So we return this evening to the series that I've been doing on Sunday evenings, which is key things you need to know about Christianity. What I've been trying to do in these evening sessions is to deal with subjects that it's really important that we should know about as Christians, both for our own benefit and also because these are the sorts of things that when you're talking to a non-Christian, They'll ask these sorts of questions. So how do we answer the non-Christian when the non-Christian comes up with these things? Now, the last few weeks we were looking at scriptural evidence that Jesus really is the Son of God. We looked at the Old Testament, we looked at his teaching, we looked at his life, we looked at his miracles, we looked at his resurrection. And then, a couple of weeks ago, we were thinking about how the Bible also shows us that Jesus was man. He was an actual human being. He got tired. He got thirsty. He needed to eat. He needed to drink. He was subject to temptation, although he didn't sin. He was born. He grew up as a child. He died. All the things that you'd expect Somebody to go through as a human being, he went through, except, as I say, without sinning. And then last week, we were thinking, well, why? Why did the Son of God become a man? And we answered, to fulfill three roles, which Bible Christians, believing Christians, have talked about for centuries. To be our prophet, to tell us about God, So we know about God, we know about ourselves, we know how to be saved, we know how to live once we're saved and we know about the future. Prophet, priest to make a sacrifice for our sins and then to be our high priest in heaven interceding for us and king to rule over us. to be our champion, to rescue us from the power of Satan, and to bring us into the kingdom of heaven, and to keep us safe. Now, this evening, I want to try and bring these things together. We've been thinking about how Jesus is God, the son of God, about how he's man, but how can he be both at the same time? Now, I have to tell you, I don't understand it. And I don't think you'll understand it either, even after this talk is over. Because this is a mystery. This is bigger than the human mind can understand. But I'm going to try to give you some, a little bit of help, so that you can hopefully get a little bit further down the line. Basically, in a nutshell, the teaching of Scripture is this, that Jesus is and always has been the eternal Son of God. He never stopped being the Son of God. There's never a time when he started being the Son of God. He has always been the Son of God. But then at a point in time in history, he added to that nature of being the Son of God, he added a second nature, which is being human. He became a human being. But when he became a human being, he didn't stop being the Son of God. He became Son of God plus human, both at the same time. And the teaching of scripture is that Jesus is one person only. There weren't two Jesuses, you know, a divine Jesus and a human Jesus. There's only one Jesus. But within that one person, you've got the two natures, the divine nature and the human nature. He's divine, fully divine, and fully God, and fully human, both at the same time. That blows our mind, we can't understand it, but that's the teaching of scripture. Man, God, and man at the same time. Now, Christians through the first 500 years of Christianity were trying to work this out. And trying to come to an understanding of how he can be God and man at the same time. And the history of early Christian doctrine is really a history of Christians going down one blind alley or chasing down a foxhole thinking, oh, that's the answer. And then they realize, no, it's not the answer. And then they chase down another foxhole. Oh, that's the answer. No, it's not the answer. And then they chase down another foxhole. Oh, that's the answer. No, no, it's not. And eventually, they got to a point where they said, OK, we've come to an understanding. But, so look, I'm just gonna, I'm gonna, at the risk of blinding you with names, I'm gonna mention a few false alleys that people have gone down in the past. Because it might just help you, when you come up, because these ideas, they come up again. So it might help you to know about some of these blind alleys, people who've been there. So, one of them I mentioned a few weeks ago, which is still alive today, which is called Arianism. And the modern day version of it is Jehovah's Witness. And what that is, is ah, he, Jesus, was an angel made by God. But he's not really the eternal son of God. And this angel then became a human being. And that's after shot called Aries. Now, another idea that people have put forward is, ah, he was a man whom God adopted to be his son. Sometimes called adoptionism. And what people do, they say, ah, you remember at Jesus' baptism when he says, you are my son, with whom I am well pleased, where God said that? They say, ah, he was an ordinary man, and then God adopted him. and made him his son. That's what some people say. Another theory that people put forward is, ah, they say he was God and then he gave up being God and became a man for a while. He emptied himself of being divine and then he lived as a man and then He was made divine again. That's called the Kenotic Theory. And that comes from, you know in Philippians