MEASURING THE MASTER
by Richard Burkard
If you're a member of a Sabbath-keeping Church of God group, here's a pop quiz. Can you name the "seven basic mysteries" listed by Herbert W. Armstrong in his final book, Mystery of the Ages?
Each mystery had its own chapter in the book -- but believe it or not, I'm prepared to say one vital mystery was left off his list. And it's a mystery directly referenced in the Bible! Paul mentions it in Colossians 2:2-3:
"My purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge."
The question "Who and What Is God?" actually was the first chapter in Mr. Armstrong's book - but Jesus Christ did not receive a separate chapter, the way angels and Israel did. (You can check on your own for the other chapter titles.) Perhaps that's because Jesus is considered "the Word" of God, "made flesh" (John 1:1, 14). Or perhaps that's because Church of God groups over the years have tended to emphasize God the Father more than Jesus the Son, because they consider the Father "preeminent."
Yet the last words of the apostle Peter in Scripture tell us to "grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ" (II Peter 3:18). We're not really told to grow in our understanding of the Father - but then again, Jesus said, "Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father" (John 14:9).
One of the greatest mysteries of Jesus is how much He was like God when He walked the Earth. United Church of God President Dennis Luker raised some eyebrows among COG traditionalists in 2010 when he said in a video sermon Jesus was "fully God and fully man." One blogger and author challenged that in a lengthy post -- leading to a study of a very deep topic. What was the nature of Christ, while on Earth? How human was He? How Godlike was He -- and in what ways?
The Little Lord Jesus
"Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus," Paul instructs in Philippians 2:5-7: "Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness."
Jesus seemed like any ordinary baby, when He was born to Mary and Joseph. Yet Luke 2 indicates some believers in God knew better - or better put, the Holy Spirit showed them otherwise. While Mom and Dad marveled and perhaps didn't understand completely (2:19), they watched their boy become a man.
"And the child grew and became strong," says Luke 2:40; "he was filled with wisdom...." Yet verse 52 in the King James Version adds Jesus "increased in wisdom and stature...." This indicates He didn't have complete wisdom, even when He asked questions in the temple courts at age 12.
But we must not overlook Hebrews 4:14-15, which describes Jesus as "a great high priest.... one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are - yet was without sin." Mystery #1: How is it that Jesus never sinned as a child?
For example, countless children have told "fibs" about everything from cookie-snatching to watching forbidden TV shows. Yet bearing a false witness to your parents breaks two commandments (Exodus 20:12, 16) - and the indication is that Jesus never did even that.
The explanation for such perfect behavior and conduct may lie in another part of Luke 2:40: "....the grace of God was upon him." Based on the Greek root word, it's the very same grace which justifies us from our sins (Romans 3:23-24) and saves us (Ephesians 2:5, 8) - the grace believers are supposed to be under now, as opposed to being "under law" (Romans 6:14).
Can He? Could He? Would He?
At the start of His ministry, "Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil" (Matthew 4:1). Stop right there!, some traditionalists would say. They detect one difference in how Jesus was not fully God. To quote the blog post mentioned above:
God cannot sin, nor can He be tempted (James 1:13), but Jesus Christ could be tempted....
This strikes me as a quarrel over wording: "can" versus "could." II Timothy 2:14 warns such quarreling among believers "is of no value," but it certainly hasn't stopped COG ministers and members from doing it over the years. In this case, I wondered if the blogger was implying Jesus erred by going into the desert at all. The blogger wrote this reply:
As far as Jesus and God being tempted, God cannot be tempted in that He does not have to struggle to resist a temptation. He is not drawn to sin. He has no desire to sin, and He does not have to struggle against the pulls of the flesh. Whereas, Jesus, when He was human, DID have to struggle. It was not easy for Him. He was PULLED in the direction of sin and had to resist that pull in a way that God does not have to do.
I could see the blogger's point at first, when he went on to cite Hebrews 5. Another article on this website notes Jesus had to be "made perfect" (verse 9) by learning obedience. Yet think for a moment -- hasn't God in heaven faced spiritual pulls similar to two of the tests Jesus faced in the wilderness?
"'Does Job fear God for nothing?' Satan replied.... 'But stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face.'" This was the devil's direct challenge to God in Job 1:8-11, concerning an upright and evil-shunning man. In effect, Satan was urging God (expressed as "the Lord" in verses 6-7) to go against His loving nature toward those who fear Him (I John 4:8, 16)!
"Very well, then," God answered in verse 12; "everything he has is in your hands, but on the man himself do not lay a finger." Note carefully the wording, which also occurs in Job 2:6 -- as God did not directly tell Satan to punish Job! He left it to the devil to decide what to do, just as humans are left with the decision between life and death (Deuteronomy 30:15, 19). But as Satan has done so often in history, a destructive choice was made.
God thus kept Himself blameless - yet we see from this that He had to resist Satanic urges, too. And we're left to wonder if Jesus recalled these moments, when the temptations came later.
Filled to Overflowing?
"For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form...." Paul wrote in Colossians 2:9. How are we to understand this? Was Paul speaking of a resurrected Savior, at the moment these words were written? Did he mean Jesus had that fullness during His years on Earth? And how "full" was Jesus, as His ministry began?
A review of "full" words in the New Testament help answer these questions. John 1:14 says Jesus was "full of grace and truth" - so much of the latter that the Lord later said in John 14:6 He was the truth. And we've already noted from Luke 2 that Jesus became filled with wisdom.
