Secularists and
other religions will claim the man of Christ.
They will celebrate in the examples He gave us, but only focus on His
humanity. These people will speak of Him
in the same context as Gandhi, Mohammad, Buddha, and consider Him a great
teacher, maybe even a prophet. However,
these same people will then deny the deity of Christ. As C.S. Lewis explained;
Either this man
was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can fall at His feet and call Him Lord
and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a
great human teacher. He has not left
that open to us. He did not intend to.[1]
Who therefore is Christ and what is
important about Christology?
In
the New Testament there is ample evidence of Christ’s humanity. The Apostle John in his first epistle
addresses how he, and other witnesses, had “heard, seen, beheld, and handled
the Word of Life”.[2] Peter
speaks about Christ’s resurrection in his first epistle (1 Peter 1:3,
17-21). In his second epistle, Peter
stresses the fact that he and the others did not “follow cleverly devised
tales…but were eyewitnesses”.[3] The Gospels also give proof of the humanity
of Christ. Two of the four Gospels give
an account of Christ’s birth in Bethlehem and all four gospels give an account
of Christ’s death, burial and resurrection.
Even the Old Testament addresses the need for Christ to come in the flesh
(Gen. 3:15; Deut. 18:15-18, Isaiah 53). The
deity of Christ is probably the most problematic for most secularists and
theologians. Muslims and Jehovah
Witnesses will claim that Jesus never claimed deity, and the Jehovah Witnesses
have gone to great lengths to try to remove all claims of deity from their
particular translation. However, if one
is willing to look at the “I Am” statements in the Gospel of John they will see
Christ’s deity. In the New World translation
the major I am statements are left intact, an example: “Martha said to him: ‘I
know he will rise in the resurrection on the last day.’ Jesus said to her: ‘I
am the resurrection and the life…”.[4]
Other
key Scriptures are the “I AM” statements in John (John 4:26; 6:20, 35, 41, 48,
51; 8:12, 18, 28, 58; 10:7, 11; 11:25; 13:19; 14:6; 15:1; 18:5) These are just some of many Scriptures that
support the deity of Christ.
Even
in the Old Testament we see the deity of Christ. Dr. Outland speaks about four scriptures that
also identify the deity of Christ in the Old Testament.
Psalm 45 rejoices in one who is both
royal groom and eternal Ruler. Psalm 110
esteems the son of David who also towers over David as God’s final answer to
worldwide human rebellion. Isaiah 9
celebrates the birth of a child who, as our divine warrior and endless
benefactor, will advance David’s kingdom successfully and infinitely. Daniel 7
reveals heaven’s decree of worldwide, eternal authority conferred on a
celestial being who stands forth also as a man.[5]
People
who argue that Jesus could not be both fully-God and fully-man miss some key
aspects of Christology. Christ was
“tempted in every manner as we are” yet also claimed the “ability to forgive
sins” something only “God could do”.
Christ had omniscience as we see when he addresses Nathaniel, yet chose
at times to restrict His knowledge in the situation of the woman suffering from
a blood disease. Christ could be
fully-God and fully-man because He did not “empty Himself” of His deity, but
simply of His glory. The Hypostatic
Union is basically “the deity and humanity of Christ exist without confusion,
without change, without division, without separation”[6].
In Romans 7 the
Apostle Paul explains the purpose of Christ becoming incarnate to save
humanity. Because sin entered into the
world by a man, it was necessary for righteousness to also enter into the world
through one man.[7] This man had to be perfect, “tempted in every
area as we are yet without sin”[8]. The writer of Hebrews goes on to explain
that the “shedding of blood is necessary for the forgiveness”[9] of
sins. Jesus’ incarnation was necessary
so that the payment of sin could be paid to satisfy the Law.
When one
overemphasizes the deity of Christ it can devalue His sacrifice on the cross,
and the fact that He “emptied Himself” for the sake of mankind. To deny the deity of Christ brings into
question the very character of Christ, and removes the possibility of Him being
a good teacher. When we overemphasize
the humanity of Christ it disallows salvation from being accessible, and all
people are therefore condemned. To deny
the humanity of Christ also denies the possibility of salvation to all people
because there is no payment that has satisfied the demands of the Law.
Through Church
history there have been several challenges to Christology. As one evaluates these claims it appears
there are two fronts of attack. Dr.
Buswell presents a chart where he demonstrates these attack fronts.[10] The first front actually came from those who
denied the humanity of Christ and would include the Docetists, Apollinarians,
and Eutychians. One simply needs to look
at Philippians 2:5-11 and John 1:1-18.
The second front, which is the more common today, is the attack on
Christ’s deity. This doctrine was
supported by the Ebionites, Arians, and Eutychians. Christ clearly claimed deity in numerous
incidents through the “I AM” statements in the Gospel of John. A clear example is in John 8:48-59.
In my own personal
life the humanity of Jesus is very important.
Even though He was fully God, still He spent great amounts of time in
prayer. He was about His Father’s
business, and gives me an example of what I need to follow in bringing people
the gospel of Jesus Christ. As long as
the LORD allows me, my desire is to be following after the example of
Jesus.
Bibliography
Buswell,
J. Oliver. "The Person of Christ, His Deity and His Humanity." In Soteriology and Eschatology,
46. Vol. 2 of A Systematic
Theology of the Christian Religion. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing
House, 1973.
Hall, J.H.,
ed. "Council of Chalcedon." In Evangelical
Dictionary of Theology. 2nd ed, edited by Walter A. Elwell, 218.-19. Grand
Rapids: Baker Academic, 2001.
Lewis,
C.S. Mere Christianity: A
Revised and Enlarged Edition, with a New Introduction, of the Three Books, the
Case for Christianity, Christian Behaviour, and Beyond Personality.
Macmillan paperbacks ed. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., 1952.
Morgan,
Christopher W., and Robert A. Peterson, eds. "The Deity of Christ and the
Old Testament." In The Deity
of Christ, 58. Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2011.
[1] C.S.
Lewis, Mere Christianity (New York:
MacMillian Publishing Company, 1952), 56.
[2] 1 John
1:1 (New American Standard Bible)
[3] 2 Peter
1:16 (New American Standard Bible)
[4] John
11:24-25 (New World Translation)
[5] Raymond
Outland, “The Deity of Christ and the Old Testament,” in The Deity of Christ, ed. Christopher W. Morgan and Robert A.
Peterson (Wheaton: Crossway, 2011), 58-59
[6] J. H.
Hall, “Council of Chalcedon,” in Evangelical
Dictionary of Theology, ed. Walter A. Elwell (Grand Rapids: Baker Book
House Company, 2001), 219
[7] Romans
5:12-19 (NASB)
[8] Hebrews
4:15 (Holman Christian Standard Bible)
[9] Hebrews
9:15 (HCSB)
[10] J.
Oliver Bushwell, A Systematic Theology of
the Christian Religion Vol. 2 (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House,
1973), 46
