Christology 1 Class 3
Christology 1 Class 3 • Sermon • Submitted
0 ratings
· 5 viewsNotes
Transcript
In this class we are going to conclude our teaching on the Humanity of Christ and ask the important question: Whey was Jesus’ Full Humanity Necessary? Then we will conclude by glorying in the truth that Jesus will be a Man forever!!
A. Why was Jesus’ Full Humanity Necessary?
A. Why was Jesus’ Full Humanity Necessary?
Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Bible Doctrine 5. Why Was Jesus’ Full Humanity Necessary?
When John wrote his first epistle, a heretical teaching was circulating in the church to the effect that Jesus was not a man. This heresy became known as docetism
Serious - it was the doctrine of the Anti Christ
By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.
The Shakers story - Mary then the NEW LIGHT BAPTIST pastor becomes the leader and biggest abvancer of the shaker movement around the world. Shaker village.
The Baptist and the Shakers
After Ann Lee and James Whittaker died, Joseph Meacham (1742–1796) became the leader of the Shakers in 1787, establishing its New Lebanon headquarters. He had been a New Light Baptist minister in Enfield, Connecticut, and was reputed to have, second only to Mother Ann, the spiritual gift of revelation.[17]
Joseph Meacham
Known as "Father Joseph," Joseph Meacham had been a Baptist preacher in New Lebanon, NY, and a leader of the "New Light" religious revival, which sought an alternative to the Congregational Church.
In 1780, faced with the fading of the revival, he went to visit Mother Ann Lee and the Shakers at Niskeyuna.
He converted, along with his family and most of his congregation.
Mother Ann called him the wisest man to be born in hundreds of years, and prophesied that he would be the first American-born leader of the Shakers, which he became after the death of James Whittaker in 1787.
One of his first acts was to appoint Lucy Wright as co-parent, ensuring that women would continue to act in positions of spiritual leadership, and he named her as his successor.
He transformed the society from scattered groups of Believers living on family farms into organized communities divided into “orders,” or families, living in gospel order.
Father Joseph understood that maintaining celibacy was key to the stability and success of the community, so he established the separate, co-equal structure that guided most aspects of life and work among the Shakers, creating the hierarchy of elders, eldresses, and temporal managers.
He selected exemplary Shakers to become "First Parents" of new communities, modeled after the structure he created at Mount Lebanon which became the Center of Union for all Believers.
He also introduced choreographed dance to worship, and wrote one of the first works of Shaker theology, A Concise Statement of the Principles of the Only True Church....
Though Shaker theology and practices continually evolve, he conceived the foundation that helped the society to become the longest-lasting communal religious society in America.
Friends, this woman and this man are what John would call ANTICHRIST -
We can easily be led away if we do not have the Spirit of God. Even the Elect will believe the the lie because they did not believe the truth of the Word.
So, Christology is very important doctrine to the faith.
Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Bible Doctrine 5. Why Was Jesus’ Full Humanity Necessary?
The apostle John understood that to deny Jesus’ true humanity was to deny something at the very heart of Christianity, so that no one who denied that Jesus had come in the flesh was sent from God
7 reasons why Jesus’ full humanity was necessary
7 reasons why Jesus’ full humanity was necessary
1. For Representative Obedience
1. For Representative Obedience
Jesus was our representative and obeyed for us where Adam had failed and disobeyed. All humans after Adam showed the same inability to obey. The life of the patriarchs, Isreal, the church now.
The tempation of Christ and the testing in the garden are two very important parallels that show that JESUS IS OUR REPRESENTATIVE OBEDIENCE.
Is it not our obedience that saves us, it is Jesus’ record of perfect obedience as a man that brought us salvation.
Paul’s discussion on this is important to note as well:
Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.
Christ is the last Adam
Thus it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
Adam is the first man and Christ is called the Second man
The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven.
Jesus had to be man in order to be our representative and obey in our place!
2. To Be a Substitute Sacrifice
2. To Be a Substitute Sacrifice
If Jesus had not been a man, he could not have died in our place and paid the penalty that was due to us.
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.
Unless Christ was fully man, he could not have died to pay the pena
3. To Be the One Mediator Between God and Men
3. To Be the One Mediator Between God and Men
Because we were alienated from God by sin, we needed someone to come between God and ourselves and bring us back to him. We needed a mediator who could represent us to God and who could represent God to us.
For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,
In order to fulfill this role as a mediator, Jesus had to be fully man as well as fully God.
4. To Fulfill God’s Original Purpose for Man to Rule Over Creation
4. To Fulfill God’s Original Purpose for Man to Rule Over Creation
God put mankind on the earth to subdue it and rule over it as God’s representatives.
