Who is Jesus Christ?
Brian GC Huggett
A little question, but a question,
which requires more than a brief answer, for Jesus of Nazareth has been the
most influential and yet at the same time the most neglected figure of
history.
So who was he?
There are very few allusions to him in secular history, with the Jewish
historian Josephus, in book 18 chapter 3 of his Antiquities, recording in three
sentences a sympathetic reference to Christ’s life and influence.
“Now there was
about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man; for he
was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with
pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles.
He was [the] Christ. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men
amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first
did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the
divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things
concerning him. And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct
at this day.”
And in book 20,
chapter 9 of his Antiquities, in relation to the martyrdom of James he again
mentions the name of “Jesus, who was called Christ”.
The Roman historian Tacitus,
in chapter 14 of Michael Grant’s translation of his Annals of Imperial Rome
wrote: -
“…Nero fabricated scapegoats – and
punished with every refinement the notoriously depraved Christians (as they
were popularly called). Their originator,
Christ, had been executed in Tiberius’ reign by the governor of Judaea, Pontius
Pilate”
And Suetonius, in the Robert Grave’s
translation of his “The Twelve Caesars” chapter 5, apparently refers to Christ
when he writes: -
“Because the Jews at Rome caused
continuous disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus, he (Claudius) expelled
them from the city.”
These and other secular references are minimal in
their information and only serve as extra biblical proofs to the historical
reality of the man Jesus of Nazareth. It
is left to his disciples, the Apostles, to provide us with first hand
information on his life and ministry.
In Matthew’s gospel we are given the
genealogy of Joseph, who though not the progenitor of Jesus, was regarded as
his legal or foster father (Matt. 1:16, 20; Luke 2:4; 3:23; 4:22; John 1:45;
6:42). Matthew’s genealogy, and another
in Luke’s gospel place Jesus, at least in a legal sense, in the line of David,
a lineage prerequisite for the expected Messiah.
There are some, including this author, who believe the
genealogy in Luke 3:23-31 reveals Jesus’ lineage through Mary. Matthew’s genealogy (Matt. 1:1-16) was from
David through Solomon while Luke’s was through Nathan another of David’s
sons. According to the scriptures Mary became
pregnant, not by Joseph (or any other man) but by the Holy Spirit, and with this
being the case, the virgin, as the last human link between David and Messiah (her
child) must also have been a descendant of David, for Messiah was to be ‘of the
seed of David’. Cf. John
7:27; Psa. 132:11; Isa. 11:1; Jer. 23:5; Mic. 5:2
That Messiah would not be of the Solomon branch is
established by the literal fulfilment of the curse God placed upon the house of
Coniah. Coniah was, a direct descendant
of Solomon. Coniah was Jehoiachin or Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim. We read of this curse in Jeremiah
22:24-30.
Vs 30. “Thus saith the LORD, Write ye this man
childless, a man that shall not prosper in his days; for no more shall a man of
his seed prosper, sitting upon the throne of David, and ruling in Judah.”
This was not to say Coniah would not have descendants,
but that none of those descendants would sit upon David’s throne
The curse upon Coniah has been
literally carried out, for he went into captivity and his uncle Zedekiah was
placed on the throne in his stead.
Zedekiah ruled until the Babylonian captivity brought about the
destruction of the Kingdom of Judah, which kingdom has never yet been
restored. It waits for the coming of
David’s greater son, the Messiah, the ‘anointed’ of God.
Matthew 22:41-46 records a
conversation between the Jewish religious leaders and Jesus of Nazareth, for
while the Pharisees were gathered together “Jesus asked them, Saying, What
think ye of Messiah? Whose son is he?” Their reply acknowledged that he was
to be the Son of David, yet Jesus’ response to this silenced them, for
he said to
them “…how then doth David in
spirit call him Lord, saying, ‘The LORD
said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy
footstool? If David then calls him Lord, how is he his son?”