it says, he emptied himself. And some people say, ah, he gave up being God. So there's various ideas that people have been down various different blind alleys. I'll give you one other blind alley which is called Nestorianism. And now what that says is that Christ was two people. There was a divine person and a human person. And some things he did as the divine person, and some things he did as the human person. So divine person did the miracles, but when he died on the cross, it was the human person. So there's a chap called Nestorius who put this idea out. So there are all these different ideas that people have come up with to try to explain Jesus being God and man at the same time. Now, what I'm gonna try to do this evening, I'm not gonna try and do anything very clever or very complicated. I just really want to just show you that if we follow the teaching of the Bible, we realize that those ideas become impossible. Because the teaching of the Bible is that from before the creation of the world, Through His birth, through His childhood, through His life as a man, and as He died on the cross, and as He was raised from the dead, and now in heaven, all the way through, He was Son of God. He never became Son of God. He never stopped being Son of God. He was always Son of God. The Son of God all the way through that time. So let me just try and give you just a quick overview And I think that at least will help us to see that some of those theories that I've just mentioned, we just have to scrub out and say, no, they're just impossible. So, first of all then, I want to show you how Jesus was the Son of God before he became a human being. Now, we have looked at this before, but we'll look at it again. Look, John's Gospel, chapter one, John chapter one. These famous verses at the beginning of John's Gospel, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made Through him and without him was not anything made that was made. There's a sheet somewhere. So, do you want to give him one of those sheets, Martin? Yeah, thank you very much, yeah. So you see that right back at the beginning, Before the world was ever made, there was this Word. Who is that Word? Well, this Word is this special message from God. And we know from, if you look down to verse 14, it says, the Word became flesh. and dwelt among us, and we've seen his glory, the glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth." So this word that is this special message is himself Jesus. So Jesus, that the Son of God, or he became Jesus, should I say, the Son of God was there before the world was made. He already was there. And he was with the Father, with God the Father. And through this word, through this Son of God, everything that exists came into being. So we see then that the Son of God existed, was the Son of God, before anything was made. So that immediately rules out that first thing I said, Arianism, that he's the first creature, because he says without him was nothing made that was made. So he was already there. He is the eternal Word of God. Now, let's go on to the next thing. Jesus was the Son of God in the womb of Mary. Let's go on to, let's look back to Luke chapter 1. And if you want to follow in the church, you don't have to follow, you might find it easier just to listen, but Luke chapter 1, and this is, if you want to follow, it's on page 1017. And I want you to notice what the angel... Theseus does this very famous story of when the angel Gabriel came to Mary and told her that she was going to bear a son. Okay? Now, what did the angel say about this son? He says, verse 32, he will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. Not a son, but the Son of the Most High, the Son of God. And he'll reign on David's throne and this kingdom will be a kingdom which will never end. It's not just an ordinary human being who's got a kingdom that comes and then falls. He's got a kingdom which will never end. So this is the Son of God who's gonna be inside her. And she expresses surprise, how can this be? And he says, the angel says, verse 36, the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you, therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God. So what this is saying is that that word, the Son of God who was with the Father before the world was made, and through whom the entire universe was made, that Son of God was a little tiny baby inside the womb of Mary. It's amazing, but that's the teaching. And this is why the early Christians spoke of Mary as the God-bearer. That's a very strong thing to say, the God-bearer. But she was, because she bore the Son of God. Now, of course, it's not that the Catholic Church picks up on that and says, oh, she's the mother of God. And they start worshipping her. No, no, no. It's not that she's the origin of the Son of God. because it's very clear from that passage, the baby was conceived in her by the power of the Holy Spirit. So she's not the origin of God, or not the origin of the Son of God, but she bore the Son of God. She carried the very Son of God inside her. So it's not that Jesus, at some point later on in his life, became the Son of God, or was adopted as the Son of God. From the very moment of his birth, He was the Son of God. And we just look a bit further down in that passage. So Mary then goes to