The God-Man: The Only Qualified Mediator and Redeemer

 

Isaiah 7:14, 9:6, 53:11; John 1:1, 14 (texts); Heidelberg Catechism Lord’s Day 5 (Q&A 12-15)

July 27, 2014 • Download this sermon (PDF)

Introduction

Congregation of Christ: Today, we extend our congratulations to the Iglesia ni Cristo (INC) for its 100 years of being a false church teaching the ancient heresy of Arianism, and for 100 years of being a cult claiming to be the only true church since the apostles died. For this, they are celebrating 100 years of leading millions of Filipinos to eternal hell.

What is this Arian heresy that the INC teaches? In the 4th century, Arius of Alexandria in Egypt taught that the Son of God was not eternally divine, but was the Father’s first created being. He is not of the same substance as the Father. But since he created all things, he is still God, worthy of worship. The Council of Nicea in 325 condemned his teaching as heresy. Therefore, the INC condemns all of Christianity since the apostles for teaching the doctrine of the Trinity, saying that the word “Trinity” is not found in the Bible! (By the same logic, since the word “Manalo” is not in the Bible, he was not a real person!)

Council of Nicea 325, fresco in Sistine Chapel, Vatican
Council of Nicea 325, fresco in Sistine Chapel, Vatican (click image to enlarge)

Among numerous Scripture texts, our texts today are but a sample of the bases for our doctrine of the full humanity and full divinity of Christ existing in one Person. Lord’s Day 5 of the Heidelberg Catechism explains why the Mediator and Redeemer of mankind has to be both Man and God, a “God-Man,” as Anselm of Canterbury called Christ in the 11th century.

So our theme this afternoon is “The God-Man: The Only Qualified Mediator and Redeemer,” under two headings: first, No Escape for Man by Man Alone; and second, The Only Escape: By the God-Man.

No Escape for Man by Man Alone

When Adam disobeyed the covenant of works in the Garden of Eden, the whole of mankind came under the curse of slavery to sin and the punishment of death. By that one act of disobedience, all humanity became “children of wrath,” God’s righteous wrath against sinners.

Heidelberg Catechism Q&A 12 then asks, “How may we escape this punishment and be again received into favor?” Because he is perfect and holy, God cannot let any sin go unpunished. His justice has to be fully satisfied, as we read in the Ten Commandments, “a jealous God,” (Exo 20:5) “avenging and wrathful… [keeping] wrath for his enemies” (Nah 1:2). Although he “[forgives] iniquity and transgression and sin, [he] will by no means clear the guilty” (Exo 34:7). If we are guilty before the Judge of the Universe, Paul asks, how shall we “escape the judgment of God” (Rom 2:3).

Since man’s fall into sin, man has become enemies of God. So God has sought to be reconciled with sinners and restore them into full communion with him. But only after God’s justice is satisfied will sinners be again received into his favor. But can man satisfy God’s demand for justice and punishment against sinners? No, for “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God… no one does good, not even one” (Rom 3:10-12). Paul concludes God’s indictment of humanity, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:23).

This is why Q&A 13 says that mere creatures cannot make satisfaction for God’s justice. Man cannot, because as sinners, “we daily increase our guilt.” The psalmist sees this impossibility, “If you, O LORD, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand?” (Psa 130:3). In the Old Testament, animals were sacrificed to atone for the sins of God’s people. But these are but foreshadows of the final and perfect atonement that Christ offered on the cross, “For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins” (Heb 10:4).

Job also knows man’s hopeless state, because not even holy angels in heaven can make satis-faction for man’s sin, “Behold, God puts no trust in his holy ones, and the heavens are not pure in his sight; how much less one who is abominable and corrupt, a man who drinks injustice like water!” (Job 15:15-16)

Not only that, but Q&A 14 gives two reasons whyGod cannot punish any other creature, angels or animals, for the sin which man has committed. First, it is man who sinned, so man has to be punished, “the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself” (Ezk 18:20). This is also what Paul says, “There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil” (Rom 2:9). Second, what mere man can “sustain the burden of God’s eternal wrath against sin and redeem sinners from it?” No one. On Judgment Day, no one can endure God’s holy and righteous wrath: “Who can stand before his indignation? Who can endure the heat of his anger?” (Nah 1:6). “But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears?” (Mal 3:2)

So the question remains, “Since no one or any other creature can satisfy God’s justice, how may we escape God’s punishment and be again received into favor with God?”

The Only Escape: By the God-Man

Q&A 15 answers the question. The Mediator and Redeemer of sinful mankind is “One who is a true and righteous man, and yet more powerful than all creatures, that is, one who is also true God.” He must be a God-Man, as Anselm wrote.

