The person and work of Christ

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The person and work of Christ

Disclaimer

Writing about the Person and work of Christ is a major endeavor. It would be arrogant of anyone to think he or she could write a comprehensive and detailed work that would truly and accurately portray Jesus in His fullness. Truly, only by means of revelation can a person come to begin to understand who Jesus is. So prayerfully and with great humility, this paper will try to unpack the work and Person of Jesus with the writings of Paul. It would be a major challenge to stay in one letter to unpack Paul’s thoughts on the Person and work of Christ. Though Romans will be mainly used, it is necessary to pull from all of Paul’s letters to gain a fuller picture of how Paul understood Jesus and his works. All scripture quotations are from the NIV or NKJ unless otherwise noted.

Who do you say I am?

While the question was asked in Luke 9:20, “Who do you say I am?” is in the Gospels, it is here the core of Paul’s writings begin. While Luke may have copied from the other gospels, he was a traveling companion and chronicler of Paul and his journeys. Believing Luke faithfully, and accurately, portrayed all the adventured, there seems a straight shot to many of the concepts Paul presents as an answer. Paul’s conversion story in itself is based on the revelation of Jesus imparted by Jesus to Paul directly the road to Damascus. While Luke tells the story of Paul’s conversion three times, Paul, himself never actually gives details in his letters. We have glimpses of Paul’s conversion in a couple of letters:

For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born (1 Cor. 15:3–8). [1]

I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that the gospel I preached is not of human origin. I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it; rather, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ. For you have heard of my previous way of life in Judaism, how intensely I persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it. I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people and was extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers. But when God, who set me apart from my mother’s womb and called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son in me so that I might preach him among the Gentiles, my immediate response was not to consult any human being (Galatians 1:11-16). [2]

While the point may be a little belabored, the idea of revelation is a major part of Paul’s understanding of Jesus. Understanding this point allows for a relational view that opens up Jesus as a person. It is a foundation that builds on the idea Jesus is alive and “relatable” unlike the “gods” before.

Jesus the man

Paul talks of Jesus as a man, however a man like no other man. This man “who was born of the seed of David according to the flesh”, was also, “declared to be the Son of God with power”. [3] This verse also points out another declaration about Jesus the man; He was from the linage of David of whom the promised Messiah would come. Here Paul makes bold claims that, if challenged as lies, could seemingly be disproven. However, Paul often takes the human “Adam” as a contrast to the human “Jesus”. While Adam is lifted up as all that is wrong with humanity, Jesus is lifted as all that is right with God and through whom all humanity is now set to right. As Stower acknowledges, one must understand Paul’s use of the analogy of the contrast between Adam and Jesus is about a set time between Adam and Moses as all humanity was under the curse of Adam’s sin until Moses when the Law added transgression to individuals.[4] However, to return to the point Paul was making, using Adam, as summed up in Romans 5:14-19:

Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come. But the free gift is not like the offense. For if by the one man's offense many died, much more the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abounded to many. And the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned. For the judgment which came from one offense resulted in condemnation, but the free gift which came from many offenses resulted in justification. For if by the one man's offense death reigned through the one, much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ. Therefore, as through one man's offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man's righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous.

More than a man who would be king

Jesus according to Paul was the exemplary example of the perfect man. However, Jesus fulfilled the Jewish idea of the coming Christ (or Messiah, King). According to Romans 9:5 Jesus was of the Israelites who were “the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, the eternally blessed God”. In that verse, it is obvious that something more is happening than a declaration of an earthly king. While earthly kings may have declared godhood, few would declare to be the “eternally blessed God”. Here, according to N.T. Wright, is a launching pad where Paul begins to retell the story of Israel around the Person of Christ Jesus.

The best example of Paul’s retelling the story of Israel around the Person of Jesus would be Galatians 3 and 4. Here as N.T. Wright again argues, “God made the initial promises to Abraham; subsequently, he gave the Law through Moses; but was always a strictly temporary stage, designed to keep Israel under control, like a young son, until the moment maturity.”[5] By retelling the story of Israel Paul puts the spotlight on Jesus in such a way that Jesus becomes the point of the story. Jesus is to be understood as the endpoint and the reason for all God did in and through Abraham, and Israel.

The issue of sin

Romans 8:3-4 shows how Paul explains Jesus’ work as well as the ramifications of what Jesus has done:

“For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.”

