JESUS CHRIST by S. N. H.

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · May 28, 1896

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 22, No. 22.

JESUS CHRIST.

By S. N. H.

BY S. N. H.

God’s only connection with the human family is by his Son Jesus Christ. Of himself he says, “I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last,” “the beginning of the creation of God,” or, as elsewhere expressed, the “I AM.” The prophet thus speaks of his birth: “Thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, tho thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall He come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from the days of eternity.” Micah 5:2, margin. This and similar expressions are used, revealing to mankind that Christ existed with the Father back into eternity, of which the human mind can form no conception. When eternity is mentioned, there is no measurement of time, no comprehending its duration. “God alone inhabiteth eternity.” All the mind can comprehend is the fact the words express, eternity, duration without end. We may speak of millions upon millions of years, but all of that does not lessen one second of eternity. As the poet has it:—

“When we’ve been there ten thousand years, Bright shining as the sun, We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise Than when we first begun.”

Sometime in eternity there was a council between the Father and the Son concerning God’s purposes; for God had a purpose, and it is called his “eternal purpose.” In this council with the Father and the Son the liabilities and possibilities of any contingency to thwart that purpose were considered. God did not plan that man should sin, nor purpose that he should, but he did purpose the creation of this world, and the peopling of it with a race that would live forever, whose life would measure with the life of God, ever bearing his own image and likeness. As the condition of a lost race was taken into account, providing man should sin, it would become necessary to redeem the race for one to die who was equal to the Father, or blot from existence both sin and the sinner. Only one such being existed in the universe, and that was Christ. Infinite love said, “Spare the sinner.” He then offered his life. “Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.” John 10:17, 18. It is thus the Father gave the Son, and the Son gave himself; and the Father loved the Son more because he gave himself to die for the lost race.

Concerning the purposes of God being placed in Christ we read, “Who hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began.” God therefore deposited in Christ his own purpose, grace and power to accomplish all of his purposes from eternity.

After man had become separated from God by sin, when Christ came in the flesh, three times did God the Father speak for the benefit of the lost race, but in each instance was the voice heard speaking to the Son: (1) When he was baptized of John in Jordan, as he came from the water, “lo, the heavens were opened unto him [John], and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him; and lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” This voice was not only an assurance to Christ of the acceptance of the Father, but it also becomes the same assurance to any who will follow in his steps. (2) Again at the transfiguration, where the kingdom of God was illustrated, “behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them; and behold a voice out of the cloud, which said, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him,” giving the assurance to all who would listen to his words of an entrance into the kingdom of glory. (3) Once more, as he entered the temple at the close of his ministry on earth, when the Greeks expressed a desire to see him, but were separated by the middle wall of partition in the temple. Christ’s great heart of love took in the Gospel’s going to the gentiles by his being lifted upon the cross, and he prayed, “Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour?” but then adds: “But for this cause came I unto this hour. Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again.” This voice was also for the people, giving the assurance not only of the Father’s approval of his Son, but that in all who follow his steps in self-denial the Father is glorified and will be glorified.

Thus Christ from eternity was made the connecting link between the heaven and the fallen race. In him, and in him alone, in his life lived in us, as we follow in his steps, will there be an eternal connection with the Father. Nothing short of this will insure any of the kingdom of God.