The Incarnation of God
Key Verses: Romans 1:1–17
I. The Birth of Jesus Was and Is Good News
A. This was not the birth of just another child.
1. He came to be Savior of the Jews (Matt. 1:21).
2. His mother recognized her own baby as God her Savior (Luke 1:47).
3. The angel from heaven proclaimed the baby of Bethlehem as Savior, the Christ, God’s anointed, the Lord. “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:11).
4. He came to save the whole world (John 4:42).
5. Paul acknowledges his mission to be that of the proclamation of the Gospel. “Paul, a servant of Jesus, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God” (Rom. 1:1). It is the incarnation of God which he calls the Gospel.
B. The news of Jesus’ birth was announced hundreds of years before it occurred. “Which (this good news) he had promised afore by His prophets in the holy Scriptures” (Rom. 1:2). This verse constitutes a parenthesis.
1. It was not a mere historical event, but an accurately foreknown and predicted one. This attaches supernatural significance to the event itself and to the person the event concerns.
2. That the child Jesus born in Bethlehem of Judea was unique. Not only was His birth and its place (Mic. 5:2) foretold, but also His death, His resurrection and His coming again.
3. This very child later, as a grown-up adult, made claims about Himself that were concomitant to the prophecies about Himself.
a) “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father” (John 14:9).
b) He claimed preexistence: “Before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58).
c) He claimed that He was with God the Father before the world was even created: “And now O Father, glorify me with thine own self with the glory which had with thee before the world was” (John 17:5). “… Thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world” (John 17:24; see also Col. 1:17).
d) He predicted His own death and said that after three days He was going to rise from the dead to meet His disciples on a hill in Galilee (Mark 8:31; Luke 9:22; Matt. 26:32). Has there been another such person?
II. He Who Was Born in Bethlehem Was the Son of God
A. The good news was that the Son of God became man. “… The gospel of God (v. 1) … concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh” (v. 3).
B. Jesus did not become “the Son of God” by being born in Bethlehem, for He was always that. Of Him it is said in John 1:18: “… the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared Him.” A more literal translation of this verse is “The Son, the only one, belonging to the same family (monogenḗs), who being in the bosom of the Father, He Himself exegeted Him (or brought Him out of His hiding place).” The Word (John 1:1) has always been in the bosom of the Father as the Son. His incarnation was the Son, eternal, infinite as the Father, become man to explain to us the character and essence of God, the Father. Therefore the good news was that God became man to tell us that through His coming into the world, His life, death and resurrection, He would offer us salvation.
C. The prophesied details of His birth:
1. Jesus was to be born in Bethlehem (Mic. 5:2).
2. He was born of Mary (Matt. 1:16), the descendant of David (Matt. 1:1, 6).
3. Luke 1:27 speaks of Mary as a virgin out of David’s house and not Joseph. It is true, of course, that the genealogy of Joseph shows (Matt. 1:2, etc.) that he, too, was of Davidic descent, being the legal but not the actual father of Jesus, which was vital for Jews and Jewish Christians to know. That is why it is recorded only in Matthew’s Gospel and not in Luke’s, since Luke was writing to the Gentile Theophilus.
III. The Holy Spirit Active in the Incarnation and the Resurrection
A. In Luke 1:35, it was the Holy Spirit who was to come upon Mary and the power of the Highest (see Rom. 1:4—“with power”—dúnamis, the same word).
B. “… The Spirit of holiness …” of Romans 1:4, actually means the Holy Spirit, completing the Trinity of the Godhead being the Gospel of God in the manifestation of the Son as the God-Man. The word “holiness,” hagiōsúnē, occurs only three times (Rom. 1:4; 2 Cor 7:1; 1 Thess. 3:13) and means a holiness that is inherent and not acquired. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit did not achieve holiness but are inherently holy due to their essential nature of Deity. All three personalities of the Godhead were responsible for the incarnation and for the resurrection. This also applies to the Gospel of God in that no man can be saved unless the Holy Spirit convicts of sin, righteousness and judgment and of the truth about Christ (John 16:8, 13, 14), Jesus saves him (Acts 4:8–12), and the Father accepts him (John 1:12; Eph. 2:18; Luke 5:11–32).
Spiros Zodhiates, Sermon Starters: Volumes 1-4 (Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 1992).
Comments