As we celebrate the incarnation anew, fixing our minds on the wonders of the mystery of Christ, let’s remember the presence and activity of the Spirit in the events surrounding the nativity. The Spirit who was forming a human nature for the Son in the womb of the virgin Mary and bringing the Son back from the dead in the darkness of the tomb is the same Spirit who indwells believers and conforms us to the image of the Son. That’s the Spirit of Christmas we most desperately need.
The Spirit of Christmas
Written by Nicholas T. Batzig |
Sunday, December 31, 2023
One of the most neglected parts of the incarnation accounts in the gospel records is that which touches on the presence and activity of the Holy Spirit in the life and ministry of Christ. We rightly wonder at the coming of the eternal Son of God into the world in true human form while wrongly neglecting to wonder at the accompanying role of the Spirit of God in the ministry of the Redeemer. Some of that is understandable. What greater mystery can there be than the mystery of Christ? He is the eternal mystery of God (1 Tim. 3:16). All God’s revelation points to Him, and everything necessary for salvation flows from Him (Col. 1:15-22; Heb. 1:1-3). Yet, throughout the gospels the Spirit is revealed as the accompanying agent of redemption. He was active, from start to finish, in the life and ministry of Christ. This opens the important question, “Why was it necessary for the Spirit to be at work in the life and ministry of Christ from the virgin conception to his resurrection from the dead?”
1. The Spirit came to indwell Jesus to sustain him as the Last Adam. The Spirit was the agent of the virgin conception, the anointing of Christ for ministry as Prophet, Priest and King at His baptism, and the leading of Christ into the wilderness to be tempted by the evil one. The Spirit is also the one by whom Christ cast out demons and overcame the kingdom of darkness. He was indwelling Christ as the Last Adam in order to enable Him to present Himself without blemish to God on the cross. The Spirit is also said to be the agent by whom Jesus was raised from the dead (Rom. 1:4; 8:11).
To be the head of the new redeemed humanity, Jesus had to do all that he did in humble reliance upon the Holy Spirit. This began even before His birth. When Mary asked the Angel Gabriel how she would carry the Redeemer in her womb, since she was a virgin, Gabriel told her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God” (Luke 1:35). Just as the Spirit hovered over the waters of creation, so He hovered over the virgin Mary at the great work of bringing about the new creation through the incarnation of the Son of God.
Christ was dependent upon the Spirit for His miraculous works. If Jesus had simply performed miracles by his divine nature, then the divine nature of the eternal Son would have imparted to the human nature something (e.g. omnipotence) that is not proper to human nature and so destroy the human nature. Jesus acted as fully God and fully man in one person in all that He did. However, as the Last Adam, he had to rely on the Spirit to impart to him the grace He needed to do such things as perform miracles of healing.
Jesus also needed the Holy Spirit for His own consecration and to sustain Him in sinlessness. Fallen humanity doesn’t not need a superhuman holiness; what we need is a human holiness.
-
Strict Merit vs. Pactum Merit and Union with Christ
It is not merely according to covenantal promise, forgiveness and imputed righteousness that we receive our inheritance in Christ but as justified sinners who by grace have been adopted in union with the Son. Believers are fitted for heaven because of all the entailments of union with the last and faithful Adam who as Son is very God of very God. Accordingly, it is in Christ we are justified and sons of the Most High.
Let’s consider afresh the relationship of pactum merit with respect to Adam in the covenant of works and how that relates to strict merit in redemption. With respect to Adam the reward of living forever would have been disproportionate to the finite work performed.
In other words, the justice of life-eternal would not have been according to strict justice but rather according to a sovereignly imposed covenantal compact to over reward Adam for obedience; a pact of sorts was at play. That is to say, the value of Adam’s obedience would not have been of intrinsic worth as it relates to the meritorious reward of unending life.
I do find, however, that in the economy of redemption our reward, though received by grace alone, is according to principles of strict justice. Where we might locate the appropriateness (or congruity) of the forever-reward is the question.
Framing the issue:
Let me try frame the dilemma and then try to offer a solution by drawing from the ordo salutis. In so doing, I’ll try to address the easier part first, having to do with strict justice as it relates to Christ’s passive obedience and our demerit.
The one time sacrifice of Christ was sufficient to satisfy God’s strict justice, render God propitious, and reconcile God to the elect in Christ. Although Christ is the kinsman redeemer, Christ’s divine nature was necessary for redemption accomplished and for there to be intrinsic worth as it relates to Christ’s mediatory work. Our demerit needed the incarnate Son of God to pay for our sins, for one thing to keep the human nature from sinking under the wrath of God. Christ could render God propitious and provide full satisfaction for the sins of many because Christ is both God and man. That’s the more obvious part. No issues there I trust.
