The Scourge Of Racism
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Mankind have been sinners so long, we cannot wrap our brains around a perfect, sinless man as Adam was before he sinned. This is why even with Jesus, Son of Man, many attribute His sinless life to His deity. This is the second of two common misconceptions of His Humanity mostly well meaning Bible teachers have and teach. However, to any way have used the powers of His divinity in the conduct of His mortal sojourn would belie the apostle Paul’s inspired declaration, “who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men,” (Philippians 2:6-7, NKJV).
Also, Scripture teaches that the Lord Jesus in the body of Mary, the virgin had a perfect, sinless body “prepared” for Him or else being holy God, He could not have entered it (Luke 1:31, 34-35; Hebrews 10:5, NKJV)! The net result of this mostly unintended second misconception of Jesus, Son of Man is the implication that He through His deity cheated somehow in keeping Himself in perfect obedience to and sinless before God. But, of course, this would be sin and scandalous! This is why once again my God demonstrates His infinite wisdom in what is recorded in three of the New Testament Gospel accounts of Jesus being put to the test before He began His ministry.
The Father having declared loving affection for and full pleasure in His Son at His baptism by John, the Holy Spirit who had descended upon Him is seen to even push Jesus into the wilderness to fast forty days and afterward become ravenously hungry; then, be tempted by the devil to act in this weakened state three ways. First, he tempted Him to use His own power as the Son of God to meet His physical needs. Second, Satan tempted Him to put the Father’s promise of protective care to the test. Lastly, the tempter offered Jesus a path to world rule through bowing to him. The Son of Man refused every temptation and prevailed (Matthew 3:13-4:11; Mark 1:9-13; Luke 3:21-22, 4:1-13)!
This was surely not the first attempt by Satan to seduce Jesus into sin from His age of accountability to that moment or after during His ministry years. But in the barren wilderness temptation of Jesus as with Adam in the paradise garden, God the Father sought to reveal His only begotten Son’s heart; His willingness to please the Father even over Himself and do His will as He avowed coming into the world (Hebrews 10:6-7). Adam failed in the garden, but Jesus marvelously succeeded in the wilderness and thereafter since it is written of Him that He “was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin,” (Hebrews 4:15, NKJV).
Jesus, the Son of Man maintained His perfection from a Boy the same way Adam could have out of faith in and love for His Father along with the pure, Selfless ambition to please Him and do His will (Genesis 2:15-17, 3:6, 17a; Luke 2:41-52, 8:19-21; John 14:31). The Gospels record that Jesus kept emphasizing repeatedly how He had come to do His Father’s will in all that He taught as His message and the deeds He carried out in the Father’s power by the Holy Spirit (John 8:25-29, 12:42-50, 14:7-11). Beyond ambition as a Man, He perfectly displayed authority, leadership, courage, zeal, physical and spiritual strength, toughness and forcefulness in His mission (Luke 4:31-44; John 2:13-22).
Along the way, He forthrightly spoke of greatness in the glory the Father had prepared for Him; the life cause and mission He was willing to suffer and endure death for in carrying out (Matthew 16:13-17:13). He took what most mortal men would certainly agree were risks in His ministry while traveling throughout Israel and decisive actions that relieved human suffering (Luke 4:16-30; 5:12-26). He followed His Father’s instructions and plans wholly to the death as an obedient Son; the distinctive Strong Man of God (Philippians 2:8)!2 Truly, He learned obedience (God does not learn, man does) in all that He suffered on the way to and on the cross (Isaiah 50:4-6; Matthew 26:36-46; Hebrews 5:5-8).
Even with the impending abandonment of His “band of brothers,” Jesus copiously “loved them to the end,” (John 13:1, NKJV).3 Before entering His final trials, He interceded for them and all of us that would be the beneficiaries by faith of His sacrifice (John 17); a sacrifice that made a way of eternal deliverance from sin and death for the first time since Adam’s fall (Isaiah 53; Romans 3:10-31; Ephesians 2:1-10). Again, Jesus, Son of Man did this to restore fallen man the creature in the divine purpose of creation-wide governance, bring many sons to eternal glory with Him, help the faithful in our earthly sojourn and remove the fear of judgment (Hebrews 2:5-18, 4:14-16, 5:9, 9:22-10:18). The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, “Who is on the Lord's side?”
2 Obeying God to the death is one of four distinctive characteristics of Jesus as the Strong Man of God I am led by the Holy Spirit to write about in my book, The Strong
Man Of God: Back To Basics available in the Strong Man Store.
3 I gratefully acknowledge here David Murrow and his book, Why Men Hate Going To Church as a reference source for presenting part of Jesus’ masculine checklist
(i.e. aspiration for greatness, a cause to die for, risk taking, adventure, action taking and problem solving, following a leader and the love of a “band of brothers”). I
have shown Jesus as such a Man in this blog and will do so in upcoming blogs to relate this partial masculine display to His disciples and very importantly, as typical
of males presently and man the creature made in the image and likeness of God. Other characteristics of masculinity displayed by Jesus, Son of Man will also be
presented in upcoming blogs as they are by Murrow in his book and me in The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics.
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