Paul explains that Jesus did what the Law could not do. N.T. Wright states it this way:

God had, it seems, called Abraham and his family to be the solution-bearing family knowing that, because they too were ‘in Adam’, they were themselves bound to become part of the problem, and that the shape of their own history was thus bound to bear witness  their own share whose solution the none the less carry.[6] 

Paul personalizes this dilemma of the “solution-bearer” in Romans 7:22-23 “22.  For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.” (NKJ). Paul exposes that while he was faithful to the Law, the Law only revealed his most inner being as captive to sin. However, Paul cries out to Jesus as the solution, as N.T. Wright may say, against evil.[7] The eradication of evil being, of course, is core of the work of Christ Jesus.

The God who humiliated himself

Here we must bring in the “Christ Hymn” of Philippians 2:6-11:

Who, being in very nature God,

    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;

rather, he made himself nothing

    by taking the very nature of a servant,

    being made in human likeness.

And being found in appearance as a man,

    he humbled himself

    by becoming obedient to death—

        even death on a cross!

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place

    and gave him the name that is above every name,

that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,

    in heaven and on earth and under the earth,

and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,

    to the glory of God the Father.

            The claims Paul makes of Jesus would, by any means, be a major overstepping of a description of a mere human, let alone a great king. Here Paul demands attention to the Person of Jesus and what He accomplished. Christopher R.J. Holmes sums Karl Barth’s view succinctly as, “The twofold action of Jesus Christ, ״ in terms of his coming low and his being lifted high, is one work, which fills out and constitutes His existence in this twofold form.”  Paul shows that while Jesus does not grasp for equality with God, (being God), that to empty himself of deity would accomplish more with humility. Here is appears that Jesus, being God, does what no descendant of Adam, let alone anyone under the Law could do. That the very act of humiliation, becomes the pivotal point of exaltation.

It should be noted that Paul is also stating in the Philippians passage, that Jesus was pre-existent.[8] Paul pushes this idea further in Colossians 1 15-20 by stating “he [Jesus] is the image of the invisible God”, as well as declaring Jesus the One who creation came, while furthering his claims with “He is before all things, and in Him all things consist” (NKJ). As noted above with the thoughts of Karl Barth, the humiliation of becoming a man that is to die out of obedience to The Father cannot separate Jesus’s humility and his exaltation any more than anyone can separate Jesus’s humanity from His deity. However, in Christ Jesus we have true humility overcoming evil out of a loving servitude toward humankind. Jesus, “being in very nature God”, as revealed by and through Paul shows us God’s love in action. 

God’s work through Jesus

Paul wrote, “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us”.[9] For Paul, Christ’s death as the demonstration of the Father’s love for humankind and becomes part of God’s work through Jesus as Messiah. This act of grace becomes the center of Paul’s theology and as Penner states, “The effect of God’s love and grace is reconciliation. By nature he is a reconciling God”. [10] This reconciliation did not come without God being willing to take on human suffering. In the willful suffering of Christ Jesus, all made right. Here we dip into 2 Corinthians 5:18-21:

Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God. For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

Man alive!

While all this was happening on the Cross, it is easy to overlook the power of the Resurrection. Jesus did not just die, for messiahs come and go even today (as in the case of the Sun Myung Moon). However, people die every day, even good people. With Jesus, there was something different from, other messiahs – He rose from the dead. We may not grasp the astonishment of those first hearing the Gospel though there is a record of Paul addressing the Areopagus in Acts  17:19. Some of the greatest Greek minds gathered there either mocked Paul or asked, "We will hear you again on this matter.'' The resurrection is often the most overlooked topic, yet the most powerful when its importance comes to realization.

Paul writes in Romans 5:10, “For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life”. While forgiveness and reconciliation came at the price of Jesus’s death, the resurrected life of Christ is what saved us. Without the Life of Christ in us, we are the forgiven dead. It was how God declared Jesus “to be the Son of God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead”. [11]  After Jesus was glorified and was seated by the right hand of the Father, the Holy Spirit is the seal of promise that we are alive in Christ. [12]

The choice

Once again, the ultimate questions is, “Who do you say I am?” in regards to Jesus. When one looks at the claims made by Paul, as well as others in the New Testament, there can only be two choices, to listen again and try to grasp the reality offered through Christ Jesus or sit in mockery. Paul’s sophisticated argument was enough to capture many of the greatest minds in Greek thinking, and that alone should enough to make anyone take some time to consider the question Jesus asked.

