eChurch Blog

Even though most of the world doesn’t even know the exact circumstances surrounding this tragedy, this hasen’t deterred some to a swift anti-Israeli response.

ENI:

Bethlehem/Geneva (ENI). Palestinian Christian organizations have urged protests by church groups around the world against an Israeli assault on ships bringing aid to Gaza, which Israel says has led to the deaths of at least 10 activists on board the convoy.

I’m quite surprised to discover that the most popular and visited science / religion website on the Internet, according to Alexa, is Ken Ham’s “Answers in Genesis“.

A quick glance at the Alexa stats reveals a monster of a website in terms of traffic. They are currently ranked by Alexa at 33,816 globally, and tellingly, a whopping 9040 in the US.

BioLogos:

A literalistic view of Genesis causes many evangelicals to believe that the earth is less than ten thousand years old. Christian children and young people frequently grow up being told that the earth is young and that evolution is a lie. The most popular science/religion web-site by far according to Alexa ratings is “Answers in Genesis”, and its museum, dedicated to a young earth perspective has attracted over 1 million visitors since its opening two years ago. Since evangelicals, we believe, are correct about so many other all-important issues, how can we be so certain that so many are so wrong about this one? Consider sending this link to a young earth friend or pastor. Some think that the science behind this matter can’t be trusted. Nothing could be further than the truth.

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If this is the primary Internet source for the intersection of science and Christianity………

Whilst on this subject, ManicStreetPreacher (atheist – good guy) has recently blogged on Ken Ham’s Answers in Genesis, and Challies has put together a piece reflecting on Adam and Eve’s experiences of God.

Re-unify the Orthodox Church and then bring the entire body into full communion with the Catholic Church……simples…..

RiaNovosti

Russian, Constantinople patriarchs hail closer ties after visit

Joint worship with Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople Bartholomew has strengthened the unity of Orthodox churches worldwide, Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Kirill said on Sunday.

The two patriarchs celebrated Divine Liturgy together for the third time on Sunday in St. Isaac’s Cathedral in St. Petersburg.

The official visit of the leader of the Constantinople Church, who is by tradition first among the 15 primates of the Orthodox churches, began last week, with joint services on May 22 and 24.

“Our celebration today is dedicated to the unity of the universal church,” said the Russian patriarch, who is fifth in the Orthodox hierarchy.

“We have known each other a long time, and I am glad that with each meeting we become closer to each other, so that the relations between Orthodox churches grow stronger,” Kirill said after the joint liturgy.

Speaking in the main cathedral of St. Petersburg, Kirill noted that Russia’s second city has much in common with Constantinople, now known as Istanbul.

“Each of these cities was fated to become the mainstay and focus of a great culture, both cities are capitals of the great Orthodox empire,” the Russian patriarch said.

The head of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, in turn, called St. Petersburg “a symbol of heroism, steadfastness and faith in the ideals of freedom.”

Addressing thousands of Russian Orthodox worshipers, Patriarch Bartholomew wished for Russians to remain “steadfast in the faith.”

In memory of Bartholomew’s visit to Russia, the Russian patriarch gave the head of the Church of Constantinople a copy of the Feodorovsky icon of the Mother of God.

MOSCOW, May 30 (RIA Novosti)

This is a ‘Trinity Sunday’ cross-post by Revd John P Richards of the Ugley Vicar, setting out his sermon of today in which he conveys the wonder of the Trinity [no easy task] primarily in terms of relationships.

I really enjoyed this one:

The Trinity — an embarrassing doctrine?

In the Church of England’s calendar, today is Trinity Sunday, but time was when the Church of England seemed to become a bit embarrassed about this.

Indeed the calendar was re-written so that Sundays after Trinity, which run from now until the run-up to Christmas became Sundays after Pentecost.

Pentecost seemed much more in keeping with the new mood of the Church. Pentecost was about experience — present experience of the Spirit in the life of the Church and the believer.

Trinity seemed to be about an obscure doctrine rooted in the Church’s past.

Pentecost was also up to date because of the charismatic movement. The Trinity was just old-fashioned.

On top of that, the Church had been through a period of academic doubt in the 1970s, with the publication of books like The Myth of God Incarnate, to which several prominent Anglican theologians had contributed.

