Emmanuel

06
Dec
2011

This is My Beloved Son

“For we did not follow cleverly devised tales when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty.

 

“For when He received honor and glory from God the Father, such an utterance as this was made to Him by the Majestic Glory,

 

“’This is My beloved Son with whom I am well-pleased”– and we ourselves heard this utterance made from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain.” (2Pe 1:16-18)

 

 

Readers,

In this study we will take a closer look at one of the most wonderful mysteries in the Bible, that is, the mystery of the Father and the Son. The question we want to unravel is how the earliest Hebrew believers could hold to an absolute monotheism and yet direct their faith and their worship to Jesus Christ as the Son of God, as well as to God the Father?

Not everyone is very familiar with the early Jewish believer’s theology of Christ, while others are little aware of how the Messiah was seen in ancient beliefs of that time. Everything centered on the word ‘identity‘.

With this key in mind let’s take a closer look at the Father and the Son.

 

The Hallmark of Hebrew Christianity

Very often we fail to understand terms like, ‘And the Word was with God,‘ or, ‘He existed in the form of God‘, because these terms are in Hebrew thought form. They don’t always mean the same thing to us as they would to a Jewish person. These expressions were deeply embedded in ancient Judaism. They reflect on a great mystery to be found in God Himself.

The earliest believers saw Jesus Christ as intrinsic to who God really is. Jewish believers had been schooled in the Scriptures and in the ancient sages. They believed that in the one true God was a mystery that reflected on terms such as, ‘the Word’, or, ‘the Form‘, or ‘the Image‘, or ‘the Glory‘, or even, ‘the Shekinah.’

The earliest Christians were absolute monotheist. They believed that Jesus Christ originated in and came forth from the Father, that is, without becoming separate from Him in His spiritual essence. This was part of the mystery that they accepted.

However, what made this belief so strong was that the Scriptures actually wrapped themselves around this great mystery in God. These new Jewish believers were discovering Jesus and letting the words of Moses and the prophets unwrap themselves in their hearts and minds.

It wasn’t long before the non-believing Jewish rabbis countered by accusing the Christian Jews of believing in two powers in heaven. The rabbis used the book Hebrews as a backdrop in their accusations against the Christian Jews, and especially where it says,

“In these last days [the Father] has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world.” (He1:2)

It was this statement that pretty much qualified the earliest theology of the Jewish church. It says that in the last days God has spoken to us (or speaks to us) in His Son, and that it was through His Son that the Father made the world.

 

An Uncomplicated Theology

The early believers fully accepted Jesus Christ as the Son of God, and as Yahweh of the former testament. They also firmly held to a Father-Son view of God.

Paul Himself brings this forth in reaffirming the sh’ma of Israel. He said,

“Yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom are all things and we exist for Him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we exist through Him.” (1Co8:6)

Where Paul says ‘one Lord’, he is drawing on the ancient ‘She’ma’ creed of Israel.

“Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD is one!” (Deu 6:4 NASB)

A great many scholars today are beginning to reach back to a more Hebraic form of theology. They are setting aside the notion that the Trinitarian doctrine is intrinsic to Christianity and that to be a Christian you must accept this form of theology.

This is not an affront against Trinitarian beliefs. It is simply for the benefit of a better understanding of how the early Hebrew Christians generally held to a less-complicated theology of the Godhead.

The point is that the earliest Christians were scriptural-centric. Both Jesus and the apostles instructed the evolving church to never exceed, “what is written”. The term ‘what is written’ had regard to Moses, David, and the prophets.

Thus we hear:

[Jesus] “Now He said to them, ‘These are My words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.’ Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.” (Luk 24:44-45)

[Paul] “Now these things, brethren, I have figuratively applied to myself and Apollos for your sakes, so that in us you may learn not to exceed what is written, so that no one of you will become arrogant in behalf of one against the other.” (1Co 4:6)

 

The Divine Image

The apostles were expressing a very ancient belief held in Israel at that time. Jesus was looked at as the ‘eikon‘ (divine image) of the invisible God. The Judaic beliefs before the rabbis made their anti-Christ intrusions, believed that you had the invisible God who could not be seen, and God who makes Himself visible across history and across time. Or, as one early Christian writer said, “God brought forth from Himself a beginning.”