But what kind of man must he be? First, he must be a true man, with real human flesh and blood, and also real human mind and soul. Jesus, born of a woman, is true man. Being conceived by the Holy Spirit in the womb of a human mother qualifies Jesus as a true man. He was not only born of a woman, but also a fruit of the womb of Mary (Luk 1:42). He also descended from Adam, Abraham and David (Matt 1:1). The Old Testament foretold of him who is the seed of the woman Eve (Gen 3:15), a branch of David (Jer 33:15), a shoot from the stump of Jesse (Isa 11:1).

The New Testament speaks of him as partaking of true human flesh and blood (Heb 2:14), a fruit of the loins of David (Acts 2:30), of the seed of David according to the flesh (Rom 1:3), descended from the Jews according to the flesh (Rom 9:5), the seed of Abraham (Gal 3:16), and of the tribe of Judah (Heb 7:14). He was “made like his brothers in every respect” (Heb 2:16, 17; 4:15). He is a true human being.

Second, not only is our Redeemer required to be a true man; he has to be truly righteous as well. For how could someone who is also sinful be a sacrifice without spot or blemish? In the Old Testament, all sacrificial animals are required to be without spot or blemish because they point to the once-for-all perfect sacrifice offered by a perfectly righteous Christ on the cross. Christ our Passover Lamb was “without blemish” (Exo 12:5; 1Cor 5:7). Isaiah foretold of a Suffering Servant who was righteous all the way to his death, “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth… he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth… the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous” (Isa 53:7, 9, 11).

Our Lord Jesus was Isaiah’s Suffering Servant, the perfect sacrifice who was born under the Law and fulfilled the whole Law (Gal 4:4; Mat 5:17). He was obedient to his Father all the way to the cross (Phil 2:8). He “suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous” (1Pet 3:18). The preacher describes him as our “high priest, holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sinners… made perfect forever” (Heb 7:26, 28). He had to completely obey God’s Law because his perfect righteousness would be given to those who believe in him, “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2Cor 5:21).

Because of his perfect obedience, his sacrifice satisfied the wrath of God against our sins. Since he is the only man who is truly righteous, and all mankind are doomed to unrighteousness, he is our only hope for salvation. And since we cannot attain righteousness on our own, our righteousness can only come from outside of us, which Martin Luther calls “alien righteousness.”

Our Mediator and Redeemer must be a true and righteous man. But he must also be “more powerful than all creatures, that is, one who is also true God.”

In the fullness of time, God fulfilled his promise of this Son who came down from heaven and “emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men” (Phil 2:7). He was “the Word [who] became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). How the eternal Son of God became incarnate—truly human flesh and blood—will be to us a great mystery until the arrival of the age to come.

The divinity of Christ never left him in his birth, suffering and death, although he did not use that divine nature in his suffering and death. The Son of God was never at any point in eternity not the Son of God. The Scriptures are replete with texts that affirm the divinity of Christ, with the two verses below as examples:

John 1:1: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God.”

Colossians 1:15-19: “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation… He is the beginning… For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell.”

In his three years of earthly ministry, Jesus performed many miracles, signs and wonders. This is why Peter preaches that he was “a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst” (Acts 2:22).

Now to digress a little to explain how the INC and Jehovah’s Witnesses’ (Arian) interpretation of John 1:1 is a huge heresy. The Greek transliteration is kai theos en ho logos, with the definite article ho before logos, but not before theos. They translate it in English as “and the Word was a god,” since there is no definite article in the Greek. All sound New Testament scholars and theologians point out that this is a gross over-simplification of the Greek construction by those who are not properly and adequately trained in the Greek language.

There are two things that must be pointed out in this construction. First, if both God (theos) and Word (logos) have definite articles, God and Word would be interchangeable, which is the Sabellian (modalist) heresy. This heresy taught that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are simply three different modes of One Person, not One God in Three Persons. John 1:1, in using theos without the article and logos with the article, distinguishes the Two Persons.

Second, the article before Logos emphasizes the subject of the clause, “and the Word was God.” Therefore, John is saying that in the pre-incarnate state (before Jesus was born), the Logos was eternal God. At the birth of Jesus, the Logos, not the Father, became flesh (John 1:14).

True and righteous Man. True God. This is the only Person who fulfills the requirements of the Redeemer and Mediator. Who is this God-Man? Only Jesus Christ, who offered himself as a perfect sacrifice for the sins of God’s people, upon Whom God poured out his wrath to satisfy his justice.

 

Dear Christian Friends: What great comfort that God “[sent] his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us” (Rom 8:3-4). He himself made provision for a Savior because there is no other Man who can save us, and there is nothing that man can do to save himself.

God required that the Mediator and Redeemer be both true, righteous Man and true God. No angel, man or creature meets this requirement, but only our Savior Jesus Christ. Without Christ, we have no redemption from sin. Without Christ, we have no mediator between God and man.

In short, without Christ, we have no hope. But by bearing our sins on the cross, the Righteous One, the Suffering Servant, made us to be accounted righteous (Isa 53:11). God so loved his hopeless people that he himself provided the only Person qualified to be our Savior.


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