The Two Natures of Jesus Christ

This Sunday, Lord willing, I will be preaching from Hebrews 4:14-16 which deals with both the divinity and humanity of Jesus. As a word of comfort for struggling saints the inspired writer emphasizes Christ's identification with us through his humanity. "For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin" (v. 15).

In his wonderful little book Concise Theology, J.I. Packer writes of Jesus' dual nature:

Jesus was a man who convinced those closest to him that he was also God; his humanness is not therefore in doubt. John’s condemnation of those who denied that “Jesus Christ has come in the flesh” (1 John 4:2-3; 2 John 7) was aimed at Docetists, who replaced the Incarnation with the idea that Jesus was a supernatural visitant (not God) who seemed human but was really a kind of phantom, a teacher who did not really die for sins.

The Gospels show Jesus experiencing human limitations (hunger, Matt. 4:2; weariness, John 4:6; ignorance of fact, Luke 8:45-47) and human pain (weeping at Lazarus’ grave, John 11:35, 38; agonizing in Gethsemane, Mark 14:32-42; cf. Luke 12:50; Hebrews 5:7-10; and suffering on the cross). Hebrews stresses that had he not thus experienced human pressures—weakness, temptation, pain—he would not be qualified to help us as we go through these things (Heb. 2:17-18; 4:15-16; 5:2, 7-9). As it is, his human experience is such as to guarantee that in every moment of demand and pressure in our relationship and walk with God we may go to him, confident that in some sense he has been there before us and so is the helper we need.

Christians, focusing on Jesus’ deity, have sometimes thought that it honors Jesus to minimize his humanness. The early heresy of Monophysitism (the idea that Jesus had only one nature) expressed this supposition, as do modern suggestions that he only pretended to be ignorant of facts (on the supposition that he always actualized his omniscience and therefore was aware of everything) and to be hungry and weary (on the supposition that his divinity supernaturally energized his humanity all the time, raising it above the demands of ordinary existence). But Incarnation means, rather, that the Son of God lived his divine-human life in and through his human mind and body at every point, maximizing his identification and empathy with those he had come to save, and drawing on divine resources to transcend human limits of knowledge and energy only when particular requirements of the Father’s will so dictated.

The idea that Jesus’ two natures were like alternating electrical circuits, so that sometimes he acted in his humanity and sometimes in his divinity, is also mistaken. He did and endured everything, including his sufferings on the cross, in the unity of his divine-human person (i.e., as the Son of God who had taken to himself all human powers of acting, reacting, and experiencing, in their unfallen form). Saying this does not contradict divine impassibility, for impassibility means not that God never experiences distress but that what he experiences, distress included, is experienced at his own will and by his own foreordaining decision.

Jesus, being divine, was impeccable (could not sin), but this does not mean he could not be tempted. Satan tempted him to disobey the Father by self-gratification, self-display, and self-aggrandizement (Matt. 4:1-11), and the temptation to retreat from the cross was constant (Luke 22:28, where the Greek for “trials” can be translated “temptations”; Matt. 16:23; and Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane). Being human, Jesus could not conquer temptation without a struggle, but being divine it was his nature to do his Father’s will (John 5:19, 30), and therefore to resist and fight temptation until he had overcome it. From Gethsemane we may infer that his struggles were sometimes more acute and agonizing than any we ever know. The happy end-result is that “because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted” (Heb. 2:18).

* Packer, J. I. (1995, c1993). Concise theology : A guide to historic Christian beliefs. Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale House.

Our affliction and the afflictions of Christ

Over at Ref21 Joel Beeke has written an "open letter to true believers."

Dear believer,

I desire to write you about something with which you are well acquainted: affliction. Much has been written on affliction by our forebears. A good part of it you have known for a long time. For example, you know that all affliction is ultimately traceable to our tragic fall in Adam. You know, too, the grievousness of affliction. After all, who enjoys suffering?

Yet you also know that all affliction is sent by a wise, fatherly God. Perhaps you even know--as the whole book of Job and the Puritans never tire of teaching us--that the important thing is not the amount of affliction we receive, but how we respond to that affliction.

Isn't it just here that your deepest questions about affliction and trial lie? For you want to respond to affliction in a God-glorifying manner, but you feel you often fall inexcusably short. You desire that your entire life may serve God's praise (Isa. 43:21), but somehow when you enter the heat and heart of affliction you find yourself losing grip on your firm intention. To respond rightly to affliction before it comes is hard; to look back on it gratefully after it is over is harder; but to live Christianly in affliction is hardest. Hence you ask yourself again and again: how may I live through affliction more Christianly--in a way that is more like Christ? How may I grow in grace while--yes, while--suffering affliction?

Please take time to read the entire post HERE.

Jesus Christ our Mediator

“It doesn’t matter how complicated, how desperate, perhaps even hopeless your life has become. No matter how overwhelmed you may feel by your problems, if your trust is in Jesus Christ, you can be sure that he is praying for you now and through that prayer he will provide for you the resources to bring you relief or enable you to carry on.

The most important thing that you and I need to learn about prayer is this: first of all and ultimately, prayer is not something we do but what Jesus does for us.”

- Richard B. Gaffin, Christ, Our High Priest in Heaven

Praying Through the Son

Before the throne of God above
I have a strong and perfect plea;
A Great High Priest whose name is Love,
Who ever lives and pleads for me.
- Charitie Lees de Chenez


What does it mean when Christians end their prayer with, “in Jesus’ name”? Too often those words are treated as little more than a postscript or a magic charm invoked to make the prayer more effective. But what is the real significance of praying in Jesus’ name? In the book of Hebrews God reveals to us the role of Jesus in our praying:

“Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4:14-16).

