THE
MANHOOD OF CHRIST
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CONCURRENTLY with the conflict as to eternal life, considerable controversy
took place on the subject of the Person of Christ and His true manhood.
The following five letters, written at that time by Mr. J. B. Stoney,
and a paper written by Mr. F. E. Raven, shew that great spiritual gain
resulted as the truth was brought out in greater clarity than it had
previously had in the minds of many.
I deprecate
discussion on this momentous subject. The moment you travel outside
the very words of Scripture you are in danger of error. “God manifested
in flesh” is Scripture, but “perfect God and perfect Man”
is not scripture. Satan’s direct opposition is against the Word
made flesh—the “man-child” (Rev. 12)—from Herod’s
day down to this. In Christendom the pious Christians think of Christ
as God and not as Man, and they read of His miracles in the gospels
to prove that He was God. They do not see that indirectly they are siding
with Satan, who will tolerate any measure of religion so that the Man
out of heaven is not paramount. Satan, in his opposition to God, perpetrated
the fall of man in the garden of Eden, but when the Son of God became
a Man His first work (see Mark 1) was to drive the unclean spirit out
of man.
The Son of
God became a Man. He thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but
He laid His glory by and took on Himself the form of a servant, and
was made in the likeness of men. “Forasmuch as the children are
partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of
the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power
of death,” etc. He became a Man, born of woman, to bear the judgment
on man. He died, and in His death the man after the flesh was judicially
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terminated: so “henceforth know we no man after the flesh: yea,
though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth
know we him no more.” There is the earthy man, and there
is the heavenly Man. The blessed Son went through the terrible sorrow
of death as a man. His very greatness caused Him to suffer beyond our
conception, for He bore the judgment on the first man, and He is the
second Man. The first man is of the earth, earthy, the second Man is
out of heaven. You must see the first man superseded by the second Man.
Every believer is of the second Man. You must keep in mind that the
greatness of the grace is that the Son of God, who could say, “I
and my Father are one,” took on Himself the form of a servant
or slave, and He says, “I can of mine own self do nothing.”
He, the only begotten Son in the bosom of the Father, declared God while
in the form of a servant. In His grace He connects His own with all
He is as a Man. From not seeing this they fell into error at Plymouth
in assuming that the church was united to God. The church or the body
of Christ is of His order and nature. It has come from Him and is united
to Him. It is marvellous grace that the Son of God became a Man—a
Man to free every one believing in Him of the man after the flesh, so
that every one in Him is a new creation. I think we have but a very
feeble appreciation of the new man. We are brethren of the risen Christ.
“Both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified, are all
of one: for which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren“—the
offspring of His resurrection, in all His divine beauty as a Man.
Again, the
manna is not essentially His acts, or His obedience, but the grace in
which He did everything; as Mr. Darby has said, His springs were in
God: our springs naturally are in ourselves.
Finally,
the better we comprehend His manhood, the more fully we see the greatness
of the mystery of
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the church—His complement. He would not be complete without His
body. The world could not contain the books which could be written of
Him, but the vastness of this blessed Man will be expressed by His body,
the church, to the glory of God for ever.
J.B.S.
I was glad
to get tidings of you.... I greatly deprecate discussion on such a grave
subject. I believe we all are given light as we require it; and I do
not see that any one understands a particular subject until he is up
to it in his soul. For instance, I do not see that any one
understands the manna until he is really in the wilderness, and is therefore
in need of it. Then he will learn it.
I should
say to every inquirer, first learn reconciliation—that the man
after the flesh has been removed in judgment, and that you are, as is
every one in Christ, a new creation. Old things have passed away, all
have become new, and all is of God. Christ is the beginning of the creation
of God. I am afraid that very few comprehend that the man after the
flesh was judicially terminated in the cross, and that He who terminated
the first man is the Man out of heaven—altogether to
God’s pleasure—a Man of an entirely new order—He is
the Son of God. You are of Him, a member of His body—of Him as
a Man; you could not be of the divine Person. The Holy Ghost, His gift,
dwells in you. I believe the real difficulty is that the Man of the
new order is not seen superseding the man after the flesh, and that
each believer now is formed out of Christ as Eve was formed out of Adam’s
rib. I need not add more. Reconciliation must be first distinctly apprehended.