The passive obedience part of redemption, which for our purposes narrowly deals with sinners’ demerit and payment for sins, is more obvious perhaps. Yet when it comes to what positively fits redeemed sinners for heaven, I find that to narrowly focus on Christ’s active obedience as a human being is to overlook the broader ground upon which the reward of everlasting life and inheritance can be found.
The dilemma:
The eternal Son eternally assumed the terms of the covenant of works that offered disproportionate reward of life for work done as a human being. So, regarding the active obedience part, pactum merit cannot be avoided and strict justice obtained if what fits us for glory is predicated solely on Christ fulfilling the original terms of the covenant and we grant that those original terms were according to pactum merit. That would appear to be the implication of a position that limits our standing before God to that which we receive only by the active and passive obedience of Christ. If the Son took on the terms of the original covenant of works and if those terms offered disproportionate reward via pactum, then it stands to reason that what fits us for glory is not according to what is strictly congruous but only according to pactum unless something beyond the merit gained through the last Adam’s obedience is included.
Read More
Related Posts: -
Gay Marriage Isn’t the New Interracial Marriage
The difference between gay people and black people is homosexual behaviour is a sin, dark skin isn’t a sin. Therefore, although interracial marriage was illegal in some states decades ago, it’s never been immoral. Gay “marriage,” however, has always been immoral.
The Respect for Marriage Act doesn’t respect marriage at all. A more accurate name for the bill is the “Disrespect for Marriage Act.”
Alliance Defending Freedom described the bill as not merely a law that codifies the Supreme Court’s ruling on Obergefell (gay marriage) as federal law, but a “misnamed bill that expands not only what marriage means, but also who can be sued for disagreeing with the new meaning of marriage.”
They also said, “The Respect for Marriage Act threatens religious freedom and the institution of marriage in multiple ways:It further embeds a false definition of marriage in the American legal fabric.
It opens the door to federal recognition of polygamous relationships.
It jeopardizes the tax-exempt status of nonprofits that exercise their belief that marriage is the union of one man and one woman.
It endangers faith-based social-service organizations by threatening litigation and liability risk if they follow their views on marriage when working with the government.The truth is the Respect for Marriage Act does nothing to change the status of same-sex marriage or the benefits afforded to same-sex couples following Obergefell. It does much, however, to endanger religious freedom.”
As always, Alliance Defending Freedom’s explanation of the legal and cultural ramifications of the law are helpful. But the Respect for Marriage Act disrespects the institution of marriage in another way.
Read More
Related Posts: -
Towards a New Paganism
This new paganism seems to be an enterprise that traffics in terms emptied of all meaning. Soul, sacred, holiness, all are just a veneer on a sort of inescapable nothingness. This void is not well covered by jargon, regardless of how well-intended or articulate. It cannot be papered over. It can only be traversed by a transcendent love bright enough to outshine all our worldly aspirations and close enough to whisper to our broken hearts in all their futile grasping.
The Apostle Paul tells us we’re all going to worship one of two things. We will either worship the Creator, or we will worship the creation (See Romans 1). It’s pretty simple. We will either allow the world to point us beyond itself to its source, as King David does in Psalm 19, or we will suppress the truth of God’s existence, that we all know deep down, and, in his absence worship some created thing, be it ourselves, someone else, or nature itself.
Christian author Peter Jones describes these options as oneism and twoism. Either all of reality is one thing, the Cosmos, hence oneism. Or, reality is accurately represented in the categories Paul gives us of Creator and creation, twoism. Every way of seeing reality can be boiled down to these options. Reality is either one or two. Choose wisely.
A magazine I regularly read is Aeon, a thoughtful online resource about ideas, philosophy, and culture. Earlier this month they published the article “A New Paganism: Now is the Time to Revitalise our Relationship with Nature and Immerse Ourselves in the Little Wonders of the Universe” by Ed Simon, an author who regularly writes about beliefs about God. Simon argues, in the absence of God, we need to turn our attention to the natural world to find a new expression of the sacred. This is the worldview of oneism.
Simon refernces an often quoted passage from the influential twentieth-century philosopher Bertrand Russell in which Russell says it is only upon the firm foundation of unyielding despair that anyone can hope to find safe haven for their souls. Put aside for the moment the fact that Russell didn’t believe in any such thing as a soul, an immaterial part of the human personality that survives the grave. Simon quotes him to disagree with him. Though Simon describes himself as post-Christian, he rejects the idea that a world without God need be described as nihilistic. Simon writes:
Read More
Related Posts:
