THE MANHOOD OF CHRIST
THE MANHOOD OF CHRIST
Concurrently with the conflict as to eternal life, considerable controversy took place on the subject of the Person of Christ and His true manhood. The following five letters, written at that time by Mr. J. B. Stoney, and a paper written by Mr. F. E. Raven, shew that great spiritual gain resulted as the truth was brought out in greater clarity than it had previously had in the minds of many.
I deprecate discussion on this momentous subject. The moment you travel outside the very words of Scripture you are in danger of error. “God manifested in flesh” is Scripture, but “perfect God and perfect Man” is not scripture. Satan’s direct opposition is against the Word made flesh - the “man-child” (Revelation 12) - from Herod’s day down to this. In Christendom the pious Christians think of Christ as God and not as Man, and they read of His miracles in the gospels to prove that He was God. They do not see that indirectly they are siding with Satan, who will tolerate any measure of religion so that the Man out of heaven is not paramount. Satan, in his opposition to God, perpetrated the fall of man in the garden of Eden, but when the Son of God became a Man His first work (see Mark 1) was to drive the unclean spirit out of man.
The Son of God became a Man. He thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but He laid His glory by and took on Himself the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men. “Forasmuch as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death”, etc. He became a Man, born of woman, to bear the judgment on man. He died, and in His death the man after the flesh was judicially terminated: so “henceforth know we no man after the flesh: yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more”. There is the earthy man, and there is the heavenly Man. The blessed Son went through the terrible sorrow of death as a man. His very greatness caused Him to suffer beyond our conception, for He bore the judgment on the first man, and He is the second Man. The first man is of the earth, earthy, the second Man is out of heaven. You must see the first man superseded by the second Man. Every believer is of the second Man. You must keep in mind that the greatness of the grace is that the Son of God, who could say, “I and my Father are one”, took on Himself the form of a servant or slave, and He says, “I can of mine own self do nothing”. He, the only begotten Son in the bosom of the Father, declared God while in the form of a servant. In His grace He connects His own with all He is as a Man. From not seeing this they fell into error at Plymouth in assuming that the church was united to God. The church or the body of Christ is of His order and nature. It has come from Him and is united to Him. It is marvellous grace that the Son of God became a Man - a Man to free every one believing in Him of the man after the flesh, so that every one in Him is a new creation. I think we have but a very feeble appreciation of the new man. We are brethren of the risen Christ. “Both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified, are all of one: for which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren” - the offspring of His resurrection, in all His divine beauty as a Man.
Again, the manna is not essentially His acts, or His obedience, but the grace in which He did everything; as Mr. Darby has said, His springs were in God: our springs naturally are in ourselves.
Finally, the better we comprehend His manhood, the more fully we see the greatness of the mystery of the church - His complement. He would not be complete without His body. The world could not contain the books which could be written of Him, but the vastness of this blessed Man will be expressed by His body, the church, to the glory of God for ever.
J.B.S.
I was glad to get tidings of you ... I greatly deprecate discussion on such a grave subject. I believe we all are given light as we require it; and I do not see that any one understands a particular subject until he is up to it in his soul. For instance, I do not see that any one understands the manna until he is really in the wilderness, and is therefore in need of it. Then he will learn it.
I should say to every inquirer, first learn reconciliation - that the man after the flesh has been removed in judgment, and that you are, as is every one in Christ, a new creation. Old things have passed away, all have become new, and all is of God. Christ is the beginning of the creation of God. I am afraid that very few comprehend that the man after the flesh was judicially terminated in the cross, and that He who terminated the first man is the Man out of heaven - altogether to God’s pleasure - a Man of an entirely new order - He is the Son of God. You are of Him, a member of His body - of Him as a Man; you could not be of the divine Person. The Holy Ghost, His gift, dwells in you. I believe the real difficulty is that the Man of the new order is not seen superseding the man after the flesh, and that each believer now is formed out of Christ as Eve was formed out of Adam’s rib. I need not add more. Reconciliation must be first distinctly apprehended.
I may add that manna in its nature and quality is unknown if you do not apprehend the peculiar and blessed way in which a Man (whose springs were in God) walked in the details of daily life here, and that you could not walk as He walked but as He lives in you. Not merely in His obedience and in his acts, but in the grace and beauty in which they were done. Be assured that if you were practically in the knowledge of Christ as the manna you would understand His Person better than any one could instruct you.
