Written Word

Attempting to Match a Perfect Pattern

There are no details given in the Scriptures concerning Jesus’ childhood except for the account of His session with the Jewish authorities in the Temple at the age of twelve. (Luke 2.41-50) This one episode gives us a very small clue to how Jesus’ early years might have been. It is true that the Bible tells us that after this event Jesus went back with His parents and was subject to them (Luke 2.51), but we are certain this could have been no ordinary lad.

What child ever grew up from birth filled with the Holy Spirit? John perhaps was one, but he was not additionally the literal Son of God. John was not the Creator of the universe wrapped in a fragile human body. He was not the great I AM. What child never commits a sin?

I am sure Jesus never tried to be exceptional in the years between infancy and the beginning of His public ministry – He simply was different. I repeat: Jesus was the Son of God. This of itself sets Him apart from His supposed peers.

There is however at least one thing about John’s life that was parallel to that of Jesus: no one wrote authoritatively about the developing years of either one of them, the Son of God or His herald. We know of the one quasi-public appearance of Jesus, but we have not even that about John. All we have is the following:

“ (80)  And the child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness till the day of his manifestation to Israel.”  (Luk 1:80 RSV)

There is not the slightest information given us about John’s developing years. I have a wispy, unsubstantiated theory or two on why this was so with Jesus and John, but I cannot speak with any certainty on the matter, therefore I will say nothing further on it.

How long was John the Baptist secluded in the desert? He was there until “the day of his manifestation to Israel.” (Luk 1:80 RSV) As it was with Jesus, it seems likely that John’s career did not begin until he was well into his adult years.

Whatever sins children and adolescents commit, Jesus was not guilty of any of them. As the Son of God, He was God and could not be snared by any sin. Now you want to know what about Jesus’ 40-day temptation in the wilderness – was it real? Take the word of the author of the book of Hebrews:

"For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." (Heb. 4:15)

This makes it clear that Jesus was indeed tempted severely, but without yielding in the least measure. What I have stated previously, that God cannot sin, is not a contradiction to Heb. 4.15. Jesus, as the human he was, slogged through the 40-day temptations. Moreover, He was more severely tried than any other mortal would have been in the same circumstances because He was the Son of God and the fate of mankind and the entire universe hung on the outcome.

And yet we know that God can never sin. It is apparently a contradiction in terms to 1) stoutly state that God cannot sin and 2) maintain at the same time that Jesus was actually tempted during the assault on His faith in the wilderness. If Jesus, who is God, cannot sin, how could there be a temptation for Him to sin?

Looking at the situation closely, I think it is likely that Jesus experienced temptation to sin only during His 40-day wilderness ordeal. It was a window that was opened just for that period of time. It was in this time, and only by special providence, that

“Jesus was tried in a ‘genteel’ manner; He was assaulted fiercely in an all-out show of Satanic force. Satan attacked Jesus in direct ways and he approached Him in insidious, indirect fashion. Billows of longing washed over His Being at times; and anger and greed assailed Him. Hatred attempted to force its way into His heart. Jesus ran the gamut of temptation, ‘yet without sin.’ Yet without sin.” (The Life of Christ in Five Phases Revised)

There was no need for Jesus to undergo further tempting; the forty days were more than enough for Jesus to establish an experiential bond of temptation with His fellow humans. But do not think Jesus was not tested in other ways during the remainder of His career. Each day brought Jesus face to face with His mortal enemies who wanted to refute His every word and who eventually had Him crucified. With each day’s dawning Jesus knew there would be another trial of His faith. Yet He never wavered and later, when the physical body would falter, Jesus pressed on through the adversity that seemed to be His birthright and was faithful to His Father’s will in all things.

The conclusion of the matter it this: We have the perfect example of a perfect life before us – now let us do our best, by the grace of God, to push toward the same perfection in our lives.

Jesus Died Once; We Must Die Daily

Today the nation of Israel cannot boast of prophets like Isaiah, Jeremiah, Obadiah and Moses (yes, he was a prophet) and their peers. There is a prophetic and spiritual vacuum like that which existed in the years between Malachi, the last of the old line prophets, and the coming of John the Baptist. Israel had lapsed into being a spiritual derelict out of touch with, and having no desire for, their God who at this point seemed to have rejected them.  They were under the rule of the Romans, a people who created gods for their own convenience and pleasure and who would not know the true God if He came suddenly upon them.

There is no “open vision” anymore among God’s chosen people. There are no doubt good spiritual leaders among the Israelis, but they are not in a class with the aforementioned prophets, who were called of God to do whatever He told them to do no matter how extreme and odd it might seem. They would fearlessly proclaim the word God gave them and dress and act in whatever manner God commanded regardless of how bizarre it appeared to their countrymen.

