I’m going to do something risky here.
I was invited by some colleagues to write an installment for a small theological education curriculum for folks in the Ukraine. The audience is unreached people groups. People that know nothing about Christianity.
When given the list of installments to choose from, I immediately chose: Who Is Jesus Christ the Son? How Can I Relate to Him and Him to Me?
The goal was to answer these questions with a minimal word count. So what’s the risk? Well, there’s more than 1.
1. Jesus is the most controversial figure to have ever lived and I’m saying something in my response that many people in the world reject. I’m okay with that.
2. Because Jesus is the most controversial figure to have ever lived, there has been more ink spilled on him than any person in history. How could I possible “sum it up”? On top of this, He’s God, He Is. This means that I cannot possibly accomplish this task without being grossly, I mean GROSSLY reductionistic.
I submitted my first draft today. Here it goes:
Who is Jesus Christ the Son?
The name “Jesus” refers to the historical person of Jesus of Nazareth, a Jewish man who lived during the first century of the common era. During the last three years of his short life he gained thousands of followers who believed him to be the long awaited Jewish Messiah (see below). He also had a particular group of twelve followers that he shared a special intimacy with. These twelve were present and involved in early part of Jesus’ three-year, earthy ministry while the masses came and went as their needs were met.
The disciples and the masses both were drawn to Jesus and believed him to be the Messiah because he taught with unprecedented authority and he publicly (and privately) performed miracles. His authoritative teaching and miracles gave witness to the presence of the Holy Spirit of God on his life and ministry. The presence, or anointing of the Holy Spirit for a powerful ministry was a special sign of Messiah-ship according to the (writing) Prophets of the Jewish Bible.
Jesus willingly gave up his life at an early age (somewhere around 33 years). He was executed on a Roman cross by Jewish and Roman authorities as capital punishment for blasphemy according to the religious laws of Judaism. He was killed because he claimed to be divine; a claim considered to be a sin punishable by death. He was betrayed by one of his 12 disciples who handed him over to the authorities for suffering and death.
While no one really understood the significance of Jesus’ death at the time (even the disciples, to whom he explained that he would suffer and die for the sins of the world), it was later understood by the revealing of the Holy Spirit that the death of Jesus was the great redemptive event through which God fulfilled his promises both to Israel and all of the creation. What was that great promise? Freedom from the chains of sinning and death that came as a result of self-isolation from God. In Jesus’ death he became a sacrifice. Jesus, while being perfectly innocent and committing no sin, died the death of a sinner. This was the most unjust event of all human history, yet at the same time, through this injustice, God reconciled himself to the world. Jesus’ death, then, is understood as a substitutionary sacrifice for all people. A sacrifice in which one dies in the place of another so the other may live. Because Jesus is the one through whom all of the world was created, it is through his death that all of the world has access to new life in him.
Three days after being confirmed dead and placed in a tomb, Jesus came back to life. This is the greatest miracle of Jesus that attests to his Messiahship as well as his Sonship. There were over 500 witnesses to the bodily resurrection of Jesus. Some have speculated that it was only Jesus’ spirit that appeared after his death, but there are numerous places in the Gospel accounts and the New Testament at large that prove that it was, in fact, a bodily resurrection. In particular, while being in resurrected form, Jesus ate with his disciples and even had Thomas, one of his disciples, put his finger in a hole in his torso which was a wound that he bore while suffering and dying in the Roman cross.
The bodily resurrection of Jesus is the first and foundational building block, or the “cornerstone” of the new creation which is marked by righteousness, justice, peace, joy, love, and most of all freedom from the chains of death. Jesus’ bodily resurrection is promised to be shared with believers. This means that when God comes to put an end to the broken and decaying world, those who believe in Jesus will take up residence in resurrected, glorified bodies just like Jesus. These bodies will bot be subject to the effects of sin.
After his resurrection, Jesus spent forty additional days on earth. Following those forty days Jesus’ body was taken up into heaven as was witnessed by his eleven remaining disciples. He went to heaven after leaving a commission to his disciples to go to all places in the world and preach the Good News (Gospel) that the reign of sin and death over humanity is over for all people who have faith in Jesus the Jewish Messiah because of his death and resurrection which provided a means for which sinners can be freed from the consequences of sin as well as from their very sin nature.
The title “Christ” is the greek translation of the Hebrew word meshiach from which we get our English loan-word “Messiah.” The title “messiah,” while having a long history and great depth of meaning, came to narrowly refer to the Davidic King of the Jewish people promised in the Hebrew Bible. The Messiah was to fulfill series of promises that God made to the people of Israel. Most importantly, the Messiah was supposed to restore God’s righteous reign and Kingdom over his creation which had entered into a state of decay, corruption and death very early on in the creation story. The Messiah was supposed to reverse the effects of death and launch a new creation in which those who submit to the lordship of the reign of the Jewish King could participate and experience eternal life, peace, and joy in the presence of the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit (Trinity).
The title “Son” has two dimensions to it. First, it attests to Jesus’ nature as being simultaneously God and human. In other words, the title “Son” speaks to the fact that Jesus is quite literally the Son of God in the sense that he was born of a virgin after a miraculous conception by the Holy Spirit. This means that Jesus, while being 100% human (inheriting the nature of his human mother), is also 100% divine (inheriting the nature of God the Father).
The second dimension of the title “Son” attests to the Lordship and authority of Jesus over the creation. Jesus is the preeminent human being. Because he is the only literal Son of God (as all believers are adopted in the God’s family as sons and daughters metaphorically), he holds a special place above all other human beings. That special place is a place of authority. Jesus has a special authority to reign over all the creation as the pinnacle member of the human race. In this sense, Jesus is “the Son”.
How do I relate to him and him to me?
Believers relate to Jesus in a number of ways. First, when a person receives the gift of saving faith in Jesus as the Messiah, they become members of God’s covenant people. This means that they inherit all the promises that came true in Jesus. In other words, believers have the privilege of participating in the everlasting life of Jesus through faith. In a sense, believers become a part of Jesus upon having faith.
Not only this, but Jesus also takes up residence in believers by means of the Holy Spirit upon faith as well. When the Holy Spirit abides in someone who puts their trust in Jesus as the Messiah, he cultivates the very righteous character of Jesus in them. He transforms the very desires of the heart to conform to the desires of the righteous and loving King Jesus. This is how we relate to Jesus.
But how does Jesus relate to me? Jesus, by taking on a physical body, knows every bit of what it means to be human. Even while being divine, he knows what it is to be hungry, tired, and tempted. Not only this, but he also knows what it is to endure physical suffering and face death. Finally, he knows the greatest despair of the human existence and that is isolation from the presence of God the father. On the cross, as Jesus bore the sins of humanity in himself, he sensed what it meant to be removed from God’s life-giving presence.
Not only this, but Jesus also knows what human experiences are yet to come for us. Jesus knows what resurrection is. He also knows what it means to live in a glorified body that is not subject to the deadly and decomposing consequences of sin. Jesus knows what it is to be human more than we do! This is what it means for Jesus to relate to us.
