Christ’s Weakened Human Nature
In this issue of the News we present another (the fourth) great truth about Christ’s human nature: that He had a weakened human nature, and now has a glorified human nature. That truth must be added to the teaching that He has a real, a complete and a sinless human nature.
That He had a weakened human nature means that He, during His earthly life, was subject to all the evil results of sin, though not to sin itself. He was subject to sickness, hunger, sorrow, pain, weakness and even to death, just as we are. He was “touched with the feeling of our infirmities” (Heb. 4:15).
Romans 8:3 says that Christ came “in the likeness of sinful flesh,” also teaching this truth. Since this cannot mean that He was Himself sinful, it can only refer to the fact that He was subject to all the evils that sin has brought upon us, to the infirmities of our sinful flesh.
Christ did not, then, come in the likeness of sinless flesh—He was not like Adam, first created and standing in all the glory and splendour of his first estate. He was made like us who have lost that estate and brought upon ourselves not only depravity and guilt, but also the curse of God.
That is a very important truth. Disease, suffering, sorrow and death are all results of our sin and of God’s curse upon sin. That Christ was subject to our infirmities is part of His being made a curse for us. He took them all upon Himself by way of taking our curse upon Himself and carrying it away from us. What a comfort to us, therefore, are all His infirmities!
Isaiah said all this when he prophesied of Christ and called Him “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief” (Isa. 53:3). His “sorrows,” Isaiah said, were to be explained thus: “Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows … He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him” (4-5).
So it was not only His death that had atoning power but also the suffering He endured. Christ Himself confesses this when He says, “Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me, wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger” (Lam. 1:12).
They have further comfort, however. They mean that He knows our trials and sufferings from firsthand experience. He has gone through them, so that we cannot say any more that no one really understands our trials. He understands!
In this way, too, His weakness, pain, sorrow and suffering are all part of our salvation. May we not only “behold and see” (Lam. 1:12) but believe! Rev. Ron Hanko
An Earthly Millennium? (1)
“When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6).
“Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth” (Matt. 5:5).
One reader, in sending in these two texts for discussion, added the question: Do these verses imply a future, earthly millennium?
By the way, something of an aside, I always appreciate it when our readers send in a specific question along with the text they ask to be discussed, if possible. If any text is sent, that I, in discussing the text, will entirely miss the point which concerns the reader.
These two texts really refer to something different (though related), and it will be well to discuss them separately.
In the first passage of Acts, the context informs us that this is a question which the disciples asked of Lord on the Mount of Olivet when they were there with the Lord at the time He ascended into heaven.
It is an interesting passage because it reveals that the disciples were still thinking to themselves that the Lord had come to establish an earthly kingdom. They were the millennialists of that day.
That they had thought in terms of an earthly kingdom throughout Jesus’ earthly ministry is clear from the gospel records. Everywhere they show evidence of their thinking in terms of a kingdom which Jesus had come to establish in Palestine by driving out the Romans and restoring to Israel the glories of the kingdom of David and Solomon. And everywhere the Lord makes clear that this conception is wrong.
In the days of Israel’s life in Canaan the saints very clearly understood, beginning with Abraham, that Canaan was only a picture of heaven. It was during the 400 years between Malachi and John the Baptist when the Maccabees ruled in the land that the people began to think in terms of an earthly kingdom. That notion persisted among the Jews and persists among many today.
Jesus repeatedly made clear, as He does here in Acts 1:7-8, that they are dead wrong. However, it was not until the Spirit was poured out that the disciples finally understood. After Pentecost there is never any mention again of an earthly kingdom. The disciples now knew it was heavenly.
The text in Matthew 5:5 is a bit different.
The text does not mean to deny that the kingdom of Christ is heavenly and not of this earth. That is clear from countless passages in the Old and New Testaments.
We often forget this. This whole universe is God’s world, God’s creation which He loves (John 3:16). While wicked men seemingly rule it in creation, it often appears as if they can make the creation their own and do with it as they please.
But God never relinquishes His claim upon His creation which His hands have formed. It is and remains His. And although now the curse is on it, Christ died also for it. And Christ died for it because God established His covenant with it (Gen. 9:8-17).
When this creation is purged through the fire that shall destroy it at the last day, that creation shall not be annihilated. It shall be purged and from the ashes of the old creation God will make all things new.
And the wonderful thing of it all is that God will give it to His elect as their everlasting inheritance.
Psalm 37 speaks of this repeatedly. Other passages from the prophets foretell it. Revelation 21 emphatically speaks of it: “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away.”
This new earth will be made like unto the heavenly, for all things will be raised to heavenly. And, just as our resurrection bodies will be new and glorious, so will also the place where we will live. Heaven and earth shall be made one.
All will be redeemed in the blood of Christ and will be to the glory of God in Christ forever and ever. Prof. Herman Hanko
The Moral Law and the Nature of God
The Ten Commandments (the moral law) are not arbitrary. They are not a body of precepts imposed by God on men simply to make life hard for them or to control them. They are not, therefore, like many of the laws which we obey in everyday life which are in some respects arbitrary and which can easily be changed.
Speed limits are a good example. On general principles such as the preservation of life, speed limits may be necessary, but even then there is nothing intrinsically wrong about going 100 miles an hour. The setting of a speed limit and the setting of it at 60 or 70 miles per hour is quite arbitrary. Such laws can be changed and often are.
This does not mean, of course, that we may disobey such laws. There is good reason for having speed limits, but even those laws for which we can see no good reason must be obeyed if for no other reason than that the word commands us to “submit … to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake” (I Pet. 2:13).
The moral law is permanent and unchangeable. It is permanent and unchangeable because it is an expression of the very nature and attributes of God Himself. It is unchangeable because God is unchangeable and abiding ever as He is.
In other words, what God says to us in the Ten Commandments is essentially this: Here is what I am and what you must be in relation to Me. This is My glory and the way your life must match and show My glory.
That is not at all difficult to see. The first commandment, for example, is not an arbitrary prohibition of idolatry. It prohibits the worship of other gods because Jehovah is the one only true God. Likewise the second commandment forbids all false worship not just because God happens to be displeased with false worship but because “God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24).
Thus it is with all the commandments.
We would suggest that each of the commandments is closely associated with the following aspects of God’s glory:
- God’s oneness,
- God’s spirituality (God is a Spirit), or invisibility,
- God’s holiness,
- God’s covenant,
- God’s authority or sovereignty,
- God’s life (for He is the living God),
- God’s covenant faithfulness,
- God’s providential ownership and government of all things,
- God’s truth and
- God’s simplicity or perfection.
This is fundamental. This is the reason why the law cannot pass away. It can no more pass away than God or His glory can. It is also the reason why the law has abiding significance for the life of man. God’s glory and attributes always have significance for us. It is even the reason why the law has such power to uncover and condemn our sin. It shows our sin in the blazing clear light of God’s glory.
O how love I thy law! it is my meditation all the day” (Ps. 119:97). Do you love it? Rev. Ron Hanko
