AP

Hebrews 2:17-18  For this reason he had to be made like them, fully human in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people.  Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

Jesus’ Incarnation (his becoming flsh) is as much an essential part of God’s Rescue Plan as the Atonement (his putting us right with God – our justification) and the Resurrection (his conquering death leaving the tomb empty).  Yes, ‘Christmas’ is as essential a part of the Gospel as is ‘Easter’ and each of these festivals is meaningless without the other.

Because the eternal Son of God became one of us, in that capacity he could achieve for us everything that was necessary for our salvation – God’s Rescue Plan.  As a man, he lived for us the life we ought to live; and died the death we ought to die.  As a man, he won for us the victory over temptation we ought to have won; and he conquered death for us, so that he now lives in us as one who understands perfectly our struggles and can help us through them, bringing us out the other side restored and strengthened.

He is in every way our substitute.  We are all descendants of the first Adam, inheriting from birth his rebellious, sinful nature; and Jesus became the second Adam, doing perfectly what the first Adam should have done and didn’t do.  What struggles are you facing at the moment?  Will you trust your ‘faithful high priest in service to God’ to guard, guide and equip you to put the arch deceiver/accuser (Devil(diabolos)/Satan) in his place?

“O loving wisdom of our God, when all was sin and shame, a Second Adam to the fight, and to the rescue came.  O wisest love – that flesh and blood which did in Adam fail, should strive afresh against the foe, should strive, and should prevail” (John Henry Newman).

– Bruce Christian