Luke 4:1 adds Jesus was "full of the Holy Spirit." Some would argue so was John the Baptist (1:15), as were several early church leaders (Acts 6:3, 7:55). But John 3:34 says God gave His Son "the Spirit without limit." This would indicate something more than mere humans can have - perhaps because Jesus had the advantage of being God first, before coming to Earth as a man.
The blogger goes on to write concerning Christ:
If He somehow was still "fully God", if there was some aspect of God's power and eternal existence that He kept when He was human, and in that way He was different from us, then His resurrection to God-life proves nothing as far as what God can do for us.
Yet the New Testament evidence shows Jesus had aspects of God's power -- aspects which cannot be explained away by His having the same Holy Spirit believers have today. After all, when was the last time a Church of God picnic or potluck dinner ended with more food than when it began? When Jesus was present, it happened (John 6:9-14) -- and the Bible shows the disciples recognized a miracle when they saw one.
Certainly some COG ministers have stories of encounters with demon-possessed people and moments of healing. By faith, we understand the Holy Spirit moved in those cases. But how many modern ministers can say they go around "healing every disease and sickness" -- the way Jesus did in Matthew 9:35? Not even Pentecostal "faith healers" on television can make that statement. And how many can turn water into wine, as Jesus did in John 2?
As the old Worldwide Church of God modified its explanation of God in the early 1990's, some ministers actually took this blogger's point of view. They said Jesus was not "omniscient," as in all-knowing -- even though the New Testament says in public situations, He "knew their thoughts" (Matthew 12:25/Luke 6:8). The ministers explained the Lord simply was perceptive. Others considered God's almighty power, and suspected it was more than that: "Jesus.... knew all men. He did not need man's testimony about man, for he knew what was in a man" (John 2:24-25).
(We address Christ-centered issues such as this one in another article on this website.)
I'd dare say some worshipers don't consider Jesus "fully God" because they place Him "second in command" under God the Father in the first place. To be sure, the Lord gave credit to "the Father, living in me, who is doing his work" (John 14:10) - but He also mentioned "the Father is in me, and I in the Father" (10:38/17:21). If Jesus's words in John 10:30 are true, "I and the Father are one," how similar do two in the Godhead have to be?
Seriously - Lacking?
"Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus," Paul advises in Philippians 2:5-7; "Who, being in very nature God.... made himself nothing...." If Jesus was not "fully God" while on Earth, what was the Lord lacking?
We've already mentioned Jesus grew into wisdom and complete obedience. He apparently lacked glory, because John 17:5 shows He prayed for it at the "Lord's Supper" Passover. And Colossians 2:12 reveals it took "the power of God" (we might presume the Holy Spirit) to raise Jesus to eternal glory from death.
Yet to borrow from an old hymn, "He could have called 10,000 angels to destroy the world, and set Him free." This comes from Jesus's words during the arrest in Matthew 26:53: "Do you think that I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels?" (Smith's Bible Dictionary says a Roman legion typically had about 6,000 soldiers.) There have been times when I've been thankful simply for one angel intervening to keep me safe -- yet to use modern slang, Jesus was "all-access" to even more.
Are You Full Yet?
The blogger found fault with the phrase "fully God and fully man" for another reason:
It is a subtle way of doing away with the good news of the Kingdom of God, the good news that we can be born into that kingdom.... and when we are born into that divine family through a resurrection, we will BE God as part of God's family.
I frankly don't grasp the logic here. God conceivably could use a variety of means of bringing children into His family and Kingdom. But in His great plan, God chose to do it through Jesus's death and resurrection (Romans 5:10) -- and as at least one Christian radio host has said, "I never would have thought of that."
To put the blogger's reasoning another way: if Jesus was both fully God and fully man, we cannot be both. But let's ask a question in response. Do we have to physically and metaphysically "be God" to be in His family?
"....We ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies," Paul writes in Romans 8:23. Ephesians 1:5 goes farther to say believers are "predestined to be adopted." with life someday given "to your mortal bodies" (Romans 8:11).
Yet Jesus told Nicodemus in John 3 we're supposed to be "born of the Spirit." Paul explained in I Corinthians 15:44, "It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body."
Can a believer in Jesus be a child of God right now? The answer from I John 3:2 clearly is yes: "Dear friends, now are we children of God...." But does that automatically mean we're "fully God" now? No - as the same verse goes on to admit, "what we will be has not yet been made known."
And will we be "fully God" after Jesus returns and the saints are resurrected? Not necessarily, as II Corinthians 3:18 talks about having "ever-increasing glory" coming from God's Spirit. Keep in mind the angels of heaven are "spirit beings" (Hebrews 1:14), yet are not considered God.
The Final Issue
The blogger boils things down to this conclusion about our Savior:
He was never fully God and fully man at the same time. Those are two contradictory conditions that cannot exist at the same time, except in the imagination of those who think God is a trinity.... Deep down inside, people know that to say Jesus was fully God and fully man is a contradiction.
Who is this human author to say two conditions "cannot exist at the same time" when it comes to Jesus? Did not Jesus say in a different context, "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible"? (Matthew 19:26/Mark 10:27) What seems contradictory to men can be compatible to God - such as God being defined as love, yet being "angry every day."
After all this examination of Biblical evidence, how "fully God" would you say Jesus was while on Earth-- especially given some of the miracles attributed to Him? Would you say 70 percent? Maybe 85 percent? Or is it better to say it's a God-given mystery, which mortal man will not know completely until the resurrection?
In preparing this article, I marveled several times at how deep and complex this subject is. I can only hope to have simplified and clarified the wonder of Jesus a little. And it only confirms for me what Paul was led to write in Romans 11:33. "Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!"
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© 2010, Richard Burkard, All Rights Reserved.