We are continuing to look at Jesus, and not just who He is by title, but we’re looking at who he is by nature.  What is the essence of his being.  In Matthew 16 Jesus asked the disciples … who do you say I am … there’s grace upon grace in answering this question.  We can look at the titles given to Jesus and that can be beneficial to us, but the grace upon grace that animates our mortal bodies, is found in knowing the very substance; the very essence, the very being of Jesus’ person.

Jesus says in Matthew 16 the works of the devil to steal, kill, and destroy mankind and creation, cannot stand against the revelation that the Son of the living God is the Son of man.  The eternally begotten Son, light from light; true God from true God; the one dwelling in the light with the Father, from all eternity.  Possessing immortality in himself, just as the Father possesses immortality in Himself, having come forth as the express image of the Father, the very brightness of the Father’s person.  That Word that has always been with God, and is God, face to face with the Father from before time was, took to himself human flesh.  The Eternal Word was made flesh, and the works of the devil cannot stand against this revelation.  

This is what’s known in Christianity as the hypostatic union …

“Hypostatic” (from Greek hypostasis, meaning
“substance,” “essence,” or “individual reality”) hypostatic refers to
the personal aspect of being. In Christian theology, it is
used to describe the individual person of Christ as the
unifying subject in which both divine and human natures
coexist without confusion, without change, without division, and without separation.  

The soul and the body being joined together in the one human is an example of what the hypostatic union in Jesus looks like.  The soul and the body are two distinct things joined together in a union within the one human being.  With neither the soul or the body being changed by the other, or lost in the other, but both fully coexisting in the one human being.  We are not a body, and we are not a soul.  We are a person, and within our person the soul and the body come together in union.  

The confusion comes in because it can be difficult to see that God and man are compatible.  How can the infinite God become something that’s finite.  How can the transcendent God become a creature.  How can God, the only immortal, assume the likeness of sinful flesh.  How can God who cannot die; feel fear; taste weakness, now put on mortal flesh that is able to taste death, feel weak, be pressed in on by the fear of death.  And the confusion that can stem from what looks like a contradiction causes people to either change the divine nature of Jesus, or change the human nature of Jesus.  Or change who he is.  

The Hypostatic Union is the theological doctrine that in the one person (hypostasis) of Jesus Christ, the divine nature (as the second Person of the trinity) and the human nature (from the Virgin Mary) are united perfectly and inseparably.  This union occurred at the incarnation, when the eternal Son of God (Logos) took on human flesh.  

The incarnation is the birth of Jesus.  Luke 1 says the angel Gabriel visited a virgin named Mary, who was espoused to a man named Joseph.  Telling her you shall conceive a child of the Holy Spirit, and his name will be called Jesus.  The name Jesus means Yahweh saves, or Jehovah saves, or God saves.  That says it all.  Jesus is God in human form.  The incarnation is God, through the eternal Son, taking human nature to Himself, so He can save his people from the disease of sin and death in the flesh.  

Jesus was born of a virgin.  He was not conceived out of the passions aroused in our flesh.  Jesus was not conceived by the passions aroused in a man and a woman.  He has no earthly Father.  He is the Lord from above.  He is the eternal Word, face to face with the Father from all eternity.  The Father in heaven is the uncaused cause of Jesus’ flesh.  As it is written in the psalms and in the letter to the Hebrews, the Eternal Son speaking with the Father, saying a body you have prepared for me.  The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, to conceive the eternal Son within the womb of Mary.  Jesus being by nature God, receiving his humanity from Mary.  Mary bearing in herself the Godman.  Jesus being fully God by nature, and fully man by receiving to himself human nature from Mary.  Born in the likeness of sinful flesh.  Born under the law of sin and death, on account of his human nature.  Fully partaking with mankind in flesh and blood, yet neither his flesh or his blood being corrupted.  Meaning his flesh and his blood is not the flesh and blood of a mere man.  It’s the flesh and blood of God Himself. 

Great is the mystery of godliness God was manifest in the flesh …. In order for humanity to partake with God in the divine nature, God would need to be manifested in human flesh.  The only way for mankind to be one with the Father even as the Son is one with the Father, is if the eternal Son, who is eternally begotten, was begotten in human flesh, himself being the fulness of deity born in human flesh, joining God and man, the divine nature with human nature in his person, both natures simultaneously existing in Jesus, neither being lost or compromised, having distinction, but not division.  

This is what John is talking about in chapter 1 of his gospel when he says the Eternal Word was made flesh, and tabernacled amongst us.  How does the eternal Word tabernacle among us?  We are tabernacling in this earthy house.  The eternal Word dwelled with us in the same tabernacle of earthy flesh, we dwell in, ( and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.  

Some read the Word was made flesh, and suppose the Word there is only a thought, or a message.  Certainly it’s true that God becoming flesh tells a story.   But the Word is more than only a message.  It’s both the logic and wisdom of God, as well as the eternal Son, the 2nd person in the Godhead.  Others read the word was made flesh and suppose, the Word became something entirely different than what he is by nature, no longer being Light from Light true God from true God, but becoming a mere mortal man, in the incarnation.  

The eternal Word did not become something else by nature when he joined himself to human flesh.  He partook with us in our nature.  He did not, and can not become something else entirely by nature.  He did not and cannot have ceased in being the express image of the Fathers person and brightness of the Fathers glory.  Or else we are saying there is a time when the Father was without His image and without the brightness of his person.  

The word was made man as we are, but was not changed, as Lord.  As it is written in Hebrews 13:8 Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever. 

