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The Creator Incarnate, February 11
And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God
was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels,
preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up
into glory.
1 Timothy 3:16
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The incarnation of Christ is the mystery of all mysteries.
Christ was one with the Father, yet ... He was willing to step down
from the exaltation of one who was equal with God.
That He might accomplish His purpose of love for the fallen race,
He became bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh.
How wide is the contrast between the divinity of Christ and the
helpless infant in Bethlehem’s manger! How can we span the distance
between the mighty God and a helpless child? And yet the Creator
of worlds, He in whom was the fullness of the Godhead bodily, was
manifest in the helpless babe in the manger. Far higher than any of the
angels, equal with the Father in dignity and glory, and yet wearing the
garb of humanity! Divinity and humanity were mysteriously combined,
and man and God became one.
It would have been an almost infinite humiliation for the Son of
God to take man’s nature, even when Adam stood in his innocence in
Eden. But Jesus accepted humanity when the race had been weakened
by four thousand years of sin. Like every child of Adam He accepted the
results of the working of the great law of heredity. What these results
were is shown in the history of His earthly ancestors. He came with
such a heredity to share our sorrows and temptations, and to give us the
example of a sinless life.
Those who claim that it was not possible for Christ to sin, cannot
believe that He really took upon Himself human nature. But was not
Christ actually tempted, not only by Satan in the wilderness, but all
through His life, from childhood to manhood?
Our Saviour took humanity, with all its liabilities. He took the nature
of man, with the possibility of yielding to temptation. We have nothing
to bear which He has not endured.
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