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Part 1: Like No One Else | Part 2: Deity 1 | Part 3: Deity 2 | Part 4: Deity 3 | Part 5: Deity 4 | Part 6: Deity 5 | Part 7: Deity 6 | Part 8: Deity 7 | Part 9: Deity 8 | Part 10: Deity 9 | Part 11: Humanity 1 | Part 12: Humanity 2 | Part 13: Humanity 3
Why did God the Son become human, just like us? I think there are several reasons.
First, the Scripture had prophesied the incarnation, and God’s Word must be fulfilled. Now, obviously, this is not the primary reason; God would not have prophesied the incarnation for the sole or even foundational purpose of fulfilling an otherwise random prophecy. But it serves as a reminder that God is true, faithful, and reliable, and he does keep his promises. This teaches us, therefore, about his character, and it also assures us that he will keep his other promises as well.
Second, by becoming man, the Son positions himself as the Second Adam, the un-Adam, so to speak, who does perfectly what Adam failed to do—or undoes what Adam did, if you will. As Adam had an agreement with God to obey him, an agreement that he did not keep, so Christ enters the same arrangement of obedience, and as a man, keeps it. The incarnation is in many ways a new beginning, a second chance, and a successful one at that.
A key passage that addresses this idea is Romans 5.12-21, and especially verses 12 and 19:
12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. … 18 Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. 19 For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.
Third, the Son became man in order to substitute himself for us. The best substitute for anyone or anything is something that is from the same class of things, and so Jesus becomes human in order to stand in the humans’ place (He 2.16-17).
By far the most important element in this substitution is the paying of the death penalty for sin. As God, the Son cannot die; it is not part of his nature to die. But as man, he can (Php 2.8; He 2.9). And so, though under no compulsion to do so, God the Son became man—eternally—to rescue us from our own failure.
There is a fourth reason, and this one is by far the most difficult to understand. The Bible says that one of the results of the incarnation is that he now sympathizes with us:
For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted (He 2.18).
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin (He 4.15).
Of course, if we know that someone has also experienced our pain, then we find it easier to believe that he will sympathize with our pain. We see that principle worked out in human experience all the time.
But here’s why I say that this is hard to understand. Does God have to experience something in order to understand it? Does the Father, who has never experienced being human, sympathize less well with us than the Son?
We can’t say that; the Father and the Son are One, and the Father is perfect just as the Son is.
Well, then, is this sympathy that the Son has for us just an exercise in accommodation? Does God know that we’ll more strongly believe that he sympathizes because the Son has been (and continues to be) human? In this just a little trick to help us believe?
We can’t say that, either. God does not pretend just so we’ll believe.
In some way, far beyond our understanding, God the Son sympathizes with us because he is one of us. That’s what the text says, and that’s what we must believe, even if we don’t understand.
That sort of thing happens all the time in theology.
Next time, we’ll start into the really puzzling stuff.
Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash
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