One of the roles of a priest is that he intercedes for God’s people. That is, he prays for them. He takes their sins, their needs, and their frailties before the throne of God. Every priest under the Old Covenant served merely as a shadow of the substance to come in Christ who would be our great and final High Priest. What an intercessor we have in Christ!

The One who knows us even better than we know ourselves intercedes for us in the courts of heaven. The Lord is on our side. We pray in Jesus’ name because as a member of the Godhead, the dearly loved Son of God, Jesus occupies a place of unique authority and power. We pray in Jesus’ name because, while we are weak, He is strong.

J.I. Packer sums up the doctrine of Christ as our heavenly intercessor with characteristic insight:

The reigning Lord intercedes for his people (Rom. 8:34; Heb. 7:25). Though requesting from the Father is part of the interceding activity (John 14:16), the essence of Christ’s intercession is intervention in our interest (from his throne) rather than supplication on our behalf (as if his position were one of sympathy without status or authority). In sovereignty he now lavishes upon us the benefits that his suffering won for us. “He pleads [for us]—by his presence on his Father’s throne” (B. F. Westcott). “Our Lord’s life in heaven is his prayer” (H. B. Swete). From his throne he sends the Holy Spirit constantly to enrich his people (Acts 2:33; John 16:7-14) and equip them for service (Eph. 4:8-12).

Prayer, for the people of God, is an act of trust in God’s complete satisfaction in the cross work of Christ. Christians do not pray in order to appease God. Rather we are able to pray precisely because Jesus drank the cup of God’s wrath so that we could approach with confidence His throne of grace. Our praying is made possible by the atoning work of Christ.

Graham Goldsworthy writes:

“Problems emerge when the task of praying is urged without the motive and pattern of the unique saving role of Jesus. It then becomes a legalistic burden that cannot promote godliness…Prayer that is not the grateful response of the justified sinner is likely to degenerate into an attempt to gain acceptance.”

John Calvin wrote:
“Since no man is worthy to present himself to God and come into his sight, the Heavenly Father himself, to free us at once from shame and fear, which might well have thrown our hearts into despair, has given us his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, to be our advocate and mediator with him, by whose guidance we may confidently come to him, and with such an intercessor, trusting nothing we ask in his name will be denied us, as nothing can be denied to him by the Father.”

Approaching God

One of the problems with many contemporary incarnations of Christianity is the casual stance they often encourage in approaching God. This “chumminess” has infected the church’s worship, preaching, and prayer. God is seen as more friendly than holy. He is portrayed as a jilted lover who wants nothing more than for us to pay him some attention. I remember often being told to have a quiet time because God longs for nothing so much as to be with me. My heart strings were strummed by the notion of God sitting by the side of my bed all day just waiting for me to spend time with him.

As I think back I cannot help but wonder how these ideas affected my understanding of God. Who was truly supreme in this relationship? Was there even room for supremacy? Was there room for true lordship? Or was God just one more responsibility? Was he just one more needy person demanding my time? Theologian David Wells is right when he critiques modern evangelicalism by saying that God rests far too inconsequentially upon the church. He has become “weightless.”

The church desperately needs to recapture a biblical vision for the holiness of God. We need to behold God in all of His undiluted purity and unapproachable light. I am not calling for ecstatic experiences or mystical journeys. I am calling for a fresh apprehension of what the Scriptures clearly reveal about the nature of God. The Bible holds forth a God who is far different from the greeting card deity that infects much of modern Christian spirituality.

The Hebrew word for holy is qadosh which means something like “cut off” or “separate.” One theologian has written that holy refers to “that which is marked off, separated, withdrawn from ordinary use.” God is profoundly separate from His creation. Donald MacLeod writes that “God is utterly different. He is separate from angels, separate from men and, above all, separate from sinners.” God says to His people in Leviticus 20:26, “You shall be holy unto me, for I the Lord am holy and have removed you from other people, that you should be mine.”

In one very important sense God’s holiness means that He is unapproachable. This is seen clearly in some of God’s earliest dealings with His people. When God gave the law He did so by calling Moses into His presence but keeping the people at a distance. In fact to breach the boundary would mean certain death. From that moment God established a pattern of relating to His people through the means of a mediator. The elaborate rituals of the Old Covenant religious rites communicated just how difficult it was for anyone to approach God. Only through a priest at an appointed time and place could the people relate to God.

Does the New Covenant in Christ change any of this? Certainly Christ changes the situation but He does not remove the unapproachableness of God. God’s holiness is not diminished in the New Testament. His purity is no less terrifying to sinners. Jesus has not made approaching God something we can simply assume. Coming to God is a privileged given only to those who by grace through faith are justified (Rom. 5:2). Approaching God is possible not because He has changed in character but because Jesus has made Himself our great High Priest (Heb. 4:14). As MacLeod writes, “The supreme achievement of Christ is that He is the Way – the only way – to God; and He is that only through His broken humanity – the rent veil of His own flesh (Heb. 10:20).”

This is why we preach and sing the gospel. It is why we continue to revel in the truth that Christ died for sinners. Every time we acknowledge that we now have access to God we are acknowledging Christ as our sin-bearing substitute; the One who died in our place. Jesus did not die to make salvation a mere possibility. He did not shed His blood so that God’s redemptive plan could be a potential. Jesus, slain before the foundations of the world, truly died in the place of all those who believe. For them the justice of God has been satisfied. For them God’s righteous wrath has been assuaged having been poured out on His beloved Son.

For this reason and this reason alone can we speak of approaching God. This is why we sing the words of John Newton:
Let us love and sing and wonder
Let us praise the Savior’s name
He has hushed the law’s loud thunder
He has quenched Mt. Sinai’s flame
He has washed us with His blood
He presents our souls to God