GOD IN FLESH

The mystery of godliness—God manifested in the flesh—made me think of these words by C.S. Lewis in “Mere Christianity”:

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

CHRIST’S RELATIONSHIP TO THE FATHER

We conclude this week’s study of Christ as the Good Shepherd today. There are three relationships Jesus identifies in John 10:11-42. Two of these that we have previously considered are Christ’s relationship to the false shepherds and to His flock. Today, we will ponder His relationship to His Father.

We know that the Father identifies Himself as the LORD, our Shepherd, in the twenty-third Psalm. Now, in John 10, Jesus identifies Himself with Yahweh Rohi of Psalm 23.

Jesus and the Father are UNITED AS ONE. “I and My Father are one.” (John 10:30). This is a direct claim to Deity. The Father and Son are not the same Person, but One in essence.   The Father is not the Son and the Son is not the Father, but the Son is as much God as God the Father.

Jesus is UNIQUE AS THE ONLY ONE. “Then the Jews took up stones again to stone Him. Jesus answered them, ‘Many good works I have shown you from My Father. For which of those works do you stone Me?’ The Jews answered Him, saying, ‘For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy, and because You, being a Man, make Yourself God.’ Jesus answered them, ‘Is it not written in your law, “I said, ‘You are gods’?” If He called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken), do you say of Him whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, “You are blaspheming,” because I said, “I am the Son of God”? If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do, though you do not believe Me, believe the works, that you may know and believe that the Father is in Me, and I in Him.’ Therefore they sought again to seize Him, but He escaped out of their hand.” (John‬ ‭10:31-39).

Jesus quotes Psalm 82:6.  There, human judges, as God’s representatives, are referred to as “gods,”—the Hebrew word, “elohim”—thus, expected to judge righteously, as God does (for further study see: https://www.gotquestions.org/you-are-gods.html ). The thought is that since a human judge can be called a “god,” how much more proper is it for the Son of God to claim to be God. Yet, He was uniquely, the Son of God—not just God’s representative as an elohim, but Elohim in the flesh!  Jesus deserves our worship and demands our allegiance.

Are you a sheep or a goat? Are you part of Christ’s flock and following Him?  It is the difference between heaven and hell.

GOD’S GOODNESS DEMONSTRATED

“So Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God.” (Mark‬ ‭10:18‬ ‭NKJV‬‬). Only God is inherently and utterly good. He is the source, substance, and sum of all goodness. Jesus was not denying His goodness here, but affirming His deity. If He is good, then He is God, for only God is good.

• Demonstrated in Creation.  In the Genesis 1 record, we find God fashioning the world and at the end of each creative day declaring His handiwork “good,” until day 6, and the completion of it all with the pinnacle of His creation—man made in His image—and pronouncing it all, “very good.”

What else could a good God do but good and very good? We see even in a fallen world that it can be breathtakingly beautiful—a golden sunrise and a blazing sunset; a majestic mountain and a verdant valley; a lovely lily and a beautiful butterfly—and on we could go.  God gave us eyes to see in color, a mind to comprehend what we see, ears to hear a baby’s laugh and fingers to touch their soft skin.  God could have made everything gray and made all food taste like gruel—but chose to demonstrate His goodness in creation.

• Demonstrated in Redemption.  In Creation, God exhaled a breath, but in redemption, He expended His blood.  He was not content to leave us in our sin, but His goodness sent His Son and sought us out.  His goodness demanded punishment on the guilty.  A good judge does not let a criminal off.  Instead, our good God enforced that good justice by pouring out His wrath on the Son of God—and our good Savior was willing to suffer in our place.  The good Holy Spirit sought you out.  What good was there in you to commend you to God?  None! The good was all His!

• Demonstrated in Providence.  “Divine providence is the governance of God by which He, with wisdom and love, cares for and directs all things in the universe. The doctrine of divine providence asserts that God is in complete control of all things.” (www.gotquestions.org) Study the story of Joseph in Gen.37-50 and you will see God’s providence in bringing Joseph from the pit to the palace, from ruin to reign, and from suffering to glory.  Here is the New Testament phrasing of this truth, “And we know that all things work together for GOOD to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” (Rom.8:28, emphasis added).

God, you are so very good!