Beginning with verses that declare the Son, this section of the Advent flow of verses I’ve selected that focus Him as the Second Person of the Trinity. Christ is preeminent. Always and forever. Let us exult in verses which proclaim a truth that should enlarge our heart and shake our soul with wonder.
Aren’t we fascinated with Angels! They appear in art, literature, drama, and of course, the Bible. They are first mentioned in Genesis 2:1 where it is written,
Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.
Host is another name for the angel army. Since God finished His work and called it all good, why does there need to be an army, which fights in warfare? Warfare isn’t good. Matthew Henry explains,
Jesus is the Son of God. Jesus is God. Jesus co-existed in eternity with God, perfectly self-sufficient and satisfied with His communion with the other two persons of the God-head.
But God…loved us and He sent His Son Jesus to seek and save the lost, enacting this magnificent plan of the sacrifice, the cross, the resurrection- the Gospel.
Jesus was and is and is to come. He existed before time and He will be living after time ends. His incarnation and life on earth, death, and resurrection means He will be brining his people into eternity with Him, to live as co-heirs of all there is. Angels aren’t eternal, they had a moment when they didn’t exist but then were created. Humans aren’t eternal either, we have a moment when our own creation begins (Adam & Eve, in the Garden, then all of us in the womb.)
The verse today affirms these truths. Jesus said “Before Abraham was, I AM.” I am, meaning He is always in the present. All of those who are in Christ Jesus are also given the gift of eternity…to be with Him, to dwell with Him in joyous worship, to serve Him forever.
Propitiation. A hard word to pronounce…and a hard word to understand, but we have to try, since the verse says this is the reason God sent His son.
that by which God is rendered propitious, i.e., by which it becomes consistent with his character and government to pardon and bless the sinner. The propitiation does not procure his love or make him loving; it only renders it consistent for him to exercise his love towards sinners. In Easton’s Illustrated Bible Dictionary. (1893)
An offering that turns away the wrath of God directed against sin. According to the NT, God has provided the offering that removes the divine wrath, for in love the Father sent the Son to be the propitiation (or atoning sacrifice) for human sin (1 John 4:10). Pocket dictionary of theological terms (1996).
The Easton’s definition uses the word ‘consistent’. God is able to do anything but it would not be consistent with His holy character to abandon his promise to punish wrongdoers for their sin. He could turn away His wrath by deciding to do so, but it would destroy His perfectly just nature to be capricious. No, God is consistent, Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today, and forever. (Hebrews 13:8). “For I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed“. (Malachi 3:6).
So He sent His Son to be that sacrifice and absorb God’s wrath for our sins, though Christ was sinless.
In Matthew 4:3, at the Temptation of Jesus, the devil said to Jesus,
And the tempter came and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”
In Matthew 4:6, at the temptation of Jesus, the devil said to Jesus again-
“If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down; for it is written: ‘HE WILL GIVE HIS ANGELS ORDERS CONCERNING YOU’; and ‘ON THEIR HANDS THEY WILL LIFT YOU UP, SO THAT YOU DO NOT STRIKE YOUR FOOT AGAINST A STONE.’”
Why did the devil say, ‘If’? We know that the devil and his unholy angels knew that Jesus is the Son of God. (Matthew 8:29, Mark 3:11). They knew He is the Lord Most High. (Mark 5:7) The Holy One of God. (Mark 1:24). And satan is the ringleader of them all, and he certainly knows who Jesus is.
One reason satan perhaps used IF, is maybe satan wanted to create doubt in Jesus’ mind as to the faithfulness of the Father. That’s what satan does, bring doubt and confusion. He did it to Eve. We also know satan is full of pride, even planning to boot God from His throne and place his own throne higher than God’s. So perhaps satan thought he had enough skill and power to create doubt in Jesus’ mind, like he did with a third of the Host of Angels that chose to follow him instead of God. If Jesus doubted for even a second, Jesus would have sinned and it would be game over.
But I have a theory that I think is even more plausible than satan’s potential effort to create doubt in Jesus through the Temptation.
Pride. Pride is a powerful sin, and the first sin found in heaven. (Ezekiel 28:15). It caused a rebellion in heaven and the disgrace and exile of satan and all the fallen angels who chose to follow him. It is an even more potent weapon in satan’s hands against us puny humans here on earth, who have no advantage of being angelic powerful beings who personally have seen God and His works. We are mere creatures living in the finite world and are polluted through and through with sin- pride among them.
If you are in a situation where someone is competitive against you, or passive-aggressive, or behaves in any other not quite proper way toward you, often they will appeal to your ego as a put-down. A peer might try to gain an advantage over you by saying, “If you have all the experience you say you do, then you should be able to handle leading this project.” A bratty sibling might say, “If you’re as smart as you always say you are, then go ahead and show me…” Kids on the playground say things like, “If you’re not a scaredy cat, then go across the monkey bars!” If…if…if.
These are appeals to our ego, which at root is pride. When we’re issued a challenge like that, unfortunately we display a knee-jerk reaction that is a cover for our defensiveness. We want to defend our honor, our skill, our reputation, so we succumb to the challenge. We want to overcome the taunt. ‘Yeah, I’ll show that guy!” When we do, the challenger wins.