Jesus was not denying the truth of
what they believed: according to Psalm 132:11 it is David’s seed that
will one day rule from Mt Zion, for “Of the fruit of thy body will I
set upon thy throne”; he was however attempting to point out a greater
truth: a truth revealed in Isaiah chapters 7 & 9.
In Isaiah 7:14 we are told, “a
virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name
Immanuel,” a name that means ‘with us (is) God’. Isaiah 9:6-7 develops the full
reality of this matchless child who would be ‘God with us’; for this “child
who would be born”, “this son who would be given”, would also be the
mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of peace. The government of peace will rest upon him,
upon the Davidic throne; a peace established by righteous judgments and a peace
that will be everlasting.
The seed of David and the seed of this virgin are one
and the same person and that this child would also be the Son of God is recorded
in the New Testament’s gospel of Luke 1:30-35.
“And the angel said unto her, Fear
not, Mary: for thou hast found favour with God. And, behold, thou shalt
conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS. He
shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God
shall give unto him the throne of his father David: And he shall reign over the
house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end. Then said
Mary unto the angel, how shall this be, seeing I know not a man? And the angel
answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power
of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which
shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.”
By means of the virgin birth, Messiah would not only
be a son of David but also and literally the Son of God. His legal descent would be through
Solomon/Coniah/Joseph; his natural descent would be through David/Nathan/Mary
the wife of Joseph. The prophecy regarding
the curse on Coniah stands true and, at the same time, the promise to David is
accomplished.
Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of
David; he is ‘God with us’; he is the Messiah or Christ, the anointed of God.
What was Christ
Jesus’ mission?
We know who he is, but what was he; what was his role
and his purpose?
An excellent
starting place for the answer to these questions is his name and title. Though Jesus was a common name, pronounced ‘ee-ay-sooce’
in the Greek, translated from Jehoshua of the Hebrew and derived
from Yeh-ho-vaw Yaw-shah or Jehovah saves, the word Christ is part of his title
not his name. His name in Hebrew would
be pronounced ‘Yeh-ho-shoo-ah ben Ee-o-safe’, Jesus the son of Joseph. Christ however is a title and a transliteration
from the Greek noun Christos, which is the equivalent to Messiah, the
Hebrew noun pronounced ‘maw-shee'-akh’, meaning anointed (consecrated).
Inanimate
objects as well as individuals could be maw-shakh’ed or anointed, by the
smearing or mixing with oil, but in every case it was the means of consecrating
the individual or the object, to God’s service.
Whether it was food, temple furniture or priest, the authorized
anointing was a dedication to the service of God. All this was done for the establishment of a
formal and centralized system of religious faith. The first mention of the ‘LORD’S anointed’
however; and this is a very notable distinction, was to do with the
consecration of God’s chosen man as King over Israel. The first was to do with the religious life
of the nation, the second for the political.
Saul was God’s first maw-shee'-akh
(Messiah) and as king he was to deliver his people from the oppression and
harassment of other nations. As Messiah
he was to lead his people into the freedom and enjoyment of social/economic
stability, but because of his weakness and sin Saul was unable to accomplish
that mission and was removed from the throne. David was the most successful of the
‘LORD’S anointed’, and under his Messiahship Israel became a free and
stabilized nation. David was only a man
and suffered from the same limitations as do all men; he was born of human
parentage and carried within him the nature of Adam, however the scripture
records David’s triumph over life with the epitaph: -
“…for David’s sake did the LORD his
God give him a lamp in Jerusalem, to set up his son after him, and to establish
Jerusalem: Because David did that which was right in the eyes of the LORD, and
turned not aside from any thing that he commanded him all the days of his life,
save only in the matter of Uriah the Hittite.”
1 Kings 15:4-5
His sons were not of his calibre and
though some received God’s commendation:
“And he did
that which was
right in the sight
of the LORD, according to all that David his father did”, most
received a varying degree of the condemnation: “And …………. did evil in the sight of the LORD,
and went not fully after the LORD, as did David his father.”