I see Mr. Darby quoted where there is no possible reference to the present subject; but as I said at the beginning I say at the close, you will never understand any divine truth until you are morally up to it in your soul.
J.B.S.
The truth is that God was manifest in the flesh; the divine Being, a Spirit, took bodily human form. Outwardly there was no distinction between Him and other men. If there were, the high priest would not have given thirty pieces of silver for singling Him out from His disciples. He was only a man to the natural eye, but when anyone had light from God to know Him as a divine Person he was there and then greatly blessed. See Peter in Luke 5 and all through the gospel until you come to the thief on the cross. I believe the opposition is really against the new man - the Man out of heaven. Many Christians know something of man being judicially terminated in the cross - and every pious one would like to have more of the grace of Christ in his ways and thoughts, but I am afraid very few would like to have the first man altogether displaced and to be here in the grace and manner of life of the Man “out of heaven”. The opposers want to have two persons in one, man and God, one time to act as God, and at another to act as man. They really do not see the incarnation. They do not see that He who was God became a man and hence a Man out of heaven. They would have Him to be a man in flesh and blood, and in a way distinct from His being God - whereas He is God, and He, that same Person, became a man in flesh and blood, but He came from God, He brought everything with Him. He learned nothing from His mother nor from any one here. He is a Man out of heaven. He bore the judgment on man, He was put to death in the flesh but quickened in the Spirit, and He is the Man of God’s pleasure for ever; and it is only as you are of His nature and order that you could be united to Him, or that you are a “living stone” in His building.
I believe when we rightly apprehend the new creation which is ours in Christ, that we must see how very far we are from the manner of life in thoughts and ways which is really ours as “brethren” of Christ; and hence some of the truly conscientious shrink from seeing the exalted position in which He has placed man through Himself.
J.B.S.
I return the letter you so kindly sent me. It is very plain that - does not see God’s purpose in a Man; he is thinking only of Christ as God. God is setting forth His own glory in Christ as Man, otherwise there could not be glory unto Him in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages. If I begin at Genesis, the great purpose before God is man. In His own Son becoming man He had a man to His pleasure, and the church is the complement of that Man. The world could not contain the books which could be written of Him, but the church will fully and perfectly display Him. Some have no idea of the mystery or of God’s purpose in Christ. He as a Man can authorise to baptise in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.
J.B.S.
The great impression made on me by your letter is that MAN, the Man Christ Jesus, is not before the vision of your soul as He is in the mind of God. If you do not see with God, you are not in communion with Him. Your one point is to prove His deity, quite right in itself; thus all the old commentators said the miracles were recorded to prove Christ’s divinity. But look for a moment from God’s side. His great purpose is to be glorified in a Man, and hence “Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages”. You do not seem to have apprehended God’s purpose in MAN. He has a MAN now to His pleasure; now there is glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good pleasure in men.
I believe that if you would look at our blessed Lord on the earth as He was in the eye of God, you would see that He as a MAN expressed the Trinity here; hence He can authorise His disciples to baptise in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. No one else could reveal or declare the Father but the Son, and no one could have the Spirit without measure but the Son, and He is a man.
Do you apprehend in any measure the greatness of the complement of Christ? The world could not contain the books which would be written, but the church is the complement of the Man who fully expressed God here. The church could not be the complement of His divinity.
I am, thank God, assured that if you are led to see the Man Christ Jesus as He is TO God, you will not in any measure lose sight of the Son ever with the Father, and the only One able to fulfil His pleasure; but you will adoringly see Him as such while afflicted in all our afflictions, the Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, the lowly, dependent Man. He ever lived here from a babe in all divine beauty. The manna was on every leaf and every thorn; never could there be anything equal to it. He magnified God in all the details of daily life. He learned nothing from man; so that God is not only well pleased with Him, but His word to us is on the holy mount, “This is my beloved Son: hear him”.
One word more. You must keep your conscience up to your faith. And again, I would ask you to look at Christ on the earth as the Father saw Him, or rather as God saw Him, for all the Persons of the Trinity were expressed by the Man Christ Jesus.
May He lead you into His mind.
J.B.S.