I think that is what satan was trying to do. Not get Jesus to doubt IF he was the Son of God, because they both knew that He is, but to goad Jesus into defending himself, which, of course, would take his focus off God.
But the challenge was not between satan and Himself. It was between satan and God. Satan is at war with God, and he was simply using Jesus as a point of attack in this long war. Jesus knows who He is, He IS God, AND he is the Son of God. (Don’t ask me how that works, it just is.) Jesus has no pride. He has no ego. He submitted completely to the will of the Father and was/is content to carry that out. He did it perfectly. As it pleased the Father to crush His Son, it pleased the Son to be crushed.
How could the King of Glory who voluntarily left His abode in heaven to become incarnated in finite flesh and willingly emptied Himself, have pride? Have an ego that could be goaded? When someone has a great deal of sin they often see that same sin in others. Satan is blinded by his own pride and his own lust to become king of the universe. He likely thinks everyone else is competing for place, has pride-driven ego, and can be taunted. And why not? It works on humans every day. So at the Temptation, why not use the trusty ego-taunt on human Jesus? A Jesus that satan already believes he will overcome someday? (Isaiah 14:13-14)
Jesus is so firmly rooted to the word of God (He IS the Word) that He does not need to prove anything to anyone. He is perfect in every way, no sin found in Him. He is not defensive. He is not goaded. He is not insecure. Even in cleansing the Temple, he wasn’t out of control, He stopped to braid a horse whip first, then righteously cleansed the temple with zeal for His Father’s house.
Our lesson is that we must also rest in our identity. We are in the Father as one of His children. We must be rooted in the Word, not the world. We don’t succumb to taunts to prick our ego like, “If you’re really a loving Christian you’d…” or “If you really believe what you say, then do what I ask…” “If you’re not a hypocrite then you would…”
We need to be strong in our identity, certain of the promises of God, calm and patient with mockers. We don’t need to prove things to scoffers, or overcome taunts, or be defensive. If we remember our heavenly home and all the glory and joy that awaits in eternity, we can withstand the tiny pricks of a scoffer for now.
Look how satan ends up. For all his power (given to him by God) and all his persuasive abilities, all the chaos and damage he’d caused, he will end up an insignificant worm at the bottom of Sheol:
Nevertheless you will be brought down to Sheol, To the recesses of the pit. Those who see you will stare at you, They will closely examine you, saying, ‘Is this the man who made the earth tremble, Who shook kingdoms, Who made the world like a wilderness And overthrew its cities, Who did not allow his prisoners to go home?’ (Isaiah 14:15-17).
And sadly many of those who taunt us or challenge us with “If-statements” will also be brought down to Sheol. At those tempting moments, we have an opportunity to display a Christ-like reply to those people, as Jesus did to satan, and perhaps the Spirit has elected such a one to be struck by our love and certainty of the goodness of God, and be saved from that pitiful eternity. But first we have to slay that ole pride at the root of our ego.
From Day 12-16 we are looking at verses that focus on Jesus as The Son. Yesterday we read the scripture from John 3:16, how God so loved the world that He sent His only begotten Son. Today we read how God was pleased with His Son whom He sent.
Jesus has been incarnated, gestated, and ill-treated. (Herod’s aim to wipe Him out caused the cataclysmic genocide of all children in the region under the age of two).
While growing up, Jesus was obedient in all things to his earthly parents. God was pleased with this. Now is the time where Jesus emerges on mission to seek and save the lost. He is baptized by John.
In those days Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And immediately coming up out of the water, He saw the heavens opening, and the Spirit, like a dove, descending upon Him; and a voice came from the heavens: “You are My beloved Son; in You I am well pleased.” (Mark 1:9-11).
Just think, a nexus point on earth where all three Persons of the Trinity were congregated, initiating the extraordinary plan of God to save His people.
And so begins the most incredible period of time on earth there ever was.
I read a good essay at The Master’s University site this morning. It’s a summary of Nathan Busenitz’s chapel sermon called “What Does it Mean to be Successful?“
“Therefore we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad” (Legacy Standard Bible). (2 Corinthians 5:9)
God cares about why we do things, not simply what we do. And this should change everything about how we pursue achievement because God Himself is the right measure of success. ~Nathan Busenitz
I’ve thought a lot about the difference between secular success and Christian success over the years since I was saved. The article hit a home run with me.
I was saved by grace at the age of 42, so I had a lot of years pursuing success in the secular world. I come from a well-heeled, highly successful family. Getting a Ph.D was a usual career path. My immediate family and extended family is full of high powered entrepreneurs, doctors, professors, and Silicon Valley software Google engineers. One cousin got into MENSA, the genius group. They’re all ‘wicked smaht’ as they say in New England.
So there is a lot of pressure to follow the family expectations. Which is a good thing. They pursue excellence, and they were fortunate enough to be able to afford Ivy league Higher Education and other great colleges to attain their goals. I’m proud of them.
