God drew us with cords of a man and with bands of love by firstly becoming a man in His incarnation, by living a perfect human on earth, by dying an all-inclusive all-terminating death on the cross, by entering into a life-imparting resurrection, and by being in an all-transcending ascension.
Through all these segments of the cords of man, He sends forth His bands of love to draw us, captivate us, gain us, and make us one with Him organically in the divine romance.
When You see Christ’s incarnation, when you read about His human living on earth, when you see His crucifixion, and when you realize what His resurrection and ascension involve and are, you will just love Him more and enjoy Him more in this divine romance between God and man!
Christ’s incarnation: a prototype of a God-man
There are so many rich aspects concerning the incarnation of Christ. First, through being incarnated Christ brought God into man and mingled God with man, having God incarnated to be a man in the flesh (see John 1:14; Gen. 3:15; 22:18; 2 Sam. 7:12-14a; Isa. 7:14; 9:6; Micah 5:2).
In His incarnation Christ mingled divinity with humanity making God and man, divinity and humanity, one entity. This one was Emmanuel, God with us, God mingled with man and living in man as one entity.
Christ was conceived of the Spirit and was born of a human virgin (Matt. 1:20) to be the first God-man, the prototype for the mass reproduction of the many God-men. What a wonderful incarnation of God in humanity!
Christ’s human living: a model of expressing God
Even though the Gospels tell us more about the last three and a half years of Christ’s human living, here and there we can see the perfect and uplifted human living of Christ throughout His life. He really lived a life under the cross to express God, not living by His own life but by God’s life.
Christ expressed in His humanity the rich and bountiful divine attributes of God through His aromatic and fragrant human virtues, not by living His human life in the flesh but living by His divine life in resurrection.
Even when He was 12 years old and He took care of the Father’s house and His business, He still obeyed His parents in full, being subject to them in everything. All throughout His life, Christ expressed God in humanity by living a crucified life to express the divine life.
He set up a model for the many upcoming God-men – He set up a pattern for us to follow, a pattern of being crucified to live so that God may be expressed through humanity (see 2 Pet. 2:21).
Christ is the prototype, and He set up a pattern, a model, for “spiritual xeroxing” to produce millions of copies, millions of God-men!
Christ’s all-terminating and life-releasing death
With this One there’s so much to tell, so much to speak about, especially when we come to His death! Human death is not a pleasant thing, but Christ’s death was all-inclusive, fragrant, sweet, all-terminating, and so wonderful!
Christ didn’t just die, and He was not martyred; He was not killed by man nor was He dying as a common human being. Christ died as the Lamb of God, as a man in the flesh, as the last Adam, as the Firstborn of all creation, as a serpent in form, as the Peace Maker, and as the Grain of Wheat.
Here is more concerning these seven most outstanding aspects of Christ’s all-terminating and life-releasing death:
- Christ crucified the flesh of sin through His death (Gal. 5:24; Rom. 8:3). He came in the likeness of the flesh of sin and He crucified the flesh of sin on the cross.
- Christ condemned sin in the flesh and took away sin by shedding His precious blood (Rom. 8:3b; John 1:29; Heb. 9:26b, 28a; John 19:34b). In God’s eyes He was made sin and condemned sin in the flesh, and He took away sin and sins by His blood.
- Christ destroyed the devil through His death (Heb. 2:14; John 12:31). The one wo has the might of death and who is in every man’s flesh has been destroyed through Christ’s death on the cross!
- Christ judged the world and cast out its ruler through His death on the cross (John 12:31; Gal. 6:14). In Him the enemy has nothing, and through His death Christ judged both the world and the devil, its ruler!
- Christ terminated the old creation by crucifying the old man (Rom. 6:6). Christ died as a man in the old creation to terminate the old creation by putting the old man to death – now we are in a new creation!
- Christ abolished the law of the commandments in ordinances through His death (Eph. 2:15). All the cultural, religious, and other kinds of differences and dividing aspects have been abolished on the cross by Christ!
- Christ released the divine life through His death (John 12:24; 19:34). As the grain of wheat, He died and released the divine life which was concealed in the shell of His humanity, so that many grains would be produced in His resurrection!
How we love this wonderful One!
What can we say when we hear about this One? When you read the Gospels and especially when you read the footnotes in the Recovery Version opening up the rich attributes of God expressed through Christ’s aromatic human virtues…
When you see His rich and wonderful incarnation, when you realize and appreciate fully His bountiful human living, and when you get into all His accomplishments in His death, all you can say is,
Lord, I love You! I want to turn away from anything else unto You and just focus on You! Take me on in this divine romance! May my eyes turn away unto Jesus to look fully in His wonderful face! May everything else just fade away in the light of Your glory and grace! I want to know You more, focus on You, and leave all else behind! I just love You!
References and Further Reading
- Sharing inspired from, The Practical Way to Live a Life according to the High Peak of the Divine Revelation in the Holy Scriptures (ch. 1), as quoted in, the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-Study of the Minor Prophets, week 3 (entitled, Three Implications concerning Christ).
- Hymns on this topic:
# Turn your eyes upon Jesus, / Look full in His wonderful face.
# Oh, hallelujah, what a death / Christ died upon the cross!
# Lord, Thou art the “Seed of woman,” / Born to bruise the enemy; - Picture source: shining sun wallpaper.