This suggested that Jesus was never meant to be regarded — and certainly never thought of himself — as anything other than a human being, albeit one with an extraordinary sensitivity towards God.

But if Jesus was not God incarnate, then at least one person of the Trinity simply disappeared.

And then on top of that, the Trinity was so hard to explain, as anyone who’d ever invited Jehovah’s Witnesses into their living-room could testify. The evidence for the Trinity seemed to be obscure, and as anyone who has ever recited the Athanasian Creed would know, it all gets a bit tortuous and convoluted.

So for a time, the doctrine of the Trinity became something about which the Church was almost embarrassed. Certainly no-one was in a rush to take on the preaching slot on Trinity Sunday.

Not mathematics …

One of the reasons for our problems with the Trinity was that the doctrine was always approached in terms of mathematics.

Hymns like ‘Three in one and one in three’ illustrate the problem. If God is one, how can God be three? If God is three, how can God be one?

One of the delights of Trinity Sunday was the various ways in which sermon illustrations would try and get round this. There was the Trinity as shamrock — three leaves on one plant. Or the Trinity as water, steam and ice — three forms of the same substance.

The basic problem with all these illustrations was that they overlooked one important factor — the Trinity is nothing like anything else. The Trinity is one of the things that is definitively ‘of God’ — something where you can’t compare God with anything else.

We should really save ourselves the effort of trying to find something like the Trinity, or trying to make it possible to understand the Trinity by comparing it with anything else.

… but relationship

There is, however, one important way in which we can begin to understand the Trinity in terms familiar to us.

This is something which actually comes from the Eastern churches. In recent years, people have begun to think about the Trinity less in terms of mathematics, more in terms of relationship.

We have to ask, why would anyone come with the doctrine of the Trinity in the first place. As we’ve already seen, it is a very complicated doctrine — unnecessarily complicated, we might say.

The answer lies in the revelation of Jesus — both what he was like and what he said. We get an idea of this from the prayer in John’s gospel that takes up John 17, and it begins with the very first verse:

After Jesus said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed: “Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you.”

The ‘father-son’ relationship points us towards the existence of the Trinity, and to its nature.

The eternal son

The idea of ‘son of God’ isn’t unique to the New Testament. In the Old Testament, the Messianic king was spoken of as God’s ‘son’. So the phrase in itself meant nothing more than someone in a special relationship with God.

But the way Jesus spoke about the father, clearly suggested a relationship beyond this. So in v 5, Jesus speaks to the Father about ‘the glory I had with you before the world began.’

This already hints at an eternal relationship — one that exists outside time. But it is not just the duration of the relationship that is special, but the quality. So twice in this passage, in vv 11 and 22, Jesus talks of himself and the father being ‘one’. And in v 21 he says to the Father, ‘you are in me and I am in you.’

To put it crudely, it is not just that the Father and the Son have been together a long time, but that they are intertwined. They are ‘one together’.

Perichoresis

The technical theological term for this is ‘perichoresis’. I think I’m right in saying it derives from a term meaning ‘dancing round’, but the core idea is that the identity of the persons in the Trinity arises from the relationship with the other persons.

It is easiest to understand this — if we can understand it at all — in the way we speak about ‘father’ and ‘son’.

You can be a person without needing other people. You can be a person on your own, and if the whole world were wiped out whilst you were up in a satellite orbiting the globe you’d still be a person.

But you cannot be a father without a child. You cannot be a son without a parent. So in the godhead, the father actually cannot be the father without the son, and vice versa. The persons of the Trinity are who they are because of the other persons.

And for them to be who they are eternally, the relationships have to be eternal. The father is only the eternal father if there is an eternal son, and vice versa, whilst the Spirit is also caught up in this.

Augustine thought of the Trinity as the eternal love between the Father and the Son. And he is certainly the Spirit who proceeds from the father through the Son.

The centrality of relationship

The Trinity, then, is to be understood relationally, and that lifts the Trinity out of being dry theory to vibrant practice, for if the Trinity is relationship, then relationships are of eternal and fundamental significance.