A prophet of that class today would find it difficult to make the stupendous predictions that the former prophets did because all of their prophecies 1) have been fulfilled already, 2) are in the process of being fulfilled, or 3) are looming large on the horizon of human history yet to be enacted. This last group of prophecies are so overwhelming in scope that there seems to be no room for any additional significant predictions.

Moreover among the many prophecies of these doughty, rough-hewn men of God and permeating the prophecies like yeast reaching everywhere in a batch of dough, was one persistent prophecy, that universe shaking foretelling of the coming of the Messiah – no other than the Son of God. The story was told in many ways and by various symbols that the predictors themselves did not always fully understand. Isaiah proclaimed,

 (1)  Who has believed what we have heard? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?

(2)  For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or comeliness that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.

(3)  He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

(4)  Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.  (Isa 53:1-4 RSV)

Look at the preciseness of detail not just in the verses under discussion, but in the entire chapter. Remember this was spoken centuries before Christ came to earth, yet Isaiah sees through the eyes of the Holy Spirit, eyes that pierce through the mists of centuries and the hopeless confusion brought on by sin. In verse one He asks plaintively, “Who has believed what we are telling them?” It was a rhetorical question and Isaiah knew that not many would believe.  Unfortunately for Israel his indirect prophecy was fulfilled.

In verse two Isaiah speaks as though he were seeing the event he foretold actually happening before his eyes: “…he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground…” and the Savior did indeed spring up like a tender plant out of the spiritual barrenness all around Him.

In verse three Isaiah again asks a question, “To whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?” And again this was an indirect prophecy that God’s power would be revealed only to a relative few who did not willfully shut their eyes to the Truth.

Jesus died once, a ghastly death. The only innocent man in all history died for a world that was populated by nothing but sinners from humanity’s inception to the last person to be born in the Age of Man. But the Apostle Paul, one of the sinful humans for whom Christ died, wrote to the Corinthians,

“I protest by that glorifying in you, brethren, which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily”! (1Co 15:31 ASV)

It is a thought provoking fact: In order to procure our salvation Jesus was required to die just once, albeit it was the most savage and gruesome of deaths, yet we are required by our faith in Jesus to die, in a figure, many times over.

The followers of the crucified Christ have to “mortify” (put to death) their carnal selves as the Holy Spirit within them cries aloud for their crucifixion. But make no mistake: we are not saved by our constant mortifying of our carnal nature – Christ settled that once for all time – rather, we die daily with Christ because we are saved. If there be no dying, it is fully evident there is no faith in Christ and therefore no salvation.

Let's Leave the Gloom of the Tomb

After telling the apostles that Jesus' body had disappeared, Mary Magdalene returned to the sepulcher, reaching it after Peter and John had left. Standing outside the tomb, Mary was a forlorn figure, weeping and confused, unsure at this time just what had happened to Jesus. She ventured a look inside. There she saw two angels whom she must have thought were two men sitting, one at the head and the other at the foot of the place where the body of Jesus had lain.

“Why are you weeping?” they asked.

“They have taken my Lord away and I don't know where they have laid Him.”

She then turned about and saw a man whom she thought was the gardener. He repeated the question to her: “Why are you weeping?

“Sir,” she pled tearfully, “if you have taken him somewhere else, tell me where He is and I will take Him away.”

He said simply, “Mary!” and the old love and concern were evident in His voice: It was Jesus!

Why do we today still search for Jesus in an empty tomb?

The followers of the crucified Jesus had good reason for their fruitless search. They had not been able to grasp the startling message Jesus had been telling them, that He would be crucified, which was too horrible for them to conceptualize and, further, that He would rise from the dead. Jesus had been with them in His public ministry only a little over three years and He had brought in some startling new ideas of God and worship and love and self-sacrifice – they simply could not grasp it all in that short time.

We today do not have an alibi for our little faith and lackadaisical service. We have no excuse for lingering in an empty tomb when the risen Savior is not there. It is right for us to go through the harrowing details of Jesus’ suffering and death: that is why He came to earth and without suffering and death there would be no resurrection. Without Christ’ssuffering and death we would still be in our sins. The empty tomb is the glimmer of hope that tells our longing hearts that Jesus did in fact break the steely grip of death. But we have no need nor is it wise to linger there and be depressed by the gloom of the tomb.

Jesus did not linger in a cold, sepulcher longer than was necessary. He left for the bright sunlight of new life and new hope. Nor does He want us to remain fixated on a chill, dank tomb that He left forever behind Him for the glorious life and light of a new day. Let’s follow Him.

