GENESIS REVISITED (2) INCARNATE SON - MYSTERY OF HUMANKIND - GLORY REVEALED

​Continuing from the last post, I will now revisit the mystery of humankind in Genesis.
 
In John 10:27-30, Jesus proclaimed that “27 The sheep that are My own hear My voice and listen to Me; I know them, and they follow Me. 28 And I give them eternal life, and they will never, ever [by any means] perish; and no one will ever snatch them out of My hand.29 My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater and mightier than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are One [in essence and nature].”[1]
 
My understanding of and paraphrasing of this passage is this: –
“I and Father are One. As such, even as Father is greater than all, and no one can snatch them out of Father’s hands, no one can snatch them out of my hands, for in the Oneness with Father, I am also greater than all”.
 
It is not as some assert that as Father is greater and mightier than all, Father is also greater and mightier than Him, Son Incarnate. There is no explicit statement in this passage that Father is greater and mightier than Son or that Son is inferior or weaker to Father. Rather, Father and Son are One(εἷς)[2].  Incarnate Son, as the man Christ Jesus, was revealing that though truly and properly God and truly and properly man, His oneness and equality to[3], in and with Father was/is not diminished or lessened in any way.
 
In John 17:1-3, Jesus had referred to Father as the only(μόνον from μόνος)[4] true God.
 
In New Testament Greek, as in Old Testament Hebrew[5], there is distinction in words between ‘one and only or unique - monos[6] in Greek and yachid[7] in Hebrew’ and ‘one including oneness - heîs[8] in Greek and 'echad[9] in Hebrew’.
 
In John 17:10, with reference, again, to Father, God, Jesus asserts: “All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them.”[10] Jesus is very explicit on this.  What this means is that: All God is, What and Who God is, Jesus is.
 
Paul had written concerning this as the ‘fellowship of the mystery”, from and in eternity, being hidden[11] in God, who created all things through Christ.
 
In the last few paragraphs of my last post, I had stated that “I am now able to see, understand and integrate all creative acts of God 'elohiym and Lord God (Yahweh 'elohiym) as the joint participatory acts of Father, Son and Spirit, even as Father initiates, Son mediates and Spirit generates all creative acts, in union and communion.” Paul’s phrase ‘fellowship of the mystery’ that God('elohiym) created all things through Christ, the Incarnate Son, is wide enough to include this view, that in God('elohiym), Father initiates, Son mediates and Spirit generates creation into being.
 
For me, the phrase ‘God, who created all things through Christ’, not only means that God created all things through the Mediatorial Person of the Eternal Son, but also for the one[12]( εἷς-heîs) Mediatorial Person of the Incarnate Son.
 
I note that the Greek word εἷς-heîs is used here instead of μόνος mónos.  I believe that this is so because in the person of Christ the divine and human natures are so in union that Christ is truly and properly God and truly and properly man.[13] This is because the Greek word εἷς-heîs, having the meaning of one, including oneness in plurality[14], is much more encompassing than μόνος mónos, which is more specific in meaning only one or unique.
 
The mystery[15] of the Kingdom of God is also the mystery of the Incarnate Son[16]. Paul wrote[17] of this as “the wisdom[18] of God in a mystery, even the hid wisdom, which God had determined before the world[19], unto our glory.”[20]


[1] Amplified Bible (AMP)

[2] Greek εἷς  heîs Strong’s G1520

[3] Philippians 2:6 “Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God.” Greek: οὐχ ἁρπαγμὸν ἡγήσατο τὸ εἶναι ἴσα θεῷ - literally not robbery to be equal with God. The Amplified Bible has it as “did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped or asserted [as if He did not already possess it, or was afraid of losing it]”

[4] Greek μόνον from μόνος mónos Strong’s G3441

[5] See previous post Genesis Revisited (1)

[6] Strong’s G3441

[7] Strong’s H3173

[8] Strong’s G1520

[9] Strong’s H259

[10] English Standard Version ESV

[11] Ephesians 3:9 ἀποκεκρυμμένου See Strong’s parsing in Ephesians 3:9 Reverse Interlinear G613

[12] 1 Timothy 2:5 Greek εἷς  heîs Strong’s G1520 is used here by Paul.

