Studying through Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology, I have now arrived to the section on the hypostatic union of Christ, or that Jesus exists as both fully man and fully God, consisting in one person, our Lord Jesus Christ. Though this is incomprehensible to the natural human mind as to how this can be reconciled, it is something confirmed in the Scriptures to which we must reverently submit to. But how can that be? That’s what the word says, we submit to it, and leave it there. There are many things within Scripture that are so, yet seem to be impossible in the reality in which we find ourselves. One example is the Trinity. There is only one God. This one God exists as three persons in one, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. And yet He is one. He has always been this way. These things are confirmed in Scripture over and over again. How can this be? Trying to wrap our minds around this concept is essentially impossible, and yet it is so. There is no human example that rightly gives justice to how this is so, mainly because it is so far above us. It is also the same with God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility. God, in His divine wisdom, permitted a world in which sin exists. And yet He is without sin. The former confirmed in so many passages of the Old Testament; the latter confirmed throughout the word, both Old and New Testaments. God is sovereign over all of the actions of man, everything, and yet man is held fully responsible for His actions. How can this be? Well, that is what Scripture says. But … ? There are no buts. We silence our mouths before the Lord in great reverential submission to His ability to do things beyond our comprehension, things that seem impossible, yet are confirmed to be so in the word. Scripture confirms that all of these realities exist, yet are outside of our intellectual conception. God is one, existing in three persons; God is fully sovereign over all things, man is fully responsible for his actions; and we accept all these things by faith. And so it is with the two nature’s of Christ. He is both fully man and fully God. And yet He is the one Christ, the Son of God. Only Christ could have lived a human life without sin, because He is God in the flesh. And to think of the ramifications of this as Jesus hung on that cross. Wow. The God-man was pierced, beaten, whipped, and bore in His being the wrath of God. When looking at Christ on the cross, we clearly see His humanity and the torture He endured on our behalf; but consider for a moment that the God of the universe, through which creation came to be, the mighty Lord that with a word spoke the heavens and the earth into existence, hung on a dirty Roman cross by nails and that He was cut off from His Father in eternal pain at that moment. This was the most tragic thing that has ever happened for all time! There is nothing worse than this. And yet it is the most wonderful thing that has happened. On the one hand, God the Son was put to death by our wickedness, and yet He bore in Himself the wrath of God for any who would believe in Him. How wonderful! At the cross, we see all of God’s attributes so wonderfully displayed. We see His love for this world (generally speaking) that the Father would send His own Son into it to be a sacrifice for sins, we see God’s justice displayed that He must uphold the honor and purity of His name in passing over sins from the past, we see how utterly wicked we all are in nailing God to the cross, we see God’s utter hatred of sin that in order to declare sinners just and righteous He had to put His own precious Son to death for us and give us His righteousness, we see God’s sovereign abilitiy that allowed all the events that occurred to even take place at all (mainly because God could have wiped everyone out right then if He wanted), and yet there are so many other attributes. For us who believe, what an amazing and powerful God we serve!
Leave a Reply