For the early Jewish believers, Jesus did not become for them a second god or another deity. Paul explained Christ as the hidden mystery of God. The apostle wrote,

“To me, the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ, and to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things.” (Eph3:8,9)

Regardless of how difficult this may seem to us, the groundwork had already been laid for the mystery of the divine image to be revealed. Here are a few Scriptural considerations:

“Who has ascended into heaven and descended? Who has gathered the wind in His fists? Who has wrapped the waters in His garment? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is His name or His son’s name? Surely you know!” (Pro 30:4)

“For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; and the government will rest on His shoulders; and His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. … 

“ … There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this.” (Isa 9:6-7)

“’What do you think about the Christ, whose son is He?’ They said to Him, ‘The son of David.’ He said to them, ‘Then how does David in the Spirit call Him “Lord,” saying, ‘THE LORD SAID TO MY LORD, “SIT AT MY RIGHT HAND, UNTIL I PUT YOUR ENEMIES BENEATH YOUR FEET”‘? “If David then calls Him ‘Lord,’ how is He his son?” (Mat 22:42-45)

“I [Yahweh] will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son, and they will weep bitterly over Him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn.” (Zec 12:10)

 

 

My Lord and My God

How is it than an orthodox one-God, Jewish man could fall down before Jesus, and say, “My Lord and my God?”

And how is it that everything Jesus did in His earthly walk reveals that He was intrinsic to the very identity of God’s person? Jesus did God things.

And so we must agree with the Jewish author who stated that Christianity is the most Jewish of all the non-Jewish faiths.

I would go further as to say that Biblical Christianity fills out the Jewish faith in that the God of the Hebrews came into the earth as a man to fulfill His own program of redemption. Did the early Jewish believers worship the Father and Son as one God? Absolutely.

Now the big question — Does our salvation hinge on acknowledging that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the Lord God Almighty?

John said it well enough;

“Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also.” (1Jn 2:22-23)

 

 

The Mystery Called, ‘Wonderful’

Do we still have a mystery? Sure we do. It is a mystery that is wondrous indeed. What we do know is that the divinity of Jesus lies within God Himself. And when we worship Jesus we are not worshipping a second deity. We are worshipping the Father in the Son.

For all our Christian, Jewish and Muslim friends, take time for this song. Let the Lord open your heart to hear from God – ‘O Come Oh Come Emmanuel’.

Your servant in Christ,

Buddy

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16
Apr
2010

Heaven calling earth…

“But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” (1Pe 2:9 NASB)

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Journal,

One word remains a constant in both the Old Testament and the New Testament, it is the word ‘call,’ or ‘the called.’ The Greek word is kaleo [kal-eh’-o] which means to call someone in order that they may come or to go somewhere or to follow someone.

In 1Thess2:12, Paul says we should, “…walk in a manner worthy of the God who calls you into His own kingdom and glory.”

Romans 8:28 says, “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”

Actually our English word ‘church’ comes from this same root word ‘kaleo ‘. The Greek for church, that is ekklesia (ek-klay-see’-ah] originally spoke of a herald calling free citizens to a gathering. With regard to the church, it addresses that same idea. The church addresses, ‘the called out ones, called to publicly assemble themselves to Christ.’

Where does the call come from? It comes from Christ Himself. When Jesus asked the apostles who they thought He was, Peter responded, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Jesus then said,

“Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock [the heavenly revelation] I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it.” (Mat 16:17-18 NASB)

This statement is so often misunderstood. Jesus was not saying that the church would be built upon Peter. He was saying that the church would be built upon the revelation that Peter received from the heavenly Father, that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. It is upon this heavenly revelation that Christ Jesus would build His church.

Actually there is much more to the picture of being ‘the called’ than meets the eye. It reaches all the way back to ‘paradise lost.’ The place to begin is to take another look at…

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The lost paradise

What was the most precious thing that Adam lost when he rejected God’s word? Notice Genesis 3:8:

“They heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.”

There are  three terms in this Scripture that are very significant. Each term describes what Adam lost. For instance the Hebrew word for ‘sound‘ is ‘kole’, which can literally be translated as ‘voice.’ Where the voice of the Lord had been a comfort to them, now the voice of God frightened Adam and Eve.

They were finding out that sin is not merely something people do. Sin is an influence that seeks to govern our lives. Thus Adam and Eve had come under the very influence and power of sin.

Then you have the word ‘cool.’ The Hebrew ‘ruach,’ means, breeze, spirit, or breath. Adam and Eve had also lost the spiritual refreshing that had been a great part of their walk with the Lord. The bottom line was simple – No more hearing the voice of the Lord on a true spiritual level. No more refreshing from the presence of the Lord. Their lives had forever changed.

