Our emphasis has always been Christ crucified.  Our emphasis will always be the Eternal Word made flesh.  There’s no other foundation that can be laid than the revelation of Jesus Christ.  Christ is the image of the invisible God.  What we see in his person is become unto us our knowledge of God.  The Revelation of Christ is become unto us, the wisdom and power of God, working in our life to bring about theosis.  Theosis refers to the process by which human beings are transformed into the likeness of God, participating in the divine nature.  

Paul says like a wise master builder he laid the foundation that is Christ Jesus. We’ve been laying the foundation of the person of Christ Jesus, so we can stand on the rock, and from the foundation of who Jesus is, see the economy of salvation.  Most of the confusion surrounding the gospel and the work of God in Christ comes from a lack of understanding about the person of Christ.  When you see the substance and the makeup of Christs person.  When you see the unity of both the divine nature and human nature inside of the Godman, Christ Jesus.  It gives clarity to the economy of salvation. 

Matthew 1 talking about the birth of Jesus, which is called the incarnation, says an angel appeared to Joseph, and told him Mary will conceive a child of the Holy Ghost, and you shall call his name Jesus for HE SHALL SAVE HIS PEOPLE FROM THEIR SINS.

The incarnation is the revelation of salvation.  It tells us salvation is about God desiring to dignify our humanity with his divinity.  God saves us from our sin by deifying human nature.  In the incarnation God honors our humanity, as being very good.  He doesnt repent from his initial statement in Genesis when he makes man and says it’s very good.  Thats not to say the work of the cross and the subsequent resurrection werent needed for the culmination of the salvation that appeared in the incarnation.  It’s merely to say that the very moment the eternal Word; the Son of the Living God; the one dwelling in the light of immortality with the Father from eternity; the moment he assumed flesh and blood, we can see the deification of human nature, in his humanity.  

The term salvation talks about something happening to you that is exceedingly abundantly above all you can ask or think.  The greatest thing that can happen to human beings is to be made as God by the incarnation of the Word.  The unity of Christs person is unto us theosis.  Gods assumption of human existence in Christ achieves salvation and deification.  As Hebrews says Christ partook with us in flesh and blood to destroy the power of death.  Christ partook with us in our nature, that we, through his humanity, might partake with him in his divine nature.  God ministers to our humanity, by becoming a man.  The humanity of God is full of grace for us.  God becomes as a decoration to your mortality; he beautifies you; he beautifies your flesh with the glory of His immortality.  And through that you become as an ornament unto Him, where He’s glorified, on account of how beautiful He’s made you.  

There’s a lot of confusion surrounding the nature of Christ.  It’s really no surprise the enemy would want to create confusion around the person of Christ.  Its in the person of Christ our humanity overcomes the works of the devil.  Thats why 1st John says any spirit that does not confess God is come in the flesh, is anti-christ, or against the revelation of Christ.  When John says that Christ is come in the flesh, he means God is come in the flesh through the Eternal Word.  I think one of the reasons there’s confusion is because people struggle to see that God and man are compatible.  The divine nature is completely compatible with human nature.  The incarnation proves God and human are 100% compatible.  

When the Eternal Son, who is begotten divinity, that is divinity brought forth from the bosom of the Father.  The same substance as the Father.  Light from Light. True God from true God.  When Jesus who is both the divine nature and a distinct person existing within the eternal Godhead, assumes human form, he receives humanity, and unites it to his person.  The incarnation is both unifying and defying at the same time.  By assuming human existence, the Son deifies it, and in deifying it, he assumes it in his person, in one and the same divine action.  

The Son did not become two people in the incarnation.  He’s not half God and half man.  He’s one enfleshed nature.  He’s by nature God; He’s by nature immortal, and without changing his nature, he was born a man.  And as a result of the unity of both natures, one nature was formed out of both.  God has been humanized and humanity defied in Christ — so the savior, even though he is become flesh, is one and the same God.  Once God assumes the nature of human, his humanity doesn’t stand separate from His divinity.  He’s fully God and fully man all at the same time.   It’s not that he’s God sometimes, and a mere man at other times.  Yes he’s fully human.  Yes he has a spirit, a soul, and a body, but it’s not the humanity of a mere man.  Its not the body of a mere man.  Its not the blood of a mere man.  Its the body and blood of God.  It’s the humanity of God.  The one who assumes humanity is God, and the humanity that is assumed is also God. 