visit Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist. And Elizabeth says to Mary, verse 42, blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And why is this being granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me? So Mary is the mother of the Lord of Elizabeth. She's the mother of the Son of God. And then she says, for behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby, that is John the Baptist in Elizabeth's womb, leapt for joy. Why? Because John the Baptist sensed somehow that in the room was the Son of God inside Mary's womb. He had that understanding somehow that the Son of God was right there. So he was the Son of God already when he was born. Of course the reason is because he was the Son of God before the world was made. But now he's come into human flesh. Now, then next thing, third thing, he was the son of God as a boy. Do you remember the story, Luke chapter 2, do you remember the story when Jesus and his family went up to the temple for an annual festival? It's recorded in Luke chapter 2 and verse 41 onwards. There was a big party that went up to the temple, and then he got left behind, because the parents thought that he was with their group, with somebody else in the group, but actually he wasn't. He was in the temple. And so after three days, they went back to Jerusalem to look for him, and it says, After three days, they found him in the temple. So there he was in the temple, and he was discussing with the religious leaders, and they were amazed at the wisdom that he was showing. And then they said to him, why have you treated us like this? And he said to them, why are you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my father's house? So, as a boy, he was the son of God in his father's house. Now then, let's go on. He was the son of God during his earthly ministry. Now there's so much that could be pointed to, as we've already done so when we were looking at him being divine. But I want to just point you to two affirmations where the father owns Jesus as his son. And the first was when he got baptized. So Luke's gospel, now chapter three, and verse 22 do you remember how John was baptizing and Jesus came to John to be baptized and John said at first said no no I shouldn't be baptizing you you should be baptizing me and Jesus said no let it be so to fulfill righteousness so he went Jesus went down into the water to be baptized and then as he came up it says the heavens were opened The Holy Spirit descended on him like a dove, verse 22 of Luke 3, and a voice came from heaven, you are my beloved son, with you I'm well pleased. So, now what's happening here? Is it, as some people say, ah, this is where the Father adopted Jesus as his son. He said, okay, now, from now on, you're gonna be my son. No, because as we've seen, he already was the son of God. This is the father affirming, this man is my son. Let's go on. Another occasion, something very similar happened. Only this time, it was even more dramatic. Luke chapter 9, in verse 35. This was the Mount of Transfiguration. Do you remember the story? Jesus went up the mountain with his disciples, and as he was up there praying, his appearance was changed. And he became bright like lightning. Dazzling bright. And then Peter didn't know what to say, so he said, oh, should we build three tabernacles? One for you, one for Moses, one for Elijah. Because there was Moses and Elijah there as well. And then it says, a voice came out of the clouds saying, this is my son, my chosen one, listen to him. So God the Father affirmed that Jesus is or was his son. So you see the pattern that's building up? He's the son of God before he became a man. He's the son of God at his birth. He's the son of God as a child. He's the son of God as he's growing up. He's the son of God in his earthly ministry. Now, he's also the son of God as he dies. God become man, died. And this is very interesting because it was actually a non-believer, a Roman centurion, who realized that this death was the death of the Son of God. Matthew chapter 27. And the end of Jesus' life, after he died, it says, Verse 54, when St. John and those who were there with him, keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were filled with awe and said, truly, this was the Son of God. Now, it's really important that we understand, it's the Son of God who died. It's not just a man who died. It wasn't just Jesus the man who died. It's Jesus the son of God who died. That's why, as I pointed out, as we sung that hymn, we can rightly say, the immortal God has died, or God died for me. It says in Acts chapter 20 that Paul says that the church was purchased with the blood of God. Now we know that God cannot die, we know that God cannot suffer, but what happened is that God, the Son, took on human flesh and the Son, the Divine and the human were so completely interwoven together that as he died on that cross, it was the God-man who died! It wasn't just a human being. It wasn't just a prophet. It was the God-man who died and who bore the sins of the people of God. And that's why we can be saved. Because if, according to this chap Nestorius, Jesus had two natures, or was two persons, And it was only the human person that died and the divine nature. You see, he's trying to protect the divine nature of God. He's trying to say, oh, God can't suffer all this. So he's