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Celebrating the Nicene Creed, Part 3

Sit and gaze at the work of Christ

Jesus is coming for dinner. Yes, the LORD!

Sweep and scrub, set out cups and plates, fetch water, bake bread, mix wine, and watch the stove!

That’s Martha. Harassed. Distracted. Grumbling.

Her sister, Mary, sits at Jesus’ feet. Still. Focussed. Hungry for every word.

Jesus corrected Martha and commended Mary. “Few things are needed – or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

The Creed has shown us this one needed thing: the Person of Christ. Now it will show us what he has done, for us. First his humiliation, then his exaltation.

Let us stop, sit, gaze, and learn.

We believe in One LORD Jesus Christ . . . Who for us and our salvation came down from heaven.

The Eternal Son, dwelling in blissful fellowship with his Father and the Spirit, the Creator and Sustainer of all things visible and invisible, descended into his creation.

He left glory for the dust, the eternal for the temporal, the perfect for the broken, bliss for agony.

Why?

For our salvation. To rescue us, because he loves us.

And was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary.

The Latin carnis means “of flesh.” In Roman Catholic countries carne vale, “farewell to meat”, is the festival before the Lenten fast. Incarnation means taking on flesh.

Jesus descended from heaven and joined humanity by taking upon himself a second and new nature – a fully human nature – a human body and soul.

The Holy Spirit conceived Christ’s human nature within the womb of the virgin Mary.

John 1:14a The Word became flesh and tabernacled among us.

Just as the LORD pitched his tent with Israel in the desert, the Eternal Son came to live among us in the tabernacle of a human body and soul.

And was made man.

From the moment of his incarnation Jesus Christ bore two natures: one divine, one human. It was not until 451 that the Council of Chalcedon put this into a precise confession. The so-called Athanasian Creed includes these words:

He is God from the essence of the Father,

begotten before time;

and he is human from the essence of his mother,

born in time;

completely God, completely human,

with a rational soul and human flesh;

equal to the Father as regards divinity,

less than the Father as regards humanity.

Although he is God and human,

yet Christ is not two, but one.

He is one, however,

not by his divinity being turned into flesh,

but by God’s taking humanity to himself.

Amen!

Who was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate.

Why did Jesus have to become man “for our salvation”? Because only a man could be crucified. Only a man could die the cursed death that we deserved to die, in our place.

Yes, in the ancient world crucifixion was the most agonising, degrading, and dehumanising method of execution that the ingenuity of human cruelty had devised. To this the Old Testament Law superadded a ghastly spiritual calamity to crucifixion:

Deuteronomy 21:22–23a If someone guilty of a capital offence is put to death and their body is exposed on a pole [by hanging, impaling, or crucifixion] you must not leave the body hanging on the pole overnight. Be sure to bury it that same day, because anyone who is hung on a pole is under God’s curse.

Sin has put us under the curse of God’s violent wrath. Jesus became man in order to lift our curse from our shoulders, to bear it upon his shoulders, and to die the cursed death of crucifixion in our place.

Galatians 3:13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole.”

He became man to bear the full brunt of God’s condemnation and anger for our sin.

He suffered and was buried.

The Creed carefully highlights Jesus’ suffering in order to correct what the ancient Gnostics were saying: that the Christ was taken up to heaven before he could suffer.

Christ indeed suffered and was buried.

This is the low point of his humiliation, his descent. The eternal Son of God lies dead in a grave.

And on the third day he rose again according to the Scriptures.

The exaltation and ascent of Christ now begins. The Creed refers to the Scripture’s promises that the Christ would rise. Psalm 16, for example, is quoted by Peter in his Pentecost sermon:

Acts 2:25–27 David said about Jesus: “I saw the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore, my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest in hope, because you will not abandon me to the realm of the dead, you will not let your holy one see decay.”

And ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father.

The ascension of Jesus forty days after his resurrection is recorded by Luke at the very end of his Gospel (24:51) and at the start of Acts (1:2,9). The right hand of the Father is the place of ultimate dignity, authority, rule, and victory.

Psalm 110:1 The LORD says to my lord: ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.’

Ephesians 1:20–21 He raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come.

And he shall come again, with glory, to judge the living and the dead.

Jesus’ first coming and his birth in Bethlehem was announced by heavenly angels, but from then on his life was fundamentally humble: as a baby he laid in an animal’s food trough for a cradle; his family had to flee to exile in Egypt to escape Herod’s wrath; though innocent he submitted to a baptism of repentance; his earthly ministry culminated in the ignominy of the cross and the tomb.

But his return will be as glorious as his first coming was humble. And he will judge every person:

2 Thessalonians 1:7b–10a The Lord Jesus [will be] revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels. He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might on the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marvelled at among all those who have believed.

Whose kingdom shall have no end.

The glorious reign of Christ co-extends with his person and will never end. This fulfils God’s promise to David, a thousand years before Jesus’ birth, that one of his descendants would be a Universal and Eternal King:

2 Samuel 7:13–16 He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom for ever. I will be his father, and he shall be my son. When he does wrong, I will punish him with a rod wielded by men, with floggings inflicted by human hands. But my love will never be taken away from him, as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed from before you. Your house and your kingdom shall endure for ever before me; your throne shall be established for ever.

Revelation 5:13 To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honour and glory and power, for ever and ever!

So stop, you Marthas. Sit still. Look up to him. Look what he has done for you. Yes, the time will come to serve him. But you must first be served by him.

He left heaven for sinners. He took on a human body and soul so that he could lift that crushing beam, God’s curse for your sin. He undertook this, as the Westminster Confession says, “most willingly.” He carried it upon his own shoulders. He was crucified and drank every last drop of God’s wrath for your sin. He laid in the grave for you.

Then he rose for you, and was seated at the right hand of God where he cares for you. And he will come and take you to be where he is.

Stop. Sit and gaze and wonder. Believe, receive, and rejoice.

– Campbell Markham