Monday, January 29, 2007

Something I have observed in recent years of being in churches, classes, conversations, conferences and other venues is that the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ is emphasized, and RIGHTLY SO. However, I wonder if while we are emphasizing this right (and absolutely necessary) doctrine of the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ, that we have neglected the important and just as necessary doctrine of the humanity of the Lord Jesus Christ.

For example, this morning in my quite time, I read Mark 1. A few verses from this chapter read:

Mark 1:12-13 12 And immediately the Spirit impelled Him to go out into the wilderness. 13 And He was in the wilderness forty days being tempted by Satan; and He was with the wild beasts, and the angels were ministering to Him.

A few things to note quickly here:
1. The wilderness is not a fun place to be - especially for 40 days without food, drink or company. It is barren, it is hot, flies are everywhere - this is not a nice, warm, fuzzy 40 days of easy-going-life for Jesus.
2. Furthermore, he is being tempted by Satan. He is tempted by the Tempter himself. Jesus is we know from Matt 4 - being tempted by Satan. Satan brings all of the goods out of his bag to try and deceive Jesus (even with Scripture!), yet without success.

Here's the point:

Hebrews 4:15 15 For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.

This text is so significant. Auctor (the beloved title for the writer of Hebrews who is NOT Paul, by the way) writes and says that Jesus Christ was tempted in all things as we are. Notice this: for a person to constantly, and fervently resist temptation without sinning is harder to resist temptation and then to give in. In other words, the longer Jesus was tempted and yet did NOT give in to temptation, the harder and more severe the temptations were confronting him.

Jesus Christ is NO more, and NO less a human being than you and I are. He was simply put, HUMAN - a man. All of the limitations that you and I face every day, - I believe - that Jesus Christ had the same limitations. Though still being very God of gods and very Lord of lords, he chose to empty himself of his divine attributes when he took on the form of human flesh (read Phil 2:5-11).

So a question I have to my readers: Are we prone to down-play the significance of the person of the Lord Jesus Christ as a human being when we all too often get caught up in the Deity of Christ?
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