I may add
that manna in its nature and quality is unknown if you do not apprehend
the peculiar and blessed way in which a Man (whose springs were in
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God) walked in the details of daily life here, and that you could not
walk as He walked but as He lives in you. Not merely in His obedience
and in his acts, but in the grace and beauty in which they were done.
Be assured that if you were practically in the knowledge of Christ as
the manna you would understand His Person better than any one could
instruct you.
I see Mr.
Darby quoted where there is no possible reference to the present subject;
but as I said at the beginning I say at the close, you will never understand
any divine truth until you are morally up to it in your soul.
J.B.S.
The truth
is that God was manifest in the flesh; the divine Being, a Spirit, took
bodily human form. Outwardly there was no distinction between Him and
other men. If there were, the high priest would not have given thirty
pieces of silver for singling Him out from His disciples. He was only
a man to the natural eye, but when anyone had light from God to know
Him as a divine Person he was there and then greatly blessed. See Peter
in Luke 5 and all through the gospel until you come to the thief on
the cross. I believe the opposition is really against the new man—the
Man out of heaven. Many Christians know something of man being
judicially terminated in the cross—and every pious one would like
to have more of the grace of Christ in his ways and thoughts, but I
am afraid very few would like to have the first man altogether displaced
and to be here in the grace and manner of life of the Man “out
of heaven.” The opposers want to have two persons in one, man
and God, one time to act as God, and at another to act as man.
They really do not see the incarnation. They do not see that He who
was God became a man and hence a Man out of heaven. They would
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have Him to be a man in flesh and blood, and in a way distinct from
His being God—whereas He is God, and He, that same Person,
became a man in flesh and blood, but He came from God, He brought everything
with Him. He learned nothing from His mother nor from any one
here. He is a Man out of heaven. He bore the judgment on man, He was
put to death in the flesh but quickened in the Spirit, and He is the
Man of God’s pleasure for ever; and it is only as you are of His
nature and order that you could be united to Him, or that you are a
“living stone” in His building.
I believe
when we rightly apprehend the new creation which is ours in Christ,
that we must see how very far we are from the manner of life in thoughts
and ways which is really ours as ”brethren“ of Christ; and
hence some of the truly conscientious shrink from seeing the exalted
position in which He has placed man through Himself.
J.B.S.
I return
the letter you so kindly sent me. It is very plain that — does
not see God’s purpose in a Man; he is thinking only of Christ
as God. God is setting forth His own glory in Christ as Man, otherwise
there could not be glory unto Him in the church by Christ Jesus throughout
all ages. If I begin at Genesis, the great purpose before God is man.
In His own Son becoming man He had a man to His pleasure, and
the church is the complement of that Man. The world could not contain
the books which could be written of Him, but the church will fully and
perfectly display Him. Some have no idea of the mystery or of God’s
purpose in Christ. He as a Man can authorise to baptise in the name
of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.
J.B.S.
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The great impression made on me by your letter is that MAN, the Man
Christ Jesus, is not before the vision of your soul as He is in the
mind of God. If you do not see with God, you are not in communion with
Him. Your one point is to prove His deity, quite right in itself; thus
all the old commentators said the miracles were recorded to prove Christ’s
divinity. But look for a moment from God’s side. His
great purpose is to be glorified in a Man, and hence “Unto
him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages.”
You do not seem to have apprehended God’s purpose in MAN. He has
a MAN now to His pleasure; now there is glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace, good pleasure in men.
I believe
that if you would look at our blessed Lord on the earth as He was in
the eye of God, you would see that He as a MAN expressed the Trinity
here; hence He can authorise His disciples to baptise in the name of
the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. No one else could reveal
or declare the Father but the Son, and no one could have the Spirit
without measure but the Son, and He is a man.
Do you apprehend
in any measure the greatness of the complement of Christ? The world
could not contain the books which would be written, but the church is
the complement of the Man who fully expressed God here. The church could
not be the complement of His divinity.
I am, thank
God, assured that if you are led to see the Man Christ Jesus as He is
TO God, you will not in any measure lose sight of the Son ever with
the Father, and the only One able to fulfil His pleasure; but you will
adoringly see Him as such while afflicted in all our afflictions, the
Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, the lowly, dependent Man.
He ever lived here from a babe in all divine beauty. The manna was on
every leaf and every thorn; never could there be anything equal to it.
He magnified God in all
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the details of daily life. He learned nothing from man; so that God
is not only well pleased with Him, but His word to us is on the holy
mount, “This is my beloved Son: hear him.”
