”

That means the gospel is not first about principles, improvement, or religious effort.

The gospel is about a Person.

And that Person is fully God and fully man.

That is why 1 Timothy 2:5 says there is “one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.”

That is why 2 Corinthians 5:19 says “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself.”

And that is why 1 Peter 3:18 says Christ suffered for sins, “that he might bring us to God.”

This is why the doctrine matters so much.

Jesus brings us to God because He is able to represent us as man and able to save us as God.

He is not half-God and half-man.

He is fully God and fully man, and therefore He is the only sufficient Savior for sinners.

Illustrate:

A bridge only works if it truly connects both sides.

If it rests on one bank but never reaches the other, it is useless.

Christ is able to bring us to God because He belongs, as it were, to both sides.

He is truly God, and He is truly man.

He does not merely point across the gap.

He spans it.

Only the God-man could bring God and sinners together.

Argue:

A human Savior can represent us, but only a divine Savior can rescue us.

Jesus is both man according to the flesh and the Son of God with power.

Therefore, Jesus alone can bring us to God.

Apply:

Stop trying to come to God through your own effort, goodness, or religious activity.

Rest in Christ alone, because only the God-man can represent you and save you.

This especially needs to be applied by the guilty sinner, the anxious believer, and the religious person still trusting in self instead of the Savior.

Transition: So the question is no longer simply whether we understand this doctrine, but whether we are trusting the Christ this doctrine reveals.

Conclusion

Visualize

In the Endurance expedition, Shackleton’s men survived the ice not simply because they had a plan, but because they had a leader who was both with them in the trial and able to lead them through it.

That is why this doctrine matters so much.

Jesus is not only high enough to save as God, but near enough to understand as man.

And when that truth settles into the heart, fear begins to loosen, worship deepens, and the soul finds rest in Him.

Reiterate: Jesus Christ is fully God, to show us God; fully man, to share our weakness; and fully both to bring us to God.

Action: Do not settle for a small, distant, or incomplete view of Jesus; see Him as He truly is, trust Him for all that you need, and come to God through Him alone.

Appeal:

If Jesus Christ is fully God and fully man, then He is exactly the Savior you need.

He is great enough to reveal God to you, near enough to understand your weakness, and mighty enough to save your soul.

So stop trusting your goodness, your effort, your religion, or your intentions to make you right with God.

Turn from your sin, and place your faith in Jesus Christ alone.

He died for sinners, rose again in power, and He is able to bring you to God.

And if you already know Him, then stop carrying your burdens as though you are alone.

Come to Christ again with worship, confidence, and full dependence, because the God-man is still enough.