Because of human frailty the Davidic
line could not bring peace to Israel, therefore a greater Messiah, a greater
‘LORD’S anointed’ must come to the kingdom and “establish it with judgment
and with justice from henceforth even for ever.” Isaiah 9:7b.
Messiah is to be King over Israel and rule with
judgment and justice: not according to the thinking and philosophies of men,
not as those that decreed “unrighteous decrees, and that write grievousness
which they have prescribed; To turn aside the needy from judgment, and to take
away the right from the poor of my people, that widows may be their prey, and
that they may rob the fatherless” (Isaiah 10); but in righteousness and in
truth will he reign and establish his peace.
This is the glorious future prescribed, not only for Israel, but also
for the world.
This future is one where only
righteousness dwells; therefore unrighteousness must be purged from those who
would share in that future. All men, if
they would be honest with themselves, must acknowledge the fearful condemnation
of this, for as the psalmist writes, “The fool hath said in his heart, there
is no God They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that
doeth good,” Psalm 14:1. Isaiah
expands this with “Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed
innocent blood: their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; wasting and
destruction are in their paths. The way of peace they know not; and there is no
judgment in their goings.
The apostle Paul, in Romans 3:10-18,
quotes extensively from these passages to illustrate God’s verdict against
humanity. No one is exempt; all of us
have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
And when we look at Job 14:4 “Who can bring a clean
thing out of an unclean? not one” and Job 25:4, “How then can man be
justified with God, or how can he be clean that is born of a woman?”; or
David in Psalm 51:5 “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did
my mother conceive me,” we must recognize that we also share in the sin of
Adam and are unacceptable to God and not fit for his Kingdom. These passages make it appear that the woman
is at fault in this transmission of sin, but it takes male and female to
conceive a child and the fact that our sinless Saviour was born of a woman
without the agency of a man, indicates that transmission of the sin nature is
through the male of the human species.
Paul in his exhortation to the
Corinthians, commands God’s people: “Be ye not unequally yoked together with
unbelievers: for what fellowship hath
righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial?
or what part hath he that believeth
with an infidel? And what
agreement hath the temple of God with idols” (2 Corinthians
6:14b-16a). Now, if God’s people are so
exhorted, how much more shall God separate himself from the unregenerate? Righteousness cannot have fellowship with
unrighteousness; light does not co-exist with darkness, Messiah has no harmony
with Belial and God has no affinity with sin.
Therefore we are as was Isaiah in his lament; “Woe is me! for I am
undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a
people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts”
(Isaiah 6:5).
He was given a vision of the King,
the LORD of hosts, and was stricken by the desolation of his sin. Because sin is the missing of the mark, the
falling short of a goal or standard, Isaiah when he saw the perfect being was
shocked and dismayed at his own imperfection.
It portrays the desperate need of
mankind, the need of a Saviour, a redeemer.
Israel did not see themselves
sinners as Isaiah had done but were complacent in their religiosity. They believed, as most ‘religious’ people do
that the externals were sufficient and as long as they performed acts of
religion and were seen to be so doing they were right with God. Isaiah chap. 48 is a denunciation of such
false claims, for Israel, which swore by “the name of the LORD, and (made)
mention of the God of Israel” did so, “but not in truth, nor in
righteousness.” Nor did they believe
the prophets. The LORD, through his
prophets, told of things to come so that Israel would have no excuse in their
unbelief, yet they flaunted their unbelief in crediting to their idols the
results of God’s loving kindness. Such
idolatry is seen today when men place their hopes on, and rejoice in the god of
money, or ‘mother nature’ (a primitive polytheism) or even in their natural
abilities. These are some of the many
forms of idolatry today and all forms of unbelief have such idols. The scientist has his evolution; the
educationist his intellect; the religionist his righteousness, and in every
case it is self-satisfaction, self-reliance and a rejection of God.
God speaks to
men through his word, yet men prefer their own ways and the ways of the pagan
world. God’s word speaks of truth and
righteousness, of justice and judgment but men prefer the lie, the ‘new
morality’, injustice and subjective emotionalism.