trying to separate the two out and say, well, it's just the man who died, but the son didn't die. But if you say that, what have you got? You've got a man dying for the sins of other people. Well, what good is that? How can a man A mere man, even a great man, even a good man, how can a mere man pay for the sins of countless numbers of people? But because it's the God-man who died, then there is sufficient to pay for the sins. of all who trust in him. And this is the great good news. And that's why, you know, sometimes you think, oh, it's all very, it's hair-splitting, you know. Why have we got to deal with these heresies, deal with these wrong ideas? Because if we land up with a wrong view of Jesus, you land up with no savior. You land up with no salvation. So it's really important that we do understand these things. So the Son of God died, and then, It was the Son of God who was raised from the dead and was shown to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead. Romans chapter one and verse four. If you want the page number, it's page 1116. The gospel, he says, verse three, is about the Son, God's Son, who is descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the son of God in power according to the spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord. Now again, it's not saying he became the son of God by his resurrection from the dead, but he was demonstrated to be the son of God by his resurrection from the dead. And finally, The Son is now reigning at the Father's right hand. The God-man is reigning at the Father's right hand. And we'd just like to turn you to the verses we read this morning, the beginning of our service this morning. Philippians 2, verse 9. Paul has been talking about how Jesus, how the Son of God left the glory of heaven, he laid aside his majesty. And by the way, just to deal with that, this is the verse where this idea of him emptying himself comes from. It says there in verse 6, who in the form of God, Did not count equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant. Ah, what did he do? Emptied himself. Did he stop being divine? No, we've just seen. He never stopped being divine. He was always divine. So what did he do? Well, he laid aside some of the trappings, if you like, of being divine. And particularly, he laid aside his glory. You couldn't see, by looking at Jesus, you wouldn't have seen his glory. You see it in his behavior, but not in his physical appearance. If he'd appeared in all his glory, people would have died instantly. But he emptied himself of some of the privileges of being divine, but he didn't stop being divine. Very important we understand that. And one of the carols, in fact, we're gonna sing in a moment. Veiled in flesh the Godhead see. He was veiled, but he's still divine. Now, but look at what it says in verse nine. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus, Every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Paul says that every knee is going to bow to Jesus, the Son of God. And what he says there about every knee bowing is reminiscent of what is said in Isaiah where God says, before me every knee shall bow. Now, so here is this wonderful, these great truths about the Lord Jesus Christ. We've got on the back of your sheets there a definition of this that was written in AD 451. It's quite complicated, I have to say, but I'm gonna read it out. You might not understand everything it said there, but I hope you'll get the main points of what's being said. Now just read out first of all, therefore following the Holy Fathers. We, with one accord, teach men to acknowledge the one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, at once complete in Godhead and complete in manhood, truly God and truly man, consisting also of a reasonable soul and body, of one substance with the Father as regards his Godhead, and at the same time, one substance with us as regards his manhood. like us in all respects apart from sin, as regards his Godhead begotten of the Father before all the ages, yet as regards his manhood begotten for us and for our salvation of Mary the Virgin, the God-bearer. One and the same Christ, Son, Lord, only begotten, recognized in two natures without confusion without change, without division, without separation, the distinction of natures being in no way annulled by the union, but rather the characteristics of each nature being preserved and coming together to form one person. And one subsistence, not parted or separated into two persons, but one and the same Son and only begotten God, the Word, Lord Jesus Christ, even as the prophets from the earliest times spoke of him. And our Lord Jesus Christ himself taught us in the Creed of the Fathers has handed down to us. So what it's saying, look, you've got these two natures, the divine nature, and the human nature. He's both God and man, but he's not two persons. He's one person, one being. in whom those two natures exist together. Well you might want to take that home and read it through again because it's not the easiest of statements but if you can read it through and think about it some more it's a really helpful definition and that really is the bedrock Protestants and Catholics have stood by this down through the ages as being the basic ultimate definition of the manhood and divinity of Christ in one person.