2Co 8:9  For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that you through his poverty might be rich. 

This isnt talking about money.  It’s talking about Christ who is God, took upon himself the poverty of dying flesh, so that we might come to possess the richness of his divinity.  The Sons descent into the depths of our fallen condition enables us to rise from it.  He who is full has emptied himself …. So that we might partake in his fulness.  By humbling himself in the incarnation, Christ is the Good Shepherd, who sought out the sheep that were lost.  We were lost in the affliction that came upon our nature; our condition was fallen into death and corruption and mortality.  The unity of the incarnation emphasizes Christs assumption of our human brokenness.  Even though the Son remains incorruptible in his own divine existence, God has fully entered into and submitted to human suffering and death, so that when the devil attacks Jesus, he unwittingly meets with God, and death is defeated by death. Christs suffering, God, that is, in his flesh suffering, shows just how great Gods love is for us because in his flesh, the eternal Son, God, has died in order to be able to raise us from the dead within the body of his own resurrection.  

Psa 107:20  He sent his word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions. 

The Word here is Jesus.  The Word, that is, God, became flesh to heal our brokenness.  For salvation to come to human beings, who partook of flesh and blood, and are suffering at the hands of death in the flesh.  It requires someone who is not subject to death, to inhabit; or take to themselves the fulness of the nature thats been corrupted by sin and death. The nature of human, which was meant for the dignity of deification, can only be cleansed from the corruption that comes from death in the flesh, if someone who is by nature not subject to death, is somehow found to be in the same state of death mankind is in.  

God needed someone that when there body is broken, and their blood is shed, what’s unveiled in their humanity is immortality.  The only way to heal the human condition from the poverty that came upon us from mortality, is if someone can enter into our brokenness, and for that person to possess something in themselves, that heals brokenness.  The only way the nature of human can be healed from the frailty of dying flesh is if someone can partake with them in their weakness but also possess in themselves something that heals the frailty of human flesh.  God needed someone to come in the likeness of mortality, but possess in themselves, by nature, immortality.  God needed someone who can enter into the depths of our despair; someone who can taste the passion of mortal flesh; stand in the face of everything that torments us …. Someone who can experience what’s its like to be movable/passable but at the same time be immovable/ impassible by nature …. So that in entering the depths of human brokenness, through themselves being human, they can reach into the poverty of the human condition and heal it. 

Theres no other being like that but God.  It’s God himself that needed to be crucified for the sin of the world.  God had to partake of the curse.  God had to be intimate with the wages of sin.  The scripture records the eternal son saying to the Father, in the psalms and the letter to the Hebrews, a body you prepared for me.  The Father is the cause of the Sons body.  He begat the Son, He sent the Holy Spirit to fashion a body within the womb of Mary.   To do what?  To become the crucified God, To assume the nature of human in his person, so that in him being able to taste death in his humanity; in him being able to enter the depths of our despair; he can heal our humanity. 

Salvation is the deification of human nature.  It’s the dignifying of the human condition with the divine nature. The creator of all things partook with you in your nature, so he can deify your nature in his humanity.  The Creator who created you for deification, sets the process of your deification into motion by assuming your humanity in his divine person.  When you begin to see God manifested in the flesh, you begin to see the incorruptible one; the one who is the light, dwelling in the light of immortality, being one with your humanity; himself being fully human, while simultaneously being fully divine. You see him in the midst of your human existence.  It shines his light into your nature.  It shines his light into your soul.  It serves you with salvation … it purges your conscience from sorrow … it covers you in His mercy.  

When God was born a man it revealed his intentions towards human beings is to heal their nature.  It made an open display of His love for mankind.  The love of God is seen in him becoming a man. They say that imitation is the greatest form of flattery.  Well what manner of love has the Father bestowed on us, that He has adopted our humanity to Himself, through the incarnation of His Son.   This is the love of God.  This is the tenderness of God towards human.  God cares so much about what hurts you, that he unites himself to your humanity in the person of Christ Jesus, the eternal Son.  He partakes with you in your pain, so you can me made whole through His humanity. 

“And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.”  I John 5:20 NKJV

Who has delivered us from the power of darkness, and has translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins: Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature:  Col 1:13-15

Prayer