One word
more. You must keep your conscience up to your faith. And again, I would
ask you to look at Christ on the earth as the Father saw Him, or rather
as God saw Him, for all the Persons of the Trinity were expressed by
the Man Christ Jesus.
May He lead
you into His mind.
J.B.S.
THE PERSON
OF THE CHRIST
F.E.R.
WHILE extremely
unwilling to enter on the field of controversy, especially on subjects
touching the Person of our Lord Jesus Christ, I have thought it right,
in the interests of the truth and of the Lord’s people, to put
out a few remarks on two points of importance which have been in question.
In so doing I decline to reply to any attacks which have appeared, based
on isolated statements culled from letters I have written, partly from
reluctance to notice them, and partly because I see in these attacks
the tendency to shift (it may be almost unconsciously) the ground of
conflict, in order to gain a point of vantage. In what I have to say
I adhere therefore to two points that have been in question, which are
these:—
1. As to
whether Christ is ever viewed in scripture as man, distinct and apart
from what He is as God.
2. As to
whether the truth of His Person consists in the union in Him of God
and man; a favourite formula with those so holding is “God and
man one Christ“—and with this is connected the idea that
every title referring to Christ covers the whole truth of His Person.
Now I affirm
that the denial of the first, while claiming to maintain orthodoxy,
is destructive of
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Christianity in its real power; and I would affectionately warn saints
against giving up, in zeal for orthodoxy, the blessed foundations of
Christianity. Further, that the assertion of the second is derogatory
and dishonouring to the Son; and I proceed to shew that both the denial
and the assertion are contrary to the teaching of Scripture.
The first
betrays a singular inability to apprehend the great reality of the incarnation,
at all events in a most essential aspect of it, namely, the fact of
Christ having by it a place as man Godward. As the Word became
flesh He dwelt among men and revealed God, and in Him all the fulness
was pleased to dwell; but He Himself filled and still fills a place
as Man towards God (see Psalm 16); and the two thoughts are wholly distinct
conceptions, which cannot be grasped at one and the same time by any
finite mind. “No one knows the Son but the Father.” As Man
He is both Apostle and High Priest. In other words, in the Apostle God
has, so to say, come out, and in the High Priest man has entered in.
Now these two thoughts, though realised in one Person, must of necessity
be separately and distinctly apprehended. The one presents God, the
other, man.
The reality
of Christ’s manhood in its aspect Godward is amply presented in
the New Testament. There we have the truth, that Christ, having died
to sin once, lives to God; Rom. 6. The having put off the old man and
having put on the new is said to be “as the truth is in Jesus,”
Eph. 4. Christ Jesus before Pontius Pilate witnessed the good confession;
1 Tim. 6. He sings praises to God in the midst of the assembly; Heb.
2. He praises in the great congregation, Psa. 22, he has entered in
for us as Forerunner; Heb. 6. He appears in the presence of God for
us; Heb. 9.
Now, while
fully admitting that, morally, Christ’s manhood had its unique
and blessed character from
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God, for in becoming man He gave character to manhood, yet in the thoughts
above presented it is utterly impossible to introduce the idea of Deity
in its proper character and attributes, because in every case it is
man that is presented, or rather, Christ is viewed in the light of man
Godward.
The refusal
of this is destructive of Christianity in its true power, for it is
on the side that I have indicated that Christ is placed within the reach
of our appropriation, so that we can eat Him and live by Him. He is,
as second Man, the pattern of our blessing, the Leader of our salvation.
He draws us to Himself by making known to us His love; and the affection
on our part begotten by this appropriates Him as the expression and
pattern of what we are according to the counsel of God; and it is in
this way that the believer is led into the true sense of the greatness
of his portion, and even partakes morally in the life of God. As “Lord”
Christ is the Object of faith, as Head He is held by the believer, who
is led by Him into heavenly blessing. Hence I am entirely at a loss
to understand how the truth of Christianity can be maintained in the
absence of the apprehension of Christ in His place as man Godward, distinct
and apart from the glory and attributes which belong only to God, and
in which Christ has part as Himself being a divine Person.
I may observe
here that Christians are, as a rule, uninstructed in three important
points of Christian doctrine.
1. Reconciliation,
which they do not know as in the mind of God. The distance between God
and the sinner must have been removed to effect it, and but few know
the nature of the distance. They do not see that the man after the flesh
has been terminated judicially in the cross in the Man Christ Jesus.