---

[1] (Emphasis added)

[2] (Emphasis added)

[3] (Rom: 1:3-4)

[4] (Stowers 1994, 254)

[5] (Wright 2005, 44,45)

[6] (Wright 2005, 126)

[7] (Wright 2005, 96)

[8] (n.a. 1993, 356)

[9] (Romans 5:8, NKJ)

[10] (Penner, 2012, 73)

[11] (Romans 1:4, NKJ)

[12] (Ephesians 1:13)

References

Holmes, Christopher R J. 2013. "The person and work of Christ revisited: in conversation with Karl Barth." Anglican Theological Review 95, no. 1: 37-55. ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials, EBSCOhost (accessed September 21, 2013).

n.a. Dictionary of Paul and His Letters. Edited by Ralph P Martin, Daniel G. Reid Gerald F. Hawthorne. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1993.

Penner, Erwin. 2012. "Christ died: love, grace, and the reconciling work of God." Direction 41, no. 1: 72-79. ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials, EBSCOhost (accessed October 8, 2013).

Stowers, Stanley K. A Rereading of Romans. New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 1994.

Wright, N.T. Paul: In Fresh Perspective. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005.

New Frank Viola book: God's Favorite Place on Earth

#SpeakeasyGodsFavoritePlace

I hope to be receiving a review copy of God's Favorite Place on Earth by Frank Viola. The book released May 1st and stayed in the top # 50 on Amazon.com for 8 straight days. There's a lot of buzz about this book on the Web, and I plan to write a review after I read it.

Here are a few interesting nuggets about the book:

•It's been recommended by 47 Christian authors, including John Ortberg, Jack Hayford, Leonard Sweet, Tricia Goyer, Mary DeMuth, Greg Boyd, Todd Hunter, Jon Acuff, Phil Cooke, and many others.

•The book tells the story of Jesus in the little village of Bethany and the amazing things that happened there through the eyes of Lazarus. It combines biblical narrative, dramatization, theological insights, and nonfiction devotional teaching. It argues that "Bethany" was God's favorite place on earth and explains how every Christian and every heart, home, village and church can be "Bethanys" today for God. 

•The book addresses 18 specific struggles that Christians face today and offers hope, challenge, and fresh insight.

You can check all of this out at http://GodsFavoritePlace.com and get the book on discount.

Here's a book trailer introducing it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RG_9TeE-BO8

John Cochran: the almost Christ-like winner of Survivor

John Cochran has been the most unlikely person ever to win Survivor. With all his weaknesses, it was interesting to watch, as other power-players seem to dominate. People like Phillip, showed a strong if not quirky strategy that gave way to his own undoing. Others like “the golden boy” Malcolm seemed a shoe-in to win. Yet, in all this, Cochran’s strength was in his almost Christ-like weakness.

 Cochran had his moment did become one the Survivor’s top challenge winners, though most the wins were in the timing in which he strategically or luckily, received an advantage. Even with the advantages, Cochran would struggle and, at times, almost lose the challenge.

I found how Cochran addressed people was amazing. His answer to Malcolm displayed the one huge strength Cochran had over others. Cochrane could tell a person his or her strengths in an honest and straightforward mane that was disarming, then state, something like, “Your strength was weakness.” In the case of Malcolm’s question, as to what Cochran had over Malcolm (who appears to have it all, in looks, strength, abilities, etc.) Cochran simply states, “You don’t have my insecurities.”

Cochran’s grasp of others strengths and his own weakness and how to exploit both in precise timing was truly a wonder to behold. People like Dawn did most of the dirty work, yet that was how she wanted to play the game. In Dawn’s attempt to go against her own true self, was her own undoing. Cochran seemed to understand that of all who were left, Dawn’s bipolar outbursts and moves put her in a position that few would want to vote for her. It is bad strategy on Survivor and life in general to love someone then exploit that person to gain one’s own personal goal.