Isa 9:6 speaking of the incarnation of our Lord says, For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, Everlasting Father, not the Father himself, but sent by the Father to father everlasting life in the earth, The Prince of Peace. 

In Luke 1 Elisabeth who is pregnant with John the Baptist, encounters Mary for the first time since she became pregnant with Jesus.  The scripture says the babe lept in her womb, Elisabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, saying “ whence is this to me, that the MOTHER OF MY LORD should come to me.  The word Lord is Yahweh.  Elisabeth calls Mary the mother of Yahweh.  Herself being filled with the Holy Ghost, seeing the Word that was made flesh, was not a mere mortal, but was God Himself, manifested in human flesh, to save His people.  

John 10:33 the Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.  Jesus called himself the light of the world, while in the likeness of sinful flesh.  A mere mortal man cannot be the Light. 

Well if the word cannot change, how can Jesus die.  God cant die

1st Peter 3:18 speaking of the death of our Lord says Christ was put to death in the flesh.  The eternal Word cannot die, He is the very substance that holds all things together.  He is that which gives life and breath to everything that exists.   Possessing the fulness of immortality within Himself.  Thats why Jesus assumed flesh and blood.  Thats why a body was prepared for Jesus, through Mary.  Jesus was joined together with human nature so that by taking human nature to himself he can taste death for all people, all without his divinity being changed. 

We quote verses like 2nd Cor 5 that says Jesus became sin.  We quote verses like Galatians 3:13 that says Jesus was made a curse for us.  Jesus didnt become sin or a curse by nature.  The substance of his being didn’t change from divinity to sin.  The substance of his being didnt change from light and immortality to a curse.  Jesus became sin.  He became a curse, consequentially, not in essence.  Meaning he took the death and cursing that was the consequence of our sin into himself, knowing it was not possible for it to hold him because he is by nature God.

What about Philippians 2?  Didnt Jesus put off his divinity?  Well thats not exactly what it says.  What it says is Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon himself the FORM of a servant, and was made in the LIKENESS of men:  And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.  

Paul isnt saying Jesus stopped being God.  He’s talking about how Jesus who is God was able to subject all things whether in heaven or in earth to Himself.  Earth was under the reign of death, so Jesus could not gather all things in the earth to himself, without first being made subject to the death that was reigning over the earth.  There was a principality and power ruling in the earth.  The rulers of the darkness of this world.  The prince of the power of the air.  Paul’s talking about how Jesus was able to spoil principalities and powers, and deliver the kingdom to the Father.  Jesus who is God by nature, cannot die.  He cannot be tempted.  Having never felt what it’s like for fear and weakness and pain to press in on him.  So he lowered himself to our estate.  He allowed himself to take partake of a nature that could be beset with weakness for the purpose of being tempted.  He assumed human flesh, without changing who he is by nature.  He fashioned himself in the likeness of a slave, for the purpose of tasting our death, all the while remaining free from the fear of death, himself being immortal by nature.  All for the purpose of gathering all things to himself, whether in heaven or in earth.  

The incarnation is the revelation that the Son of God is the Son of man.  It’s the incarnation of God.  It’s the revelation of God manifest in the flesh.  The gates of hell; the works of the devil to murder mankind and creation cannot stand against the revelation of God manifested in the flesh.   Jesus isnt a mere man.  His flesh and His blood is not the flesh and blood of a mere man.  The very substance of his being is that which has no beginning, so it can never have an end.  The scripture says that Satan would eat dust all the days of his life.  One of the things it means is you could say well he’s going to return to dust.  The scripture says he’ll be turned into ashes.  But another thing that it meant is you will feed on dying flesh all your days.  The serpent, that old dragon; the sea dragon was confused when he saw the Godman, Jesus, because Jesus is dwelling in the likeness of sinful flesh.  His flesh can taste death.  And so the serpent is trying to swallow his flesh on the cross, just like Jonah was swallowed in the belly of the whale.  But now there’s a problem because when he eats the flesh of someone who is immortal by nature, you know what happens?  He has to spit them out.  The sea dragon has to spit Jesus out of the grave because it’s not possible for his flesh to enter corruption, because he’s immortal by nature.  Jesus was able to enter our death by taking to himself flesh and blood in the incarnation.  But because he’s immortal by nature.  When he tastes death in his flesh, his divinity wells.  The divine nature that is Father, Son, and Spirit wells up.  It was impossible for death to hold him because he’s God.  He’s immortal by nature.  And now he comes out of the grave having conquered death in the flesh.  The serpent having spit out his flesh because his flesh hasn’t been born from sin and death.  And all those who believe God became a man through the eternal Son, not shedding his divinity, but ministering his divinity to them by way of his humanity.  They shall be made lively stones, built up a spiritual house in him, and the purposes of Satan to steal their inheritance; the purpose of satan to steal the promise of God from them, by destroying their flesh, cannot prevail against them, for their life is built upon the immovable Rock 

Jesus putting on human flesh in no way lessens his divinity.  God cannot be changed or altered.  He isn’t less God when he joined himself to the burning bush.  He is no less the divine nature, just because he assumes human flesh … whether the flesh of Jesus was in the likeness of sinful flesh, or whether it was deified in the resurrection and ascension.  It’s still the body of God.  And if it be not the flesh of God.  If it’s not God who has taken our flesh to Himself, then there be no hope of salvation for anyone in human flesh.  For it is not by the resurrection that flesh is solely saved, but it is by God taking flesh to Himself that flesh is saved … the resurrection is the result of God first taking human flesh to himself in the incarnation.  

Prayer