2. Christ
as manna. They do not apprehend in any degree the manner of life of
Christ here as man, “the life of Jesus.”
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3. The mystery. They have no true conception that the church is the
complement of the Man who glorified God here; but while admitting
that all saints are united to Christ, they are leavened with the error
that they are united to the Son of God, and they thus betray their ignorance
of the mystery.
Hence it
is not surprising that many find difficulty in the apprehension of Christ
in the point of view which I have sought to make plain.
The second
error maintains that the truth of Christ’s Person consists
in the union in Him of God and man.
Now, this
idea arises, I judge, from confusion of thought as between person
and condition, and has been fostered by expressions found in
hymns, and the like, which have been used simply and devoutly by Christians
without any very strict inquiry into their real force; but it involves
a thought very derogatory to the truth of the Son, namely, that in becoming
man a change has taken place as to His Person—He is in Person
something which He was not before. This is not the teaching of Scripture,
nor do I think that it can be entertained. When I come to the word,
I find that while in three gospels the truth of Christ in certain official
positions is prominent, the fourth (John) is given to us to afford full
light as to His Person, that is, “the Son”; and in this
respect He is seen in three positions, namely, as eternally with the
Father, as come into the world, and as going back to the Father, the
same Person unchanged and unchangeable.
Further than
this, the Person is even viewed as acting in regard to His form or condition,
divine or human; “Being in the form of God, he emptied himself
and took on him a servant’s form, becoming in the likeness of
men.”
He comes
to do God’s will in the body prepared for Him.
He raises
up the temple of His body.
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He gives His flesh for the life of the world.
He lays down
His life (human condition) to take it again.
We have thus
a divine Person presented, even apart from the question of form, and
the idea of the unity of the Person in the sense asserted is not found.
The One who
being in the form of God, emptied Himself, and took on Him a servant’s
form, is the same who, having become man, humbled Himself, and became
obedient to the death of the cross, and is now highly exalted. There
is no idea either of unity, or of change, in the Person. It is the same
person in servant’s form, and entering into what that form involved.
The truth
of a divine Person assuming human condition, the Word becoming flesh,
and in such wise as that He can be viewed objectively as man, I believe;
but that is not a question of unity of a Person. It is a Person in a
condition in which He was not previously.
Another idea
connected with the above appears to be that every title or name inherited
by the Son or applied to Him in Scripture embraces or covers, if it
does not describe, the whole truth of His Person. Now I believe this
to be a fallacy, and a mistaken way of apprehending Scripture. Unquestionably
the Lord is identified or designated, and designates Himself, by official
names or titles, as “the Christ” or “Son of man”;
but such titles, though serving sufficiently to identify or designate
the Person, do not cover the truth of His Person; and different titles
applied to or fulfilled in Christ have to be understood each within
its own appropriate limits. They describe the office, but not the person
that holds the office. In the same way we commonly use official and
acquired titles as “The Queen,” “The Colonel,”
“The Doctor,” to identify or designate a person, but we
have no idea that such a title is descriptive of the
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person, or covers all that is true of the person, though once the person
is so designated, many things can be said which refer to the person,
and have nothing whatever to do with the particular designation; for
instance, I might say, “When the Queen was a child.” She
was not queen as a child. It is simply a title used for designation,
which has its own particular force and meaning.
Jesus is
the anointed of God, that is, the Christ, but not properly so until
He was anointed, whatever might be true in purpose. So too, He was not
Son of man until He became man, yet He says “The Son of man came
to minister.” “What and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend
up where he was before.” “The Son of man which is in heaven.”
The simple fact is that a title serves to designate the Person, without
being descriptive of the Person, or involving any question of the unity
of the Person. The titles “The Christ” and “Son of
man” are both official titles which could have had no place or
meaning except in the Son having become man; and it is remarkable that
the Lord does not in the gospels use what is, perhaps, the nearest approach
to a personal name, that is, Jesus, in the same way.
In conclusion,
I earnestly entreat saints to come prayerfully and patiently to Scripture
to get their thoughts of Christ formed by the word of God; and not to
adopt the creeds or moulds into which men, often with pious intent,
have cast the truth in the vain effort to guard against error; and it
is significant that those who have of late come forward to expose what
they deemed to be error, have shewn a tendency in their minds in the
direction of a kind of Tritheism. It is not in this way that the truth
of Christ’s Person is guarded, or that of the unity of the Godhead
maintained.
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