Paul’s High Christology (Part 2)
Jesus First: A Study of Colossians • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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“Nothing is more valuable than knowing Christ, and God in Christ.” Joel R. Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, Reformed Systematic Theology Vol. 2: Man and Christ, 722.
I. CHRIST IS GOD AND MAN
I. CHRIST IS GOD AND MAN
A. He is the Invisible God
A. He is the Invisible God
Everything that is true about God is true about Christ (and the Holy Spirit, too!). But He is not just the invisible God. He is the image of the invisible God. Or, to put it another way, He is the Visible God.
B. He is the Visible God
B. He is the Visible God
“By assuming our human nature to his person, he was then able to manifest and reveal God to us in the flesh.” Matthew Barrett, Simply Trinity, 199
Christ is the God-man, God in the flesh. He is God incarnated. There is so many ways to say this, but think about the significance of this statement.
God, the invisible God who is beyond human comprehension and senses, became man.
His immanence cannot get any closer than the incarnation. As with our first sermon, our goal is to draw our hearts into further worship.
“God’s bigness does not mean he is too great to care, just like his nearness does not mean he is too weak to help. Instead, the right inference to draw in all of life’s afflictions is that the God of transcendent glory and personal immanence is too good to forget and too great to fail.” Kevin DeYoung, Daily Doctrine
1. Image in the New Testament
1. Image in the New Testament
Because of the many heresies, both ancient and new, we need to grasp what Paul is and is not saying when he refers to Christ as “the image of the invisible God.”
As I just mentioned, there are many heresies that come up that involve a misunderstanding of this phrase “the image of the invisible God.”
Jesus uses the word image to describe the imprint of Caesar’s face into a coin (Matt. 22:20). It is also used several times to describe idols (Acts 7:43; 19:35).
However, is it not limited to these two uses. It is used to describe the Lord Jesus Christ’s in His incarnation (and more, but that will be for another day!).
2. Christ—the Image of God
2. Christ—the Image of God
4 whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.
Christ is the image of God.
3 who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
Paul uses a different word for image in Hebrews 1:3, but the idea is still the same.
Francis Turretin helps us understand. Whereas Adam, and all humanity, are made in the image of God (cf. Gen. 1:26–27), Christ is the image of God differently.
Adam and the rest of humanity bears the image of God inadequately, or not perfectly or essentially. There are vast difference between humans as image bearers of God and God whose image we bear.
The differences are like a photograph of the person and the person themselves. The picture is an image of the person, it is like the person, but it is not the person.
Christ differs from us in that His image bearing is perfect. He is the “express image,” the perfect representation. He is God in the flesh, God with us.
“‘The Son of God is the essential image of most perfect equality sharing in the same essence with the Father,’ but Adam was ‘the analogical image of inadequate and imperfect similitude.’” Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, 5,10.1, quoted in Joel R. Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, Reformed Systematic Theology, Vol. 2, 170
Why is this important? Besides it being in God’s Word and worthy of all our attention and, as a result, part of the command we opened our study of this section with, namely to love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, and soul.
But more than that, it is vital for our salvation.
3. The Image of God and Our Salvation
3. The Image of God and Our Salvation
If Christ did not become man, we would not be saved. Gregory of Nazianzus helps give a starting point for this discussion by saying, “Whatever is not assumed is not healed.”
We see the biblical basis for this in the inefficiency of the Old Testament sacrifices. They had to be offered year after year, because they were incapable of atoning for sins. Hebrews 10:3–4 “3 But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. 4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.”
If human beings were to be saved, they had to be saved by a perfect human, which is why Christ assumed a human nature. To phrase it another way, if Christ did not become incarnate, with a human body and soul, we would not be saved.
Consider what Paul writes just a few verses later in Hebrews 10. Hebrews 10:10 “10 And by that will [the will of the Father that Christ came to do, cf. Psalm 40:6–8] we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.”
He says, “Whatever is not assumed, is not healed.”
4. The Image of God and Our Sanctification
4. The Image of God and Our Sanctification
Romans 8:28–29 “28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. 29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.”
We are saved by God, not so that we can enjoy a pain-free life, or to enjoy wealth and status on this earth, or even to get out of Hell. We are saved by God for His glory, and His glory is achieved through our sanctification into the image of His Son, Jesus Christ.
Notice that Paul is encouraging believers in the midst of trials and difficulties (8:31–36). Our goal on earth is to glorify God and we do so by knowing and making Him known.
2 Corinthians 3:16–18 “16 But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. 17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18 And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.”
When one is saved by the incarnated image of God, Jesus Christ, the veil hiding the beauty and glory of God, is removed. And as we behold the glory of the Lord, we are being transformed. We are becoming like Jesus Christ, the image of the Invisible God.
Just think of how this transforms the spiritual disciplines of prayer, Scripture reading, and corporate worship.
Prayer- in prayer we speak to God for help, for specific requests, and thank Him for His goodness. Imagine how beholding His glory in the face of Jesus Christ transforms our prayers from simply rote prayers or repetitious requests to fellowship with God Himself, speaking to our Creator.
“God has made us for himself—he has made us to enjoy and communion with and participate in himself, such that our deepest delight and the realization of our created purpose us to receive the fullness of life from the fullness of life—deep cries out to deep.” Samuel Parkison, To Gaze Upon God, 180
Scripture Reading- We are reading God’s Word to us, His life-giving, glory-displaying, praise-inducing Word of Life! Rather than reading through habit, mindlessly skipping over words and phrases, we feast on Christ’s glory in the sacred Scriptures and are, thereby, changed into Him image, day after day, year after year.
“God’s glory on Christ’s face objectively shines forth from the text, which means that any hermeneutic [interpretation of Scripture] that fails to appreciate this glory is incomplete.” Samuel Parkison, To Gaze Upon God, 184
Corporate Worship- We gather as the redeemed people of God with unveiled faces and behold the beauty of God in the face of Jesus Christ through Scripture reading and exposition, prayer, and the sacraments (ordinances). It is no longer an empty ritual or weekly item on our checklist, but rather fellowship, communion, with the highest earthly joy possible, between the redeemed and their Redeemer.
“Heaven and earth meet, for those who are in Christ, here: at the proclamation of the Word, the administration of water, and the consumption of bread and wine. By faith (and never without it), Word and Sacrament are true meeting places for communion with the Trinity and are thus trustworthy promises of the truest meeting place for our communion with the Trinity in heaven, where we will commune fully in the beatific vision.” Samuel Parkison, To Gaze Upon God, 191
“Nothing is more valuable than knowing Christ, and God in Christ.” Joel R. Beeke and Paul M. Smalley
In order to know the invisible God, God had to assume humanity, and Christ’s incarnation, life, death, burial, and resurrection brings us to God.
Do you know Him? Do you see the incredible blessings of knowing and making known this Triune God of glory?