Cochran, like Christ, exploited the strengths of His enemies and in the end outwitted, outlasted and outplayed his enemies. Jesus looked like an unlikely savior as much as Cochran seemed the most unlikely winner of Survivor. In Christ weakness such as love, mercy, grace, became Jesus’ strong points. To be taken prisoner, beaten, and then murdered, would be a definite declaration of weakness. However, Jesus overcame death and rose from the dead. Cochran also rose above his own weakness to become this year's winner in Survivor. Now, please, I understand this analogy goes only so far and Cochran did not do all things perfectly. However, I still think this season was the best one since the Africa and Australia sessions. 

NICENE CHRISTIANITY THE COUNCEILE OF NICEA, CONSTIANTINOPLE, AND CHALCEDON

This may be a bit dry of a read, but I haven't posted for a while.

 Source: Wikipedia

NICENE CHRISTIANITY

THE COUNCEILE OF NICEA, CONSTIANTINOPLE,

AND CHALCEDON 

Carlos Shelton

13SP RELS 111

Intro to Christian Hist/Thght (09)

March 28, 2013

           

13 But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.  14 Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, spotless and blameless, 15 and regard the patience of our Lord to be salvation; just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, 16 as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.  17 You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard lest, being carried away by the error of unprincipled men, you fall from your own steadfastness, 18 but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity.  Amen (2 Peter 3:14-18).

.

Part One: The controversy over the deity of Jesus

The Bride of Christ appears to have been always in some sort of controversy since her conception.  One view is of a purer source liken to someone who was hiking near a lake and began to thirst.  As the person passed the lake, the river, then passing the small streams up the mountain, they finally come to the source spring of pure water.  One view is, believers must return to the apostolic source and stay true to their intended words of teaching.  These men are those who either walked with Jesus under his teaching or later received direct revelation and wrote their revelations about and from Jesus for others to learn.  In a sense, believers must stay true to the purest spring we can find; otherwise, the possibility of contamination could cause sickness in the Body of Christ.

 Even in the time of the Apostles, there were those who twisted the words of the Apostles to mislead others.  While some who twisted the words of Jesus and the Apostles were sincere, others may have had other motives.  To understand this in a present way, the lyrics of Neon Horse in their song, “When Daddy Gets Home” speak of this issue even today.

“But who you gonna believe

When Daddy comes home

We believe what we wanna believe

 ‘Till the games are over”

Still even today, the Nicene Creed (NC) stirs controversy, as it is not the complete expression of Christianity but an attempt to address issues of the day.  As indicated on the Ecclesio.com website, the discussion of the events in the Councils of Nicaea, Constantinople, and Chalcedon gives debate regarding the weight of the “strange creeds” and how even newer creeds along with older creeds must be kept in context (Naude, Piet, 2003).  With this as a reminder, while looking at the NC and other councils attempting to understand why and how the reasons the councils came about via two opposing views on the deity of Christ Jesus.

The two opposing views

There were two main opposing views about Jesus and his divinity.  Some followed Arius who taught that Jesus was a creature or a created being (Bingham, 2002, 46).  Further, the idea Arius put forth led to the conclusion Jesus was not eternal, or as Arius stated, “the son had a beginning, but God is without beginning” (Ibid).  Arius may have been trying to be true to the scriptures as he pulled his idea that Jesus was “Wisdom” (1 Cor. 1:24, 30) from Prov.8:22, which states, “The LORD brought me forth as the first of his works, before his deeds of old” (NIV).  Arius took the idea from a verse Jesus was God’s first “work”, so was therefore “created”.  It may also be noted Arius did not just pull this from the Scripture, but also built on ideas of Origen who set forth the idea the Father is “true God” (Lane, 2006, 29).  It must be also noted, that Origenists were not Arians as Origenist held a distinction between the “threeness of the Godhead” though Origenists were not clear concerning the deity of Jesus” (Lane, 2006, 30).

The main person to oppose Arianism was Athanasius. While the NC was specific in how it addressed the eternalness of Jesus by using words such a homoousio (meaning of one substance), which showed that there was no distinction between The Father and Jesus. Athanasius also believed this was not a strong enough approach to attack the heresy of Arianism (Lane, 2006, 31).  Athanasius pressed harder against Arianism as he believed the acceptance of Arianism could be the end of Christianity. Athanasius stated in the Athanasian Creed:

“And the  Catholic Faith is this: That we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; Neither confounding the Persons ; nor dividing the substance. For there is one person of the Father, another of the Son: and another of the Holy Ghost. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and the Holy Ghost, is all one: the Glory equal, the Majesty coeternal.” (Kerr, 1990, 76-77).