But man fell into sin.
putting everything in subjection under his feet.” Now in putting everything in subjection to him, he left nothing outside his control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him.
Jesus was able to win the right as a man for this rule because of his full obedience.
But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.
And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church,
The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne.
Jesus had to be man in order to fulfill God’s original purpose that man rule over his creation.
5. To Be Our Example and Pattern in Life
5. To Be Our Example and Pattern in Life
whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.
Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.
Paul tells us:
And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.
Moving to the goal for which God saved us:
For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
Peter also tells us that in suffering we are to consider Christ’ example:
For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps.
looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.
Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.
Jesus is also our example in Death. We are to become like him in this manner as well:
that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,
For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil. 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,
Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin,
Our goal should be to be like Christ all our days, up to the point of death, and to die with unfailing obedience to God, with strong trust in him, and with love and forgiveness to others.
Jesus had to become a man like us in order to live as our example and pattern in life.
6. To Be the Pattern for Our Redeemed Bodies
6. To Be the Pattern for Our Redeemed Bodies
Paul tells us that when Jesus rose from the dead he rose in a new body that was “imperishable…raised in glory..raised in power…raised a spiritual body.
So is it with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable; what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body.
This new body is a pattern for us...
But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ.
Paul uses an agricultural metaphor that likens Christ to the first sample of the harvest, showing that the other fruit from that harvest would look like.
We now have a physical body like Adam’s, but we will have one like Christ
Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven.
Jesus had to be raised as a man in order to be the “first-born from the dead”
THE PATTERN FOR THE BODIES THAT WE WOULD LATER HAVE.
7. To Sympathize As High Priest
7. To Sympathize As High Priest
For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.
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.
If Jesus had not been a man, he would not have been able to know by experience what we go through in our temptations and struggles in this life.
Because he was a man he is able.
B. Jesus Will be a Man Forever
B. Jesus Will be a Man Forever
Jesus did not give up his human nature after his death and ressurection, for he appeared to his disciples as a man after the resurrection, even with the scars of the nail prints in his hands.
So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.” Eight days later, his disciples were inside again, and Thomas was with them. Although 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, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.”
He had flesh and bones
See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.”
He ate food
And while they still disbelieved for joy and were marveling, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled fish,
Later he was taken up into heaven
and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”
Stephen later sees Jesus
And he said, “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.”
Paul as well
And he said, “Who are you, Lord?” And he said, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.
Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are not you my workmanship in the Lord?
John the apostle wrote over 40 years after Jesus died:
and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest.
and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength. When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he laid his right hand on me, saying, “Fear not, I am the first and the last,
He promises that one day we will drink wine again with his disciples in his Father’s Kingdom
I tell you I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.”
And invites us to the supper
And the angel said to me, “Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.” And he said to me, “These are the true words of God.”
Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Bible Doctrine 6. Jesus Will Be a Man Forever
Moreover, Jesus will continue forever in his offices as prophet, priest, and king, all of them carried out by virtue of the fact that he is both God and man forever.
All of these texts indicate that Jesus did not temporarily become man, but that his divine nature was permanently united to his human nature, and he lives forever not just as the eternal Son of God, the second person of the Trinity, but also as Jesus, the man who was born of Mary, and as Christ, the Messiah and Savior of his people. Jesus will remain fully God and fully man, yet one person, forever
English Standard Version Chapter 22
Whose Son Is the Christ?
41 Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them a question, 42 saying, “What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he?” They said to him, “The son of David.” 43 He said to them, “How is it then that David, in the Spirit, calls him Lord, saying,
44 “ ‘The Lord said to my Lord,
“Sit at my right hand,
until I put your enemies under your feet” ’?
45 If then David calls him Lord, how is he his son?” 46 And no one was able to answer him a word, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions.
In our next class we will look at the Divinity of Jesus Christ, also a very important part of the Nature of Jesus.
Our hymn of worship for this class is:
Praise the Savior
All my sin was so contagious
All my failing so outrageous
Says the Saviour, "I will pay this!"
Praise the Saviour, Jesus
I was lost once, full of hate then
If He left us who could blame him?
Says the Saviour, "I will claim them!"
Praise the Saviour, Jesus
Such a freedom! Who could earn this?
Who could pay for this forgiveness?
Says the Saviour, "It is finished!"
Praise the Saviour, Jesus
Praise the Saviour, praise the King
This our song, our song shall be!
Praise the Saviour, praise the King
This our song, our song shall be!
Praise the Saviour, praise the King
This our song, our song shall be!
Praise the Saviour, praise the King
Now, the Treasure of my whole life
I will stand soon by Your own side
Says the Saviour, "Welcome home child!"
Praise the Saviour, Jesus
Praise the Saviour, Jesus