1. Yeshua, in his earthly service to humanity,
was made a little lower than the angels.
BT: I fail to
see how this statement needs to be handled or understood in a light different
than that of the kenosis of Phi 2.5-11. It was in a state of
servitude that the Son revealed the heart of his Father. "But we see
Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death
crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death
for everyone. For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by
whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of
their salvation perfect through sufferings. For both He who sanctifies
and those who are being sanctified are all of one, for which reason He is not
ashamed to call them brethren"; "And being found in appearance as a man, He
humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of
the cross. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the
name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee
should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the
earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to
the glory of God the Father" (Heb 2.9-1; Phi 2.8-11).
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2. Yeshua said his father was greater than he
was.
BT: It was the
Son's prerogative to honor the Father, to stand in the gap between humanity
and God as mediator of God to man and man to God. For the sake of our weakness
he places himself between us and his Father. As I said in my exegesis of Phi
2.5-11, it was/is impossible for humanity to reach the height of God; we have
not the ability to make that ascent. God in his love for us sent his Son to be
God with us. In Jesus Christ we meet the very embodiment of the sovereignty of
God breaking into the world to claim for himself those who without him were
lost. In him we have the coming of Immanuel, God himself condescending to
be with us and one of us and for us. And so the Son became a little lower
than the angels in coming to us, that he might raise us in his glorious
ascension to the Father. In
reference to this statement, John Calvin said something on the order that
Christ was not here comparing the Father's divinity with his own, nor his own
human nature with his Father's divine essence, but rather his present state
with the heavenly glory to which he was soon going to be received. Taken
in the context of its greater narrative in Scripture, I find this statement to
be quite satisfactory.
And now, David, without undue respect, may I again tell you that I do not believe
your reductionistic approach to deriving truth is always the best, especially
when it is the big picture that we are attempting to apprehend? Torrance has
argued that there is a comprehensive nature in God's trinitarian
self-revelation, "which has an intrinsic significance as a whole that cannot
be broken down and specified in terms of its constituent parts, upon
which knowledge of the whole may then be built up; for in the Trinity the
three divine Persons are internally interrelated in such
a coinherent way that the one Being of God belongs to each of them
as it belongs to all of them, and to all of them as it does to each of them."
I agree with Torrance; hence I am reluctant to willfully participate in a
degradation of the whole in a dogged pursuit of particulars, which cannot
be known in themselves as parts. With due respect, in such hunts we are wont
to lose the bunny.
And so, may I make a suggestion: rather than
parse my thoughts into oblivion, how about a definitive statement from
you on your own teaching on these matters? That, it seems to me, would give us
all a comparative basis upon which to draw.
God bless you. I will
be eagerly awaiting your presentation.
Bill