The core belief of Athanasius was of the deity of Christ; for he believed only if Christ is divine could He save us (Lane, 2006, 32). According to Lane (2006, 33), Athanasius held strong arguments against Arianism as well as against the Jewish and pagan charges against the incarnation and crucifixion of God’s Son as ”unfitting and degrading” (Ibid). Anathasius argument was simple but brilliant as according to Lane, he held “only the one through whom the world was created could restore it (2006, 33). While Athathanuis used Greek philosophy, he mainly turned to Scripture to back his arguments against Arianism. Here Athananius argued the point that Christian “worship” of Jesus Christ, which started in the time of the new testament and in his own time would be considered idolatry if Jesus were  “merely a creature” (Lane, 2006, 33-34).

Part Two: The Outcome

The outcome of these Creeds held true to the pure stream of the Apostle’s teaching.  The Creeds gave a sense of unity and definition concerning the Person of Jesus Christ as well as the idea of a Uniting Trinity.  However, as these Creeds gave clearer understanding, they also gave way to new questions that needed addressing.  While the understanding of Christ’s divinity was clearer, the question turned to what it meant of Christ or as John’s gospel states, “The Word became flesh” (John 1:14, NIV).  Once again, a better definition was sought.

Chalcedonian Definition

The Chalcedonian Definition was an attempt to answer the question of whether Jesus had one nature or two.  Because Jesus was declared divine, yet also was considered truly human.  Bingham brings up the point that while Jesus did divine acts such as walking on water, raising the dead, and healing people, He also showed human frailty (53).  Jesus experienced hunger, sadness, needed to sleep, and as all humans do, died (Ibid).  However, this does not mean Jesus was two Beings (Ibid).  The Chalcedonian Definition attempted to clear the understanding that Jesus had two natures in unity.

The conclusions they reached and how

The Church Fathers reached their conclusions through reasoning, discussion (even angry fighting), as well as using Greek philosophy, and appealing to Scripture.  While some people may think of old men in pointed hats who appealed to their own egos, history shows the Church Fathers sincerely working toward keeping the purity of the teachings of Jesus and the Apostles.  It is easy to look back and not catch the careful approach these men took to keep the Doctrines they fought for so hard, was also guided by the Holy Spirit.  While these Creeds are not perfect in anyway, as Bingham points-out,  these Creeds do not “answer all our questions about the Trinity and incarnation” however, “they do give us boundaries within we can find acceptable interpretations of the Scriptures about the Trinity and the two natures of Christ.”  (54). These boundaries still a have an effect today.  Even today, there are new Creeds that further build on the foundation built by the Early Church Fathers.  The effect was not just in setting boundaries, but also in setting a sense of unity (Bingham 54).  This unity of consensus helped quench the fires of heresy that had risen to threaten the Church.

Part Three: Application and Analysis

Even today, there are groups such as the Jehovah Witnesses that twist the scripture.  Thankfully, we have these writings to solidify belief in the truth.  The understanding that Jesus is not a mere man or other created being is a core belief in churches today with a few exceptions.  Creeds like the Nicene Creed show us about Jesus; however only when we encounter who Jesus is, do we begin a journey in Christology.  To encounter Jesus in Who He truly is allows us to grow in our own understanding of who we as believers are in Him.  To depart from the truth that Jesus is divine does in fact open us to idolatry for instance.  To believe only God can set things right by becoming a man to fulfill His own requirements, also shows the loving forethought of God toward His creation.  To hold the wrong view of Jesus is to lose sight of the message of salvation.  For, by not holding true to the message it is not holding true to the Messenger.  For, if we contaminate the view of the Messenger, the message is also contaminated.

Bibliography

Bingham, D. Jeffrey. Pocket history of the Church. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2002.

elryics.com. When Daddy Gets Home. http://www.elyrics.net/read/n/neon-horse-lyrics/when-daddy-gets-home-lyrics.html (accessed March 29, 2013).

Hill, Jonathan. The History of Christian Thought. InterVarsity Press, 2003.

Lane, Tony. A Concise History of Christian Thought. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006.

Naude, Piet. A letter from South Africa. Ecclesio.com. http://www.ecclesio.com/2011/03/a-letter-from-south-africa-by-piet-naude/ (accessed March 29, 2013).