Seeing & Savoring Jesus Christ – Chapter 2
January 6, 2012Reflections on the second chapter entitled…
“Jesus is the Glory of God – The Deity of Jesus Christ.”
By Pastor Kenny Burchard email me here
Is it “up” or is it “down”?
Have you seen Raphael’s painting of the “school of Athens?” It is an immense painting in the Vatican in Rome. In the center of the Painting, we can see a depiction of Plato center-Left, and his student Aristotle center-right. Raphael surrounds these two mega-minds with other philosophers, but uses the centrality of Plato and Aristotle to depict two ways of approaching “knowledge.”
Plato is pointing UP and away from himself. Aristotle is motioning downward with his palm opened in front of him. It is as if Plato is saying, “Knowledge is up there, and out there, and above us, and if we can get out there, we can know things as they really are.” Plato tried to look for the “deeper meaning” in things. He tried to look “behind” physical forms and visible realities to “big ideas.” But, since he was bound in a physical world, he could never verify his ideas or his conclusions. He thought there was a “logos” – or a “big idea” that was behind everything, but he could not get to it. He “knew” it must be out there, but he could not see it.
Aristotle, on the other hand, seems to be disagreeing with his teacher, and saying… ”NO, sir, we live down here, and down here is all we can know, so we have to base our concept of reality on only what we can observe in the natural world.” Aristotle was thought to be one of the world’s first scientists, and was incredible at making accurate observations about the visible world, but he could never tell anyone what they actually meant.
A little “Greek” for the Greek Philosophers
In John 1:1 & 14, we have these words… 1 In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God… 14 and the word became flesh and dwelt among us…”
In Greek, the first part of v. 14 looks like this… “Καὶ ὁ λόγος σὰρξ ἐγένετο καὶ ἐσκήνωσεν ἐν ἡμῖν”
One way of reading this is… “That which was above – the big idea, the “word” which was God, took on a body and entered our world to live with us.”
What would John say to Plato and Aristotle? To Plato, he would say… “The logos is God.” There really is a reality that exists outside of creation. To Aristotle, he would say… “The logos came into the visible world so that we could observe him, and we have seen him.” Or, in another way – “That which was outside has come inside, and that which was above and far away, has come down and near.” They might both ask… “How is this?” John’s answer… “Through incarnation! God has come in the person, Jesus Christ, the God-man.”
Jesus is God
In this chapter, Piper affirms the Christian belief that Jesus is not merely “from God,” but that he is in fact GOD himself – incarnated and living in the very world that he has made. That “big idea” and that “outside reality” that is self-existent as Plato saw it has actually come into the visible world of men to be known by him (as Aristotle would like it to be). So, our Christian understanding of God is neither Platonist nor Aristetilian. Our view of the world is instead “christ-centered.” God (logos) has become flesh (sarx). Heaven has come to earth. ”Outside” has come “inside.” ”Up” has come “down.” God is with humanity again, in the person of Jesus (i.e. IN HIMSELF!!).
Jesus is BOTH “heavenly” and “man.” He both “logos” and “sarx.” In fact, that is what Paul the Apostle calls him in 1 Cor. 15:48. He is the “man from/of heaven.”
Some applications and insights…
My response to this chapter is… “Amazing Love, how can it be, that you my King would die for me.”
God has come to be FOR us what we cannot be in our fallen place. He has become what he wants us to be. He is “God with us” and he is “God for us.”
In this, I see Piper’s words as an encouragement that relationship with God is not initiated by people. God has “come down” and “dwelt among us” and “we beheld him.” God loves us. God is, in Jesus, reaching out to the human race with a human hand, and the heart of God. It makes me love God more. We love him, for he first loved us.
It takes a long time to think the right way, and talk the right way about Jesus and who he is. We need to do it more. I pray that the pieces we see can be put together in our hearts and minds, and that we could SEE and SAVOR MORE JESUS!
How about you? What did you gather from your reading of Chapter 2? What insights and illustrations could you share with the group? What prayer – praise – perspective is filling your mind and heart?
