The text-only issue.
I am firmly convinced that Christianity is a fully reasonable faith. At the same time, I must admit that our religion is full of paradox. Sometimes reason will take you far along the trail of understanding, and sometimes it will lead you astray. Indeed, Martin Luther once said “Reason is the devil's whore”.
Skeptics might mock us at this point. They will point to some paradox and cry “absurdity” and “nonsense”. Well, if we have to appear as fools for Christ, so be it. Still, I'm reminded of the famous quote from Hamlet—“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy”.
God is so much bigger than we can imagine. If we could fit everything into a neat package, I would be dreadfully suspicious that we were dealing with something invented by man. It seems to me that paradox is precisely what we would expect when dealing with the true God.
Many people consider the Trinity to be the great paradox in Christianity. Now, I'm not surprised that people find the Trinity complex. That's almost a given. What surprises me is that people seem to find the idea of the Incarnation so simple.
Perhaps we need to start by understanding the doctrine. Websters dictionary gives a very good definition of the word Incarnation—“The act of clothing with flesh ... the act of taking ... a human body and nature.” Incarnation is derived from the latin in carne, meaning “in flesh”.
So what's this got to do with Christianity? Perhaps the key biblical passage for the Incarnation comes in John chapter 1: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God ... And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us,”. The Word is Jesus, as John makes clear later.
If you are paying attention, this really is a mind-blowing passage. Think about it. The Word (Jesus) is God. The Word (Jesus) became flesh. Question: who is Jesus Christ? Answer: God incarnate. God “in flesh”. Jesus is God in the flesh. Truly God and truly man.
Charles Wesley captured this idea in his famous carol, Hark, the Herald Angels Sing:
Veiled in flesh, the godhead see
Hail the Incarnate deity
This really is a remarkable idea. In my experience, there seems to be little discussion and mental wrestling with this doctrine in popular Christian circles. Not like you find with the Trinity, say, or predestination. Why is this? Perhaps most people do not find the idea difficult. Not likely! Actually, I think it is because the Incarnation is so confronting. It is God up close and personal. It can't be treated as an abstract puzzle of philosophy—the Incarnation is messy and dirty and in-your-face.
For myself, the Incarnation is a greater mystery than the Trinity. It leads to a host of questions, some of which are bizarre. My mind hovers momentarily over the conception itself. Did Mary supply the egg? Does that mean...? But the hidden things belong to God, and modesty forbids too much enquiry there.
But there are other questions. God is all-powerful. Was Jesus all-powerful? God sustains and upholds the universe. Did Jesus, God-incarnate, do the same? Was the baby Jesus all-knowing? All-wise? Difficult questions.
Reason can lead us astray here. We want a precise understanding of what the Incarnation involves. In what ways was Jesus beyond an ordinary man? In what ways was he limited like one? Logic can only take you so far because the fundamental concept is so paradoxical. Reason is good, but the human heart is deceptive. Throughout history, pious men have gone amiss by the injudicious application of reason to the great questions.
Do we give up questioning then? By no means. We can confidently step where Scripture shines a light. But where the Scriptures are silent or vague, we probably ought to cease our questioning. God never promised us complete knowledge, either. Some truths transcend mortal comprehension. This is right and proper, by the way. A God that we could very easily confine to a logical box would be a poor thing indeed. The true and living God should be beyond us in many ways.
Yet even within scriptural boundaries the difficult questions continue. Jesus got hungry. Does that mean God got hungry? Jesus got tired. Does that mean God got tired? Jesus wept real tears. Was God crying?
But here's the tough one for me. Jesus was executed on a roman cross and died. Does that mean that God died?
Even the question feels blasphemous. Did God die? Nietzsche summed up the modern world with the cry “God is dead”. What he meant, of course, is that we have ceased to believe in Him. But is it possible that, 2000 years ago, Nietzsche's statement came literally true? Did God die on two pieces of wood, with nails through his hands and feet?
Logic offers a ready answer. Jesus is God. Jesus died on the cross. Therefore, God died on the cross. Simple syllogism. But I don't know that can subject the scriptures to that sort of analysis—not when we are dealing with something like the Incarnation. As I said before, reason can easily lead us astray.
We could approach it differently. God didn't die on the cross. Rather it was the human nature that God had robed Himself in. The man died but not the God. But I find this wholly unsatisfactory. It seems to be a denial of the Incarnation—it splits the human and divine natures such that Jesus can no longer be considered one person.
As far as I'm aware, the Bible never plainly states “God died on the cross”. But there is this verse:—
“Be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood.” (Acts 20:28)
Read it again. God purchased the church with His own blood. The blood of God. We worship a God who bled. And if God can bleed, it seems inconsistant to deny that He can die.
So, did God die on the cross? We can answer a confident yes. In Christ, God Himself got hungry, got tired, laughed and cried. And in Christ, God Himself died. As one church father put it: “God suffered in the flesh”. And so we can sing with Charles Wesley:
Amazing Love, how can it be
That thou, My God, shouldst die for me?
Craig Schwarze is a systems analyst with a large insurance company. But what he really enjoys is discussing theology. Craig lives in Camden, in Sydney's west. He is married and has 3 children.
You can read more of Craig's thoughts at Thinking Out Loud.
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