GOD IN SOLIDARITY WITH HUMANS
“And the Word became flesh” [a human]—John 1:14
“God sending his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh” [sinful humans]—Romans 8:3.
“In bringing many sons to glory it became God…to make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering. He that makes holy and they who are made holy are all of one family and that’s why he is not ashamed to be called their brother…Since the children were made mortal humans he himself shared the same…” Hebrews 2:10-11, 14, (paraphrased, jmcg).
“There is one God and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus.” 1 Timothy 2:5
“Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God…” Acts 2:22 [see also John 8:40 and elsewhere].
The truth that Jesus is God being a man must not be used to weaken, much less to deny, that Jesus is God being a man.
Though Jesus never in any shape or form did wrong his righteousness was more than that [not less]—it was positive holiness; it was the ceaseless willing and seeking and doing God’s will and not merely avoiding the wrong.
But the pre-incarnation holiness of the Word did not prevent God from fully identifying with his human creatures who became his human brothers and sisters. This truth must be kept in mind when we read texts like 1 Peter 1:15-17. That text is a plain call to upright moral behavior but that specific expression of holiness while it is not to be downplayed much less denied is based on the foundational truth, “Be holy as I am holy.” However we are to construe holiness we are not to deny the astonishing truth of the incarnation of God in Jesus Christ. We must resist the view that God’s holiness is such a holiness that it requires him to have nothing to do with sinners or even that he must be reluctant to seek sinners out to help [compare 1 John 2:1-2]. Whatever is in us that makes us reluctant or distant is to be renounced and resisted.
When we speak of “the holiness of God” we must be careful to acknowledge that the phrase means “God is holy”. God’s mercy is God being merciful, God’s grace is God being gracious and God’s kindness is God being kind. All these “virtues” and many more are not to be turned into abstractions and much less are they to focus our eyes on the “qualities” of God and off the God who makes himself known in and through such virtues. We must “keep it personal”.
It’s also vitally important that we understand that Jesus Christ [who is God being a man] is the human expression of his pre-incarnate Godhood. That is, it was what God was prior to the incarnation that resulted in the incarnation becoming a spellbinding fact; it was what the Word was prior to the incarnation that made the incarnation inevitable; it was what God was prior to the incarnation that led to how he showed himself when he incarnated himself in Jesus Christ. God didn’t become kind or loving at the incarnation—he was eternally that and expressed it by becoming incarnate.
Such a complete identification with the humans he created showed itself in Jesus of Nazareth who refused to distance himself from his sinful human family. Not only did he spend time with them and eat with them [compare rabbi Neusner on the significance for a truly devout Jew of eating a simple sandwich] he stood in line to be baptized with them when John preached a national call for repentance and baptism for the remission of sins.
And today? Yes, I know [no, I can only come up with an educated guess] how hard this is for many to believe, but God DOES see ALL that's going on and he WILL right all wrongs. Acts 17:31 and Psalm 67:3-4. Think and speak noble things of God.
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