And this is something else we see in the prayer in John, for at the heart of it, Jesus is praying for his disciples to be caught up in the relationship of the Trinity.

The Trinity is a relationship of ‘oneness in many’, and so Jesus’ prayer is for oneness for the many disciples. In v 11 Jesus prays:

I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name —the name you gave me —so that they may be one as we are one.

This is much more than a ‘prayer for Christian unity’. It is a prayer for the divine character — the disciples are protected by the divine name given to Jesus and used, v 12, to protect them:

While I was with them, I protected them and kept them safe by that name you gave me.

Mission

The church is to be a community in which the divine character — the name of God — is present and recognized. And so this ‘oneness in many’ is also central to mission. So in vv 20-23, we read:

My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one: 23 I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

Oneness in many is to be the outcome of mission and the evidence of the truth. And all one can say to that is how very far the church has therefore fallen from the truth!

Transcending ourselves

I began by saying that the character of the Trinity is unique to God, and that is true. We cannot explain the Trinity because there is nothing to explain it by.

However, that is not to say that the character of the Trinity is therefore irrelevant to the world. On the contrary, I have tried to show briefly that it is of the very essence of the world in which we live.

At heart, the Trinity is relational — it is about the eternal interrelationships of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, each being what each is because the others exist as who they are.

But the other thing we can say about the Trinitarian God, because God has revealed it to us, is that he seeks out other relationships, to draw others into oneness with one another and with himself.

In other words, the character of the Trinity drives both creation and salvation — it drives the mission of the Church. And so throughout the prayer of John 17, Jesus speaks of being sent by the Father — in 3,8,18,21,23 and 25, and therefore he sends the disciples, who remain in the world (vv 13-18) to continue what Jesus came to do.

And Jesus also speaks of returning to the Father, not in isolation, but preceding the disciples who will also be drawn into the relationship of the Trinity. So although he is no longer remaining in the world, he prays in v 24,

Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.

And v 21 expresses this same hope. The prayer is for all the disciples, present and future (and we may certainly add, past), that:

… all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us …

The indescribable, indefinable Trinitarian relationship is ultimately to be shared. That is the what flows from the nature of that relationship, and that is what should inspire us in our mission for God.

Original source: OurFunnyLists

1. You became an atheist when you were 10 years old, based on ideas of God that you learned in Sunday School. Your ideas about God haven’t changed since.

2. You think that the primary aim of an omni-benevolent God is for people to have FUN.

3. Although you’ve memorized a half a dozen proofs that He doesn’t exist, you still think you’re God’s gift to the ignorant masses.

4. You believe the astronomical size of the universe somehow disproves God, as if God needed a tiny universe in order to exist.

5. You spend hours arguing that atheism actually means “without a belief in God ” and not just ” belief that there is no god”, as if this is a meaningful distinction in real life.

6. You can make the existence of pink unicorns the center-piece of a philosophical critique.

7. You’re a spoiled fifteen year old boy who lives in the suburbs and you go into a chat room to declare that, “I know there is no God because no loving God would allow anyone to suffer as much as I…hold on. My cell phone’s ringing.”

8. You believe that if something cannot be touched, seen, heard, or measured in some way, then it must not exist, yet you fail to see the irony of your calling Christians “narrow-minded”.

9. You believe that priests are only in it for the money, despite the fact that they make less than almost anyone else with their level of education.

10. Your only knowledge of The Bible comes from searching ‘bible contradictions’ in Google.

11. You believe the movie Dogma gives the most accurate portrayal of Christian theology.

As I am personally guilty of becoming wrapped up in my own pathetic little problems, I’m popping this one on from the Catholic Herald so that we don’t forget our Christian brothers and sisters in Iraq.

With all of the horror our Christian brethren are suffering in Iraq, we must remember that there are tiny slivers of light and encouragement coming from the Iraqi Muslim community themselves:

Catholic Herald by John Pontifex is head of press and information for Aid to the Church in Need (UK)

It was a day that started like any other. But what happened that spring morning will never be forgotten by those who experienced it.

On Sunday, May 2, 18 buses packed with 1,300 mostly Christian students made their way from Qaraqosh, in Iraq’s Nineveh plain, to their university in