Finally the word ‘presence.’ The Hebrew word ‘paneh’ literally means ‘face.’ This Hebrew word is often used metaphorically for the entire person. Adam was now cut off from the ‘person’ or ‘face’ of the Lord.

So, in accepting Satan’s lie, Adam’s life became contaminated by sin. His very nature changed. Adam’s former spiritual walk with the Lord was now replaced by sacrifices. Each sacrifice would speak of Adam’s lost estate, that he had been cut off from the direct presence of the Lord. From that moment on there would be a vacancy in the heart of the human race. We can describe this vacancy as a homesickness. There is a cry in the human heart for a return to paradise.

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The call of eternity.

But God left something in place. He left in Adam and Eve a sense of eternity. Solomon draws attention to this in Ecclesiastes 3:11 –

“[God] has made everything appropriate in its time. He has also set eternity in their heart, yet so that man will not find out the work which God has done from the beginning even to the end. ”

The sage is pointing out that man cannot find out the redemption work of God, without the aid of God Himself. This redemption work of God would come into place through God’s very own Son.
However, this ache of the human heart tells us where religion comes from. All religions are based on man’s attempt to get back to paradise.

Oh yes, the natural man is very apt at inventing religions. But in the midst of all this God did something special. He set forth through Moses a religion that would occupy a space in time until the clock of redemption would reach its determined place. This religion would involve temple sacrifices and a priesthood. From this religion God would send forth prophets to the nations who would speak in His name.

What was God’s time clock of redemption Listen:

“But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. Because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father!’ Therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son; and if a son, then an heir through God.” (Gal 4:4-7 NASB)

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God dismantled religion.

The dismantling of religion began with a prophet’s call. A voice is heard in the wilderness, “Make ready the way of the Lord, make His paths straight.”
John the Baptist would finish up the work of the Old Testament prophet. His job was to introduce the Redeemer. And so we hear John make a startling statement, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” (John 1:29)

For the next three years the Lamb of God would walk the earth. Then we hear some of the last words that Jesus spoke, and that to a thief hanging next to Him on a cross.

“And he [the thief] was saying, ‘Jesus, remember me when You come in Your kingdom.’ And He [Jesus] said to him, ‘Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise.'” (Luk 23:43 NASB)

Paradise lost was now restored. The cross would for all time become the door to heaven. No religion would ever again take the place of a personal walk with God’s Son. The call from heaven would never change.


What is the essence of the call of heaven?

Listen to these Scriptures. Think about the message that they give –

“After being baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove and lighting on Him, and behold, a voice out of the heavens said, ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased.'” (Mat 3:16-17 NASB)
“And He was transfigured before them; and His face shone like the sun, and His garments became as white as light. And behold, Moses and Elijah appeared to them, talking with Him. Peter said to Jesus, ‘Lord, it is good for us to be here; if You wish, I will make three tabernacles here, one for You, and one for Moses, and one for Elijah.’ While he was still speaking, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and behold, a voice out of the cloud said, ‘This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased; listen to Him!'” (Mat 17:2-5 NASB)
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.”He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” (Joh 3:16-18 NASB)

“For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day.” (Joh 6:40 NASB)
“The one who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself; the one who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has given concerning His Son. And the testimony is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has the life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have the life.” (1Jn 5:10-12 NASB)

The call from heaven declares that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, that He died, was buried, resurrected, and ascended into heaven, that He is now Lord, and that by calling upon Him as Lord becomes our introduction into the realm of salvation.

The apostles preached this clarion call from heaven, which simply states, “Whoever will call upon the name of the Lord will be saved.” (Acts2:21; 16:31; Rom10:9,13;

This is why the word church [ekklesia] means ‘the called out ones’. We have been called back into fellowship with the Father through His Son Jesus. We can walk in His presence and enjoy His voice. We are called to live in His grace and in His love. Everything that Adam lost has been restored and much more. The apostle said it has not even entered into our hearts all that God has prepared for us.

So, the questions remain: ‘Have you responded to the call from heaven?’ ‘Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of the living God?’ ‘Have you called upon Him as Lord and Savior?’

While you are thinking on these things listen to this song. The time is short and the hour is late. The Lord is coming soon. Will you be ready?

I have  no other message to leave with you. I cannot help but preach Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

In Christ Always,

Buddy

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