During the latter part of 2007, our church was going through a series on Wednesday nights entitled "Christ our Mediator". The study was part of a larger study on the 1689 London Confession of Faith. I did not make it to many of the sessions. I think I made it to the first one and one other. The second one I attended was on the topic of "fully God and fully man". Someone in the audience made the comment that "Christ had to be fully man." Now this is something I believe 100% was the case according to Scripture, but I have not really ever understand why Christ HAD to be fully man. I though that it was really nice that He was human because he can understand our weaknesses, but that it was required by God for Christ to be human, I never saw why. I understood that He HAD to be fully God because no man could ever live a perfect life to be an acceptable sacrifice on behalf of others.
The next week at Home Fellowship Group, I asked this question (and gave challenges) and Tom explained it very well. He showed me that throughout Scripture God's way of doing things was that of an individual singled out to represent the group. For instance, Achan's individual sin affected the whole camp (as well as his family). Often Adam represents the whole human race (we are all "dead in Adam", "the first Adam" passages etc.) Because of this, Christ had to be of the human race in order to represent the human race. I gave the challenge that the goats and bulls in the OT were not of the human race when they took the sins of the people. But, rightly so, it was stated that the bulls and goats never really took the sin. Sure, the people of that time had faith in doing what God had revealed and I believe because of their faith in God and obedience to His word, it was efficacious. In reality, the bulls and goats were just a picture of what, rather Who, was to come - Christ.
This is very interesting to me and enlightening as I had never really considered the whole "head-representing-the-race" thing before. Yes, I have a Bible degree and have probably heard this explained a million times in theology class, but I never really understood it before.
Anyways, today I read Spurgeon's Morning and Evening and it is a wonderful encouragement and reminder that yes, Christ was one of "us":
Some excerpts:
Oh, what relationship there is between Christ and the believer! The believer can say, "I have a Brother in heaven; I may be poor, but I have a Brother who is rich, and is a King, and will He suffer me to want while He is on His throne? Oh, no! He loves me; He is my Brother." ...He is a brother born for adversity, treat Him as such.
"He was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin." In all our sorrows we have His sympathy. Temptation, pain, disappointment, weakness, weariness, poverty-He knows them all, for He has felt all. Remember this, Christian, and let it comfort thee. However difficult and painful thy road, it is marked by the footsteps of thy Saviour; and even when thou reachest the dark valley of the shadow of death, and the deep waters of the swelling Jordan, thou wilt find His footprints there. In all places whithersoever we go, He has been our forerunner; each burden we have to carry, has once been laid on the shoulders of Immanuel.
The next week at Home Fellowship Group, I asked this question (and gave challenges) and Tom explained it very well. He showed me that throughout Scripture God's way of doing things was that of an individual singled out to represent the group. For instance, Achan's individual sin affected the whole camp (as well as his family). Often Adam represents the whole human race (we are all "dead in Adam", "the first Adam" passages etc.) Because of this, Christ had to be of the human race in order to represent the human race. I gave the challenge that the goats and bulls in the OT were not of the human race when they took the sins of the people. But, rightly so, it was stated that the bulls and goats never really took the sin. Sure, the people of that time had faith in doing what God had revealed and I believe because of their faith in God and obedience to His word, it was efficacious. In reality, the bulls and goats were just a picture of what, rather Who, was to come - Christ.
This is very interesting to me and enlightening as I had never really considered the whole "head-representing-the-race" thing before. Yes, I have a Bible degree and have probably heard this explained a million times in theology class, but I never really understood it before.
Anyways, today I read Spurgeon's Morning and Evening and it is a wonderful encouragement and reminder that yes, Christ was one of "us":
Some excerpts:
"He was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin." In all our sorrows we have His sympathy. Temptation, pain, disappointment, weakness, weariness, poverty-He knows them all, for He has felt all. Remember this, Christian, and let it comfort thee. However difficult and painful thy road, it is marked by the footsteps of thy Saviour; and even when thou reachest the dark valley of the shadow of death, and the deep waters of the swelling Jordan, thou wilt find His footprints there. In all places whithersoever we go, He has been our forerunner; each burden we have to carry, has once been laid on the shoulders of Immanuel.