I was on that path too. I was tapped to write a booklet for Brown University and it was published. As a Grad Student I was asked to co-write a piece for The Reading Teacher Journal and it was published. I was asked to be an Editorial Assistant for the University of Chicago’s National Association for the Study of Education 98th and 99th Annual Yearbook of Education Research and earned a credit in the foreword. I attained a 4.0 grade in my Master’s Degree in Education, and was vetted and pushed to continue into the Ph.D program. I founded and ran an award-winning newspaper, earning 2 New England Press Association awards for editorial writing and a 3rd for Advertising Excellence. I was trained by Bloomberg News. I was appointed by the Maine Senate to serve on a Maine State Legislative Committee to look into improving and protecting Maine’s Right to Know Laws. The recommendations of our committee were passed by the Legislature.
As a secular person, I was climbing the success ladder, earning credits, notoriety, and reputation. I thought I was good. Then I made the same discovery that Saul of Tarsus had made:
But whatever things were gain to me, these things I have counted as loss because of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them mere rubbish, so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; if somehow I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. (Philippians 3:7-11).
I had potential. I was getting somewhere. I was becoming SOMEBODY. Only…outside of Christ we are nobody. We are pagans, wallowing in the mud, even lower than the pigs.
Christ came to serve. As a newly minted Christian I prepared to do the same. What I achieved before I must count as rubbish.
The very definition of my job now, is support. I serve. I serve kids in the classroom and the teacher I support. I am a Teacher’s Aide, a lowly job compared to the heights of others jobs I had potential to reach, and expectations to do so. However, Christ’s expectations are that we humble ourselves, be content in the arenas in which He desires to put us, and to serve in whatever fashion He may have readied us for.
Some serve in the heights. I am designated to serve in the lowlands, what would be considered a failure by world standards. A job where a full college degree isn’t required. In fact, I was rejected for a job as a teacher’s aide in another school when I first applied, they said I was overqualified. And I was…I am. But that is according to the world’s standards.
Pride is a deadly sin, infecting us thoroughly from birth. It was even found in the pure and righteous heaven, the place where glory dwells, in Lucifer’s heart. He was the guardian of the throne of God, (Ezekiel 28), blameless in his ways, till pride was found in him. No longer content to serve, he promised ‘I will’ ascend higher than God. (Isaiah 14:13). He won’t.
It took a while to release attraction to the world’s definition of success and look unto God’s version of success. I was proud of “my” successes, “my” heights, until I wasn’t. I had done it for me, not for God.
The Westminster Shorter Catechism describes what we are to do while drawing breath here on earth:
Nothing we do apart from God is worth anything, because we are NOT doing not for God or to glorify Him. In fact, Romans 1:18-21 says we do the opposite of glorify Him, on purpose,
Romans 1:22 has the result of this deadly suppression of the truth of our main job on earth,
For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their reasonings, and their senseless hearts were darkened.
For 78-80 years of a usual female life span here in America, I could have gone along and been somebody. I could have, and would have, spending my lifetime cultivating reputation, accolades, personal satisfaction. And that would have been great- until I died.
And just as it is destined for people to die once, and after this comes judgment, (Hebrews 9:27).
What would I say to God? ‘I did it my way’? ‘It was fun while it lasted’? ‘I was making my legacy’? Our lives are but a vapor, and our legacy or reputation even less. It’s a few words carved on a headstone, one that after a few years is covered over with leaves and sunken crooked and obscured by frost heaves.
Where is their legacy? How is their reputation? What are their achievements? EPrata photo
The only reputation is Jesus’. The only legacy is His from the cross. The only way is His WAY.
Who am I? Who was Moses? Pharaoh’s daughter’s adopted son, rather than enjoying the riches of Egypt he was willing to suffer with his people instead, and thus was considered a friend of God and the most humble man on earth. His was a far better trade. Who was David? King of Israel, reputed warrior, yet content to dance nearly naked in public for joy in God’s mighty works. Who was Solomon? God personally said to him, “Ask for whatever you want me to give you” and Solomon answered by calling himself a little child and pleaded for wisdom to do right by God’s people. (1 Kings 3:9). Who was Paul? A Hebrew of Hebrews, attaining heights unusual for someone his age, from the reputable tribe of Benjamin, yet counted all his efforts for God prior to that moment on the road to Damascus as vile rubbish.
So who am I? No one. No one like Moses, David, Solomon, Paul. Make myself of no account and make much of Jesus.
Nobody…except a child of God. A person made in His image and given grace to repent and become adopted into His family. With a future bright with eternal bliss and joy, worshiping in the presence of the One True God. A woman given means to glorify Him in ways that hopefully actually glorify Him. Earning not an earthly, temporary, vaporous reputation, but one that will last in heaven as He resounds with the hoped-for welcome-to-heaven comment, “Well done good and faithful servant.”
The only good is from Him. The only service is to Him. And it’s enough.
With today’s post, we’ve now flowed through the first section of this series, in looking at verses that prophesy Jesus’ coming, His arrival, and His early life.
Starting tomorrow, from Day 12-16 we will look at verses that focus on Jesus as The Son.
From Day 17-26, verses will focus on the preeminence of the Son, His works, and Ministry.
Days 27-36, His resurrection, ascension, and return.
the-end-time.org 