Mr. Ex Nihilo writes:
I don't accept that God is all-powerful. He can't sin for one thing.
Phatboy writes:
Sin means seperation from God. God cannot sin because God cannot be God and be someone else at the same time. This is the essence of monotheism. It is easier to believe in Gods endless possibilities than it is to believe that our own imaginations are capable of such thought.
To some extent I agree.
However, when one looks at the incarnation of Christ, we see God in human form experiencing sin so that he can understand what it is like to be human and therefore have compassion on us.
NIV writes:
Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are - yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
If God can understand and know sin from heaven's spiritual perspective, it seems kind of pointless for Christ the second person of the holy trinity to come in human form in order to be tempted in every way so that he could sympathize with our weaknesses.
Although I do believe that Christ's incarnation was "without sin" in the sense that he was aware of what sin was (in his mind) and yet he never succumbed to it mentally or physically, I also believe that Christ "became" sin by knowing sin (in his mind) and becoming aware of its temptations so that God could pin-point sin and obliterate it through Christ's life, death and resurrection.
NIV writes:
We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
When I look to the incarnation of Christ, I see the second member of the holy trinity emptying himself, making himself virtually nothing (for a small time) when compared to his former and future glory both before and after his humiliation he experienced as a human being.
I think that Philippians 2:5-8 captures this very well...
NIV writes:
Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
but made himself nothing,
taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to death - even death on a cross!
You had said above that "God cannot sin because God cannot be God and be someone else at the same time". However, when we look toward Christ on the cross we hear him speaking these words:
NIV writes:
At the sixth hour darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?" - which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"
I think the answer to this question can be found in Isaiah 59:1-2...
Behold, the LORD's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear: But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear.
In other words, I don't think the father could see into the heart of the son at this unique period in history because God cannot look upon the face of sin.
If this is correct, I tend to think that Christ was going through utter agony not so much because of the physical abuse that was heeped on him via the crucifixion. I don't even think that the sins that he took unto himself in order to become sin were that bad by comparison of the possibility that Christ was truly separated from his father at this most unique event in human history.
NIV writes:
But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. This is why it says:
"When he ascended on high,
he led captives in his train
and gave gifts to men."
(What does "he ascended" mean except that he also descended to the lower, earthly regions? He who descended is the very one who ascended higher than all the heavens, in order to fill the whole universe.)
In other words, in order for Christ to truly know what it was like to be human, he had to be spiritually separated from his father just like
all other people were. Unlike anyone else in the
entire scope of human history, Christ continued to believe in his father even when totally separated from him and dropped into the depths and despair of the dead.
NIV writes:
For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit, through whom also he went and preached to the spirits in prison who disobeyed long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built.
This is to say, Jesus' faith in the father saved him from the depths of death -- and at that unique moment in history, Christ connected himself spiritually with all other souls past, present and future that would be saved in him, even those that did not know him per se in human life.
NIV writes:
For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
This is what I mean by the
power of Christ's resurrection. If Christ hadn't become fully human and died on the cross, even to the point of separating himself from his father in heaven, then every Christian's faith in him would be totally useless.
NIV writes:
If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.
Although others may disagree, this is my definition of Christ the savior and it works quite well for me.
This message has been edited by Mr. Ex Nihilo, 06-21-2005 04:32 PM
This message has been edited by Mr. Ex Nihilo, 06-21-2005 07:51 PM
™ Version 4.2