Yet there is nothing new under the
sun and as men are today who forget God, so was Israel when she went astray
from the LORD. But because of his very
public commitments to Israel, God says: “For my name’s sake will I
defer mine anger, and for my praise will I refrain for thee, that I cut thee
not off. Behold, I have refined thee, but not with silver; I have chosen thee
in the furnace of affliction. For mine
own sake, even for mine own sake will I do it: for how should my name be
polluted?”... “Come ye near unto
me, hear ye this; I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the time
that it was, there am I: and now the Lord GOD, and his Spirit, hath sent me.
Thus saith the LORD, thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel; I am the LORD thy
God which teacheth thee to profit, which leadeth thee by the way that thou
shouldest go” (Isaiah 48:9, 16,17).
Here, almost as an aside, we have mention of one who is to
be sent, yet speaking in the first person as being from eternity. Who is this one who was from eternity past
and whom the Lord GOD, and his Spirit has sent?
Isaiah has already told us: it is Immanuel, born of a virgin, given to
Israel as a son, one who is also the
Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the
Prince of Peace. And why was he
sent?
Every step of
Israel’s disobedience, every act of idolatry was grounds for his coming and
Isaiah in the next chapter states the reason clearly, “to bring Jacob again
to him” and “to raise up the tribes of Jacob.”
“Thus saith the LORD, thy Redeemer,
the Holy One of Israel; I am the LORD thy God which teacheth thee to profit,
which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest go.” And if that teaching and that leading had
been heeded, “then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as
the waves of the sea” their children and their children’s children would
have been “as the sand” and “like the gravel thereof,” and they “should
not have been cut off nor destroyed from before me,” yet for all of God’s
mighty acts of redemption and providence “There is no peace, saith the LORD,
unto the wicked,” Isaiah 48: 17-22.
Israel was not at peace with her
God; this is proven by the fact that God shows himself not to be at peace with
Israel. The leaders believed themselves
to be leaning upon the LORD and said, “Is not the LORD among us? none evil
can come upon us,” Micah 3:11. Yet
the prophetic word of judgment became the reality: Micah, Isaiah and Jeremiah
were all vindicated and God’s word fulfilled.
In Isaiah 49 the Redeemer,
the Holy One of Israel continues his dissertation on the past present and
future acts of the LORD. Even though his
coming would be accompanied with the sharp sword of God’s word, his labour, his
strength would be spent for nought and in vain. Israel would reject him and though one
day their redemption would be accomplished, in the meantime their redeemer
would be sent as a light to the gentiles and as Saviour to the ends of the
earth. He would be despised by the many
and abhorred by the nation and in chapter 53 these very words are reiterated
and expanded: “He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and
acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was
despised, and we esteemed him not”.
In Isaiah 49 the Redeemer continues:
“Thus saith the LORD, In an acceptable time have I heard thee, and in a day
of salvation have I helped thee: and I will preserve thee,” The antagonism
and contempt heaped upon him by an unbelieving people made the promised help
and preservation necessary, for though he was the Everlasting Father, the
Almighty God, yet was he also a son of man.
The omnipotent and omnipresent LORD
of creation could not suffer the things described by Isaiah in his 53rd
chapter? Such a God could not give his
soul as an offering for sin nor his ‘body’ as a sacrifice, but the Son of God
born of a virgin could. His sacrifice
could be given for a covenant between God and his people, a covenant designed
to establish the whole earth as well as the heritage of Israel. Isaiah 49:8.
Every covenant is ratified with
blood and again in chapter 53, Isaiah expounds on this, in that “...he
(Messiah) was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression
of my people was he stricken,” and “thou shalt make his soul an offering
for sin.” It would be this offering,
this sacrifice that would release those who were captives to sin, and enlighten
those who recognize this, their spiritual poverty, and who humble themselves
before God in repentance.