 

Defilement Is Easy; Sanctification is Not

From the moment of conception in His mother’s womb, Jesus was a markedly different mortal from His peers. He was a God/Man, the product of divine “genetic engineering.” He was fully God and fully man, exhibiting the divine or mortal aspect of His nature as the occasion warranted. After He “suffered” (allowed) Himself to be baptized by John in the Jordan, Jesus became even more different than other men, not in losing any of His human nature whereby He was “near of kin” to other humans and thereby qualified to act as their redeemer, but in the fact He could no longer be ceremonially defiled (This is my supposition  and, although a likely fact, I cannot prove it by Scripture).  The watershed moment was Jesus’ baptism by John. It seemed to mark a high point in a career full of them.

Jesus wore His God/Man nature with its human frailties in a manner vastly superior to that of the demigods (creatures that were half god and half man) of mythology. Their human nature was  all too readily apparent in their sins of lust and  greed and envy, vices of which Jesus was never guilty.

The first thirty years of Jesus’ life we may safely assume were like those of most Jews. He could be ceremonially defiled through no fault of His own. There were at least two general ways by which Jesus could be defiled: 1) by touching a dead body or by a person’s falling dead next to Him, and 2) by unintentionally touching anything or any person that was unclean. In the latter case there was no way by which a Jew could go through life undefiled; and it required ceremonial cleansing each time for the defiled person to be right in the eyes of the Law.

The Old Testament is very plain on the matter of sanctification or consecration, which was the state of the Jew who had met every requirement for his cleansing after every instance of defilement. First of all, consecration or sanctification was not transferable from a consecrated person or object to another person or object. But defilement (“uncleanness”) was all too readily transferable from a defiled object to that which was “clean.” Jehovah explained it to Haggai in the passage following:

11 "This is what the Lord Almighty says: 'Ask the priests what the law says: 12 If a person carries consecrated meat in the fold of his garment, and that fold touches some bread or stew, some wine, oil or other food, does it [the bread. stew, etc) become consecrated?'" The priests answered, "No." 13 Then Haggai said, "If a person defiled by contact with a dead body touches one of these things, does it become defiled?" "Yes," the priests replied, "it becomes defiled." 14 Then Haggai said, "'So it is with this people and this nation in my sight,' declares the Lord. 'Whatever they do and whatever they offer there is defiled.' (Haggai 2.11-14 – NIV)

In light of this, it is rather remarkable that twice in His public ministry Jesus raised a dead person to life while touching the corpse or touching the object on which the corpse lay. (Mark 5.22-24, 35-43; Luke 7.11-15) As we all know, touching a dead body or that whereon the body lay was a sure means of defilement under the Old Covenant Law.

Let’s deal more specifically with the incident of the leprous man in Mark 5.22-24, 35-43. I have “borrowed” my own text from The Life of Christ in Five Phases I,  further clarify the teaching point:

“There was another significant factor about this incident of healing. According to the Law of Moses, the man was ceremonially unclean and would defile any person or thing that he touched. Jesus, though, touched him in the act of healing him and suffered no ceremonial or physical ill effect. According to the Law, Jesus should have been unclean at that instant. Reason would tell us that, as a Jew, Jesus must have become ceremonially unclean just by chance more than a few times in His life span of thirty-three years.

“There were many things that would defile a man according to the Mosaic Law. We cannot surmise that, because Jesus was God, He did not ever become ceremonially defiled. Becoming unclean was an involuntary way of life with the Israelite just as becoming physically dirty is an undeliberate way of life with any person, Jew or Gentile. Like any other man, Jesus had to wash away physical uncleanness as the occasion demanded. Therefore it would appear that, like any other Jew, He had to go through the ritual of cleansing Himself ceremonially as the occasion demanded.

“But on this occasion Jesus could not in any way be defiled by this symbol of sin. Ceremonial uncleanness was a symbolic matter that Jesus had probably endured previous to His public ministry for the sake of being human and being a Jew and it never besmirched His righteous Self. However, in this instance God was showing to us that in His divinity He could not be considered even ceremonially unclean. On the contrary, He can transfer His wholeness to all who want it. Instead of His receiving uncleanness from the leprous (sinful) man, Jesus imparted His own sinlessness to him. He touched the man and made him whole and sin free.”

This was Jesus the God who was man and the man who was God. He had the qualities of both the human and the divine, but it seems that, only during His 3 ½ years of public ministry the human quality was never either ceremonially or spiritually impure (defiled). As God, Jesus could not sin while, as the fully human He was, He was terribly limited in what He could do and where He could go, although  it was never to engage in sin and it never resulted in His being ceremonially defiled.

Can you understand? Jesus is the only one who can make us clean. He alone of all persons in this world is intrinsically clean and pure and righteous. If you want to be undefiled and holy as He is, you have to have Jesus touch you with the finger of divinity and impart to you the august holiness that resides only in Him and that only He can impart.

Throw away your pride and stubbornness and come to Jesus , saying, “Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean!”

He will respond by saying so graciously, “I will. Be thou clean!”