Pastor Kenny
Good word. The way relate to Christ must begin with a genuine understanding of who He truly is. And although I love Piper’s acknowledgement that we cannot, with our finite comprehension and limited vocabulary understand the immensity of all that Christ is, we can understand enough – enough about his eternal deity, his complete yet unmarred humanity, and thus his perfect sacrifice – to be flooded with a sense of gratitude and a compulsion to follow him for the rest of our lives.
One of my favorite passages in this chapter is: “”Of the Son [God] says, ‘Your throne, O God, is forever and ever. . . . You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning’” (Hebrews 1:8, 10). Thus the Father bears witness to the deity of the Son. He “is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power” (Hebrews 1:3).”
To think that this same, ever existing “the radiance of His (God’s) glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high (Hebrews 1:3NAS)
To borrow from our brother Harold Helms in his book, “God’s Final Answer” He explains “exact representation” in this way, “He is visibly exactly what God is in essence.” of “when he had made purification of sins” Harold says, “to be (purified) means to be cleansed thoroughly. We have nothing to do – just receive. Harold give a bit of history about this – “When Betty Crocker first marketed her cake mixes they were a colossal market failure. They required only water to be added. Market research produced the answer that the mix was too easy – consumers felt they had to DO SOMETHING!.” Betty Crocker made the adjustment of allowing consumers to add an egg and were an industry success. “but when it comes to the finished work of Calvary it is exactly that – FINISHED! Nothing can be added.” We need only to receive.
To think that same Jesus, – exact essence of God, who upholds all things by his rhema (spoken command) , who cleansed me thoroughly, would then say to the Father “they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am, so that they may see My glory which You have given Me, for You loved Me before the foundation of the world. (John 17:24 NAS). is amazing, unmerited, and so extremely merciful as to be mind boggling.
The DESIRE of Christ is that we EXPERIENCE the LOVE which comes from seeing His Glory. He desires that we BE with himself. Notice Christ is not asking that we are busy to show His glory – rather he wants us to BE WITH HIMSELF. Christ’s – and therefore God’s (exact essence of the Father’s Nature) – deepest desire is relationship with His Children.
What else can we do but be still and KNOW His love?
Experience the Deep deep love of Jesus. The one who took upon Himself the form of man eternally in order to redeem His creation.
I agree with MaryJo. It is hard for me to grasp exactly how Jesus and God are one. A million questions start to go through my mind to rationalize how this can or cannot be. Then, I stop… For me it doesn’t matter if I have a complete understanding of how they are one. What I do know is who they both are and I know that I want to follow them completely. I am enjoying the book and I appreciate the prayer at the end of each chapter.
I am also reading along. I had to read some parts over to get a fulll understanding. I have to admit some part are over my head.
That song came to my mind while I was reading chapter 2. Be magnified.
I also appreciate the prayer at the end of the chapters.
After reading the chapter and giving the Plato vs. Aristotle argument some thought, I respectfully submit the following: Plato, by reason and reflection, was very much aware that the earth and heavens revealed the design of the Creator–in Psalms 19:1 David declares it to be so, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands.”
Aristotle relied upon personal observation and investigation (and produced significant scientific discoveries), and “imagined an eternal universe without beginning or end.”
Aristotle also described a hierarchy of souls where plants are of the lowest kind, animals are of a higher kind because of their ability to feel, and humans are of the highest because of their ability to reason and rationalize.
I like what Albert Barnes says in his commentary on 1Cor 15:45, “The first man Adam was made a living soul… (ἐγένετο εις ψυκὴν ζωσαν egeneto eis psuchēn zōsan – in Hebrew, נפשׁ חיה nephesh chayaah is, became a living, animated being; a being endowed with life.” Barnes goes on to say, “We apply the word “soul,” usually, to the intelligent and the immortal part of man; that which reasons, thinks, remembers, is conscious, is responsible, etc. The Greek and Hebrew words, however, more properly denote that which is alive… which breathes, which has an animal nature, … precisely the idea which Paul uses here, that the first man was made an animated being by having breathed into him the breath of life Genesis 2:7, and that it is the image of this animated or vital Being which we bear, 1 Corinthians 15:48.”
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” Heb 13:8. God is for us–He was for us in the beginning, He is for us today, and He will be for us forever. By the saving Grace of the Cross, we can be made anew through a transformation process designed to make us more like Jesus.