The results of this would be
salvation, “They shall feed in the ways, and their pastures shall be in all
high places. They shall not hunger nor thirst; neither shall the heat nor sun
smite them: for he that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs
of water shall he guide them.” And it will extend to all the earth, for: “Behold,
these shall come from far: and, lo, these from the north and from the west; and
these from the land of Sinim (of the East).”
Therefore, “Sing, O heavens; and
be joyful, O earth; and break forth into singing, O mountains: for the LORD
hath comforted his people, and will have mercy upon his afflicted.”
Yet for all of God’s promises and assurance, Zion the
very heart and soul of Israel, continuing in the darkness of unbelief thought
the LORD had forsaken them. But though
they turned from God “…yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of
my hands; thy walls are continually before me.” The graciousness of this brings to mind
Lamentations 3:22-23: “It is of the LORD’S mercies that we are not consumed,
because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy
faithfulness.”
It is God’s faithfulness to his promise that will
bring about Israel’s restoration, and Isaiah sees, as do all the prophets, that
in a day to come, in “the latter days”, Israel will be re-gathered into the
land. Though they will reject the
Messiah and suffer national destruction: though they will be dispersed among
the nations, yet they will be re-gathered and the land though wasted and
desolate will be too small for the future inhabitants. For God will set up a standard to his people
and to the gentiles, and will cause his peoples return. It will be after a time of great destruction,
a time when the LORD will contend with the nations for their contentious
actions against Israel. It will be a day
when all mankind will know “that I the LORD am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer,
the mighty One of Jacob.”
It is this contention with the nations and the
refining of Israel through affliction that opens another aspect of what Messiah
is.
The Judge of all Flesh.
“And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of
Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots: And the spirit of the LORD
shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of
counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD; And
shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the LORD: and he shall not
judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his
ears: But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity
for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his
mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked. And
righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins (the foundation to his sovereignty), and
faithfulness the girdle of his reins (the source of his compassion).” Isaiah 11:1-5
In Psalm 72:1-9 we see the king, the LORD’S anointed
in prayer, and his son the Messiah in future possession of dominion and power
over the world of men.
“Give the king thy judgments, O God,
and thy righteousness unto the king’s son.
He shall judge thy people with
righteousness, and thy poor with judgment.
The mountains shall bring peace to
the people, and the little hills, by righteousness.
He shall judge the poor of the people; he shall save
the children of the needy, and shall break in pieces the oppressor.
They shall fear thee as long as the
sun and moon endure, throughout all generations.
He shall come down like rain upon
the mown grass: as showers that water the earth.
In his days shall the righteous
flourish; and abundance of peace so long as the moon endureth.
He shall have dominion also from sea
to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth.
They that dwell in the wilderness shall bow before
him; and his enemies shall lick the dust.”
This is not just some dreamtime pie in the sky, but a
vision of the promised future for the children of Abraham, of Isaac and of
Jacob. It is God’s reiteration of his
promise, and as certain as Messiah has already come to be the offering for sin,
so he will come to be judge and King over all the earth. Israel has, up to this moment rejected him,
yet they are not alone in that rejection, for though over the centuries very
many millions of people from every nation and tongue have believed in God’s
anointed, yet the masses have said “away with him, crucify him, crucify
him”. It is not just religious Israel
that has rejected “Iesous Christos”, but unregenerate and unrepentant man.
He is to come as judge and he will come as Isaiah
describes in chapters 34:1-8 and 63:1-6, in all the power of a conquering
king.
In the New Testament, a revelation is given John the
Apostle: a revelation from Jesus Christ of the consummation of history and of
time. Isaiah’s battle vision is
described by John in Rev 19:11-21’ but first in the fifth chapter of this revelation,
John sees from within heaven itself the giving of the earth’s title deeds to
the one to whom they rightly belong - The Lion of the tribe of Judah, the root
of David, God’s anointed, the Messiah, the Lamb slain for the redemption of “every
kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation.” It is of such majesty that I do not hesitate
to include it here in full.
“And I saw in
the right hand of him that sat on the throne a book written within and on the
backside, sealed with seven seals. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a
loud voice, Who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof?
And no man in
heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book,
neither to look thereon. And I wept much, because no man was found worthy to
open and to read the book, neither to look thereon. And one of the elders saith
unto me, Weep not: behold, the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the Root of David,
hath prevailed to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof.
And I beheld,
and, lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four beasts, and in the midst of
the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven
eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth. And he
came and took the book out of the right hand of him that sat upon the throne.
And when he had taken the book, the four beasts and four and twenty elders fell
down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of
odours, which are the prayers of saints. And they sung a new song, saying, Thou
art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast
slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and
tongue, and people, and nation; And hast made us unto our God kings and
priests: and we shall reign on the earth.
And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many
angels round about the throne and the beasts and the elders: and the number of
them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands; Saying
with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and
riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing. And
every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and
such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, I heard saying, Blessing, and
honour, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and
unto the Lamb for ever and ever. And the four beasts said, Amen. And the four
and twenty elders fell down and worshipped him that liveth for ever and ever.”
Israel wanted a Messiah who would conquer their
enemies and establish the kingdom based on their own moral and material
values. They ignored or could not
understand the values of holiness, which are true justice and righteousness,
for these values in all their fullness are incomprehensible to the unregenerate
human heart. Finite man can recognize
relative justice and relative righteousness, but the infinite holiness of God
is beyond him and will remain so until God does a work of regeneration and
renewal.
Any system of justice or righteousness that is subject
to the demands of man’s wants is relative: relative to his lusts. Our modern world is ruled by such injustice
and unrighteousness and people today are as much in need of the healing touch
of God’s forgiveness as was Israel.
Spiritual blindness came upon Israel because of her self-centred
materialism, and that same blindness has come upon Christendom for its
self-centred materialistic humanism.
Jesus of Nazareth, Israel’s Messiah,
which is the Christ, came so that unjust and unrighteous men might be redeemed,
cleansed and forgiven. His sacrifice
was the greatest display of love that has ever been enacted on this world’s
stage. It was not done in a corner, but
was displayed to the world both in its actuality and in its effects, yet the
world generally has ignored him to this day.
His death, burial and resurrection became the division of time and the
means of uniting mankind. Gentiles were
estranged from Israel, Israel was in contempt of the Gentiles yet in Christ
that wall of partition has been broken down and all, both Jew and Gentile can
be united within the “Body of Christ” the Church.
The word Church is the Greek
‘ekklēsia’, and in the context of its first usage in Matthew 16:18, is an
assembly belonging to Jesus, whom the apostle Peter had just affirmed as being “the
Christ (the Messiah) the Son of the Living God”. It is an assembly of all those, both Jew
and Gentile, who believe that God’s anointed, had died for their sins and had
been raised for their justification. It
is not a Gentile assembly nor is it a Gentile organization. Gentile religions have permeated its ranks
and made a mockery of the Apostle’s doctrine so that what is seen today as the
“Church” is not the ‘body of Christ’, but a world religion.
Yet Christ’s
church is still in the world. A
universal assembly, unknown and unacknowledged on the most part: scattered
across the face of the globe among every tribe and every tongue. In their twos, their threes and their fifties
they make up a spiritual body, a myriad of believers separated by distance but
united in Christ Jesus and faithful to his call, the call to a ministry of
reconciliation as described in 2 Corinthians 5:18.
Where God’s
people are in agreement with his word and when they experience subsequent
communion with their God in prayer, there they have fellowship with him, there
Christ Jesus is in their midst and there they fulfil the ministry he left for
them. However, we are living in a
failing age, an age of declension within the Church, and we look to the coming
of our Lord Jesus Christ to raise his Church from out of this world, to purge
and restore his people Israel, to judge the nations and to free creation from
its bondage to death and decay.
With this
freedom in view, the apostle John’s heartfelt cry comes to mind, “Even so
come quickly Lord Jesus”
Amen.
