THE DIVINE INTENTION REVEALED
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“So also it is written, The first
man Adam became a living soul. The last Adam became
a life-giving spirit.” 1 Cor. 15:45
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THE INCARNATION IS FIRST A
REVELATION TO MAN OF MAN AS TO FIRST DIVINE INTENTION. It is therefore also a
revelation of God, for perfect man is the image of God. In Jesus there has been
revealed to the race God's purpose for every human being, a mind of royal and
loyal love, and the activity of self-emptying service, as expressive of that
loyalty. The greatest injunction laid upon Christian men by the writers of the
New Testament is that of the apostle, “Have
this mind in you, which was also in Christ Jesus." (Phil 2:5) His mind was the mind wholly
actuated by the principle of love. It was submissive and regnant, submissive to
the dominion of love, reigning in the power of love. (Rom. 15:5; 1 Cor. 2:16)
From this consideration of ideal man, there breaks upon the
consciousness the truth concerning God. In Jesus, man finds Him for Whom he has
been searching, and being unable to find, has created the false deities that
have cursed his whole life. According to this revelation, God's
knowledge is the knowledge of personal interest in all His creation. His
affection joys in the joy of His people, and sorrows in the midst of their
sorrows. His will is ever impulsed by this perfect affection, and operates
within this intimate knowledge. These truths, too large for perfect
comprehension, are yet recognized as the lines project from the unique
Personality of Jesus into immensity. Through the Man Jesus, MAN HAS FOUND GOD.
He had built upon his ruined nature a false conception of God, but now upon the
perfect nature of the LAST ADAM (1 Cor.
15:45), man forms a correct idea of the infinite God. Jesus of Nazareth is
perfect in His humanity. That humanity is the cornerstone, and if its lines
are all carried forth, as in the case of the cornerstone of the pyramid, the
whole fact will be included.
The value of the Incarnation then
at once becomes apparent. Human misconceptions of God have created human
hatred of God. The hatred of the human heart therefore is not hatred of the
true God, for He is not known. In Christ He is revealed, and when men know Him
as THE REVEALER, they love Him.
Much more of course needs to be said,
as in the mission of Christ much more needed to be done, for though the light
of Deity has perfectly shone in the Person of the Christ, man does not see it.
Something must be done to quicken his intelligence, to open his eye. That, the
Incarnation does not do. It provides the true view of God for the quickened
intelligence. In the present article the subject is merely that of the Divine
self-revelation, contained within the Incarnation. When man through the mystery of Atonement, is
reconciled, and the miracle of regeneration is completed, then in the vision of
God granted in Christ, he will also be reconciled in intelligence, in emotion,
in will.
Thus the Incarnation has made provision for the reconciliation
of the whole man, but into this reconciliation man will only pass as he becomes
reconciled through the death of Jesus. When so reconciled, his FULL SALVATION
will proceed through the harmonizing of the facts of his being, with the
revelation of the possibilities thereof in the Man Jesus, under the constraint
of the infinite love of God revealed also in Him. “If while we were enemies, we were reconciled
to God through the death of His Son, much more, being reconciled, shall we be
saved by His life." (Rom 5:10)
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