THE MAN CHRIST JESUS

The purpose and will of God, the work of redemption, our salvation and blessing, all depend as much upon the perfect humanity of Christ as upon His deity. These are the two great pillars on which everything rests. Too much stress cannot be laid upon the truth of the Lord’s deity; but it may be that we have not sufficiently recognised the reality and perfection of His manhood. He was truly Man. He was subject to hunger, thirst, weariness of body. He suffered in His spirit as well as in His body. Though the Lord had no element of death working in Him, no disease, no corruption, yet He bore our sicknesses and carried our sorrows, Matt 8: 17. In all our afflictions He was afflicted. And now as Priest in heaven He is still touched with the feeling of our infirmities, having been tempted in all points as we are, sin apart, Heb 4: 15. In the days of His flesh He offered up prayers with supplications and strong crying and tears to Him who was able to save Him out of death, Heb 5: 7. In scripture the Lord Jesus is much more frequently brought before us in His manhood than in the Godhead. Because it is in Him as Man that God has drawn near to men in the revelation of Himself. “The Word became flesh, and dwelt among us”, John 1: 14. Then it is by Him, and in Him as Man that God set forth His good pleasure in men. We cannot separate the two parts of the truth, though in some scriptures we may contemplate Him more in the truth of His Person, while in others we may consider Him more in that which He became in manhood. His personal greatness and glory give lustre and value to all He became, and all He did, and He did not cease to be what He was—God, in becoming what He became—Man. Indeed, there is nothing in which His personal glory shines out more than in His death. “Who by the eternal Spirit offered himself spotless to God”, Heb 9: 14. The remarkable thing is that having come into man’s estate He remains man for ever (1 Cor 15: 28), yet never ceasing to be “over all, God blessed for ever”, Rom 9: 5.

It is a most wonderful fact to contemplate that from eternity man has been in the thoughts and purposes of divine love. Not angels, but man. When Christ came into the world, He did not take hold of angels, but He took hold of the seed of Abraham. “Since therefore the children partake of blood and flesh, he also took part in the same”, Heb 2: 14-16. The question had been raised, “What is man that thou art mindful of him, and the Son of man that thou visitest him?”, Ps 8. The answer to that question is, “we see Jesus … crowned with glory and honour”, Heb 2: 9; Eph 1: 19-23.

First of all we see One who was God from eternity coming into manhood as born of a woman, then in Him we see manhood exalted to glory. What an expression of God’s good pleasure in man! In the babe born in Bethlehem we see Emmanuel, “God with us”; in Jesus glorified we see man with God. The gospels Matthew and Luke relate the manner in which He came into manhood, as conceived by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the virgin, coming in at its weakest and most lowly condition. The gospel of the glory of Christ shews us how as man He has gone up to the highest point of glory according to God’s purpose for man. But before He could go up as man to God, two things were essential, if God’s purpose for men was to be brought to pass. First, He must be tested in the conditions in which the first man had failed, proving that He was the true Man, man in every way pleasing to God. This was borne witness to at His baptism when He was anointed with the Holy Spirit, and when the voice came from heaven saying, “Thou art my beloved Son, in thee I have found my delight”, Mark 1: 11. After this Jesus allowed Himself to be tempted of the devil for forty days and later to be tried by the wickedness of men, and finally in His life of obedience and devotedness to the will and glory of God tested even by death itself, all serving to prove His moral perfection as man. His whole life and death was a sweet savour to God. Then, secondly, He must take up the question of sin and glorify God as to it, by bearing the judgment of God as made sin for us, and thus remove sin from before God, and so lay a righteous basis on which God can establish all His will, and accomplish the thoughts of His love in regard to men. As He could say, speaking of His death, “Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him”, John 13: 31. He took part in flesh and blood in order that He might die, Heb 2: 9, 14. Moreover in dying He has annulled death and him that had the power of death, the devil. He has ascended up on high leading captivity captive, the triumphant Victor. All this could only be accomplished in manhood, yet only by One who was more than a man.

Coming in flesh, He took a life which He could lay down, the life which was proper to man, but which in Him was absolutely sinless and holy. As it was said, “The holy thing also which shall be born”, Luke 1: 35. That holy life over which death had no claim, He laid down in expiation for sin. “I have power [authority] to lay it down, and I have power to take it again”, John 10: 18. The shedding of blood means the giving up of life. “The life … is in the blood”, and it was given to make atonement, Lev 17: 11. The precious blood of Christ has made full expiation for sin and thus laid the foundation in righteousness for the activities of divine grace toward men.

The Man having come and having accomplished the work of redemption, God is now free to unfold thoughts which were hidden in Him from eternity. These are wonderful thoughts of blessing and glory for men. They are already established in the Man Christ Jesus, and we await the day when they will be accomplished and displayed in the whole assembly which is His body. And not only this, but also God’s purpose in regard to Israel, and the Gentile nations, will be established by Christ. Eventually the eternal state, the universe of bliss, will be established and maintained in the Man Christ Jesus, the Head of all principality and power, to the glory of God, and for His eternal pleasure. So that the breakdown of the first man, and the first creation as set under him, has become the occasion for the incoming of the second Man, and the new creation which will abide for eternity. The world to come will display the triumph of God by the second Man. His praise will be sung throughout the universe, “Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever”, Rev 5: 13.

Note, Christ is said to be “the second man” in contrast to the “first man”, Adam. The first man and his generation have been found wanting: man has failed God in every position in which he has been set up by God. It is evident therefore that God could establish nothing in that order of man. He has been rejected by God and set aside to make room for the second Man. All that had been lost in the first has been recovered in the second, and very much more brought to pass for the glory of God.

Bristol

From The Believer’s Friend vol 24 (1932)