“Jesus was a
human, and yet he is God.”
How is this
possible?
The
categories “God” and “man” are normally taken to be mutually exclusive, so how
could there be, or have been, a God-man, such as Jesus is seen by Christians?
Just think
of some of the characteristics we would use to describe God, and then compare,
and indeed contrast, them with the characteristics of human beings.
Obviously,
in our minds it is impossible.
And yet, if
we respect the written word of evangelists and apostles, it is true!
The ‘Logos’,
which was God, became a human and made his dwelling among us.[1]
In the Bible,
we find many teachings that would appear to be inconsistent or ignoring the
natural laws as we observe them.
Most people
in the secularized world take it that ‘god’ is just a fantasy-idea of those who
believe in fairy tales or at least lack a good education, or perhaps for those
who are weak and fearful.
Paul,
already wrote that the Gospel was foolishness for the Greeks.[2]
On the
other hand, the Bible tells us that human knowledge and wisdom is ignorant and
foolish if it rejects the Word for its apparent inconsistencies. In other
words, the biblical truth is often more complex than we can fathom with our
limited mind-frame.
For the
secular mind, this is indeed an insurmountable obstacle, but also among
Christians this frequently generates disagreements and schisms. Throughout the
centuries, churches have professed that the biblical canon is the infallible
Word of God. Jesus did not hesitate to refer to the Septuagint, the Greek
translation of (what we now call) the Old Testament, as authoritative for his
time, so the early church included ‘the teaching of Jesus and the apostles’ as
the criterion by which all teaching and prophecies had to be tested. Paul often
claims that his writings are the very words of God; hence those who reject his
teachings, reject the Word of God.[3]
Over time, this ‘apostolic deposit’ was more specifically defined as the New
Testament.
While the
Christian church confesses that the Bible is the Word of God, yet we all know
that it was written by human authors, each with their own experiences, gifts,
and personal use of language. The Bible books also come to us in different
genres, as they existed at that time. Nevertheless, we may not therefore
dismiss the apostolic teaching as if it merely expresses the authors’ opinions,
influenced by the culture of their times.
Yes, they
are historical books, written by ordinary men. Yet, in the writing God directed
them to write in such a way that the written word was God’s own teaching, authoritative
for the church of all times and places.
The Bible,
thus, is a collection of books, written by human beings, and yet it is the authoritative
Word of God. The tension, here, provides us with a hermeneutical challenge as
well as a test of true discipleship.
Having
explored some of the biblical ‘complexity’ in relation to our ‘simple’ minds,
we can explore the issue of “free will”.
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