[13] See Salvation Army Doctrine 4. – even though Paul was on the human Christ.

[14] See  Mark 12:29 where the Lord is one εἷς-heîs and Mark 10:8, Ephesians 5:31 one εἷς-heîs flesh See also Matthew 19:5 where μία mía the Irregular feminine form of εἷς was used.

[15] Mark 4:11

[16] Ephesians 3:4  1Timothy 3:16 "the mystery of Godliness,: Gog manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit....received up in glory."

[17] 1 Corinthians 2:7 See also Romans 6:25

[18] See Proverbs 8:22

[19] Before creation – in Eternity

[20] 1599 Geneva Bible.

​It is also “the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself: That in the dispensation of the fullness of times he might gather together in one[1] all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him.”[2]” “4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world[3], that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love 5 he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.”[4]
 
Note that Paul’s understanding was that we were chosen in the Eternal Son, Incarnate Son to be(Christ), before creation, thereby predestining or foreordaining us to be adopted as sons(children) in Christ(Incarnate Son), according to the purpose of his will.
 
This is the mystery of God’s will revealed.

1. In eternity, before creation, within the Triune union and communion, Father, Son and Spirit's joint will was for Son to become a created human being.
2. For this cause and to fulfil this purpose, Father Initiated, Son Mediated and Spirit Generated creation. God created.
3. Human beings were the forethought of God, Father, Son and Spirit in eternity. Humans were not created as an afterthought of God.
4. Through the Incarnate Son, the man Christ Jesus, Who is truly and properly human and truly and properly divine, to gather together in one[5] all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth.
5. Through the one Mediator, the man Christ Jesus[6], for human beings to be one[7] with God, Father, Son and Spirit, in union and communion, through partaking of the divine nature[8].

 
This is also the mystery of the Kingdom of God and Incarnate Son revealed. For in writing to the Colossians, Paul desired that “that their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love, to reach all the riches of full assurance of understanding and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ.”[9]
 
Therefore, in Genesis 1:26,27, where it is written that God 'elohiym said: “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” [10], it was an expression of what was already decided by Yahweh 'elohiym(God, Father, Son and Spirit), in love[11], in eternity.
 
And, if it has always been the eternal will and purpose of God to bring together, to sum up, all things into one in and through Christ, the human Jesus, then there is nothing, neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation,  that will be able to prevent this from happening.
 
Therefore, whatever choice that Adam and Eve would have made vis a vis concerning eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, the Eternal Son would still have to become a human being for the will and purpose of God to be fulfilled.
 
The Eternal Son becoming the Incarnate Son has always been the eternal desire, will and purpose of God, not an afterthought of God to address the consequence of eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
 
For the glory of the mystery has always been Christ in us, the hope of glory.[12]
 
The glory of the mystery, Christ in you, the hope of glory, be yours today.
 


[1] See Strong’s G346 ἀνακεφαλαίομαι anakephalaíomai under Thayer’s Lexicon “In Ephesians 1:10 God is said ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι τὰ πάντα ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ, to bring together again for himself (note the middle) all things and beings (hitherto disunited by sin) into one combined state of fellowship in Christ, the universal bond [cf. Meyer or Ellicott on Ephesians, the passage cited];”

[2] Ephesians 1:9,10 KJV - 'sum up'

[3] before the creation of the cosmos i.e. in eternity in Eternal Son, the Incarnate Son to be.

[4] Ephesians 1:4-6 ESV

[5] See Strong’s G346 ἀνακεφαλαίομαι anakephalaíomai under Thayer’s Lexicon “In Ephesians 1:10 God is said ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι τὰ πάντα ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ, to bring together again for himself (note the middle) all things and beings (hitherto disunited by sin) into one combined state of fellowship in Christ, the universal bond [cf. Meyer or Ellicott on Ephesians, the passage cited];” See also Colossians 1:20 ‘to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven’ ESV

[6] 1Timothy 2:5

[7] John 17:20-26

[8] 2 Peter 1:4

[9] Colossians 2:2 ESV the term Christ means the Incarnate Son.

[10] ESV ‘man’ meaning ‘mankind’

[11] Ephesians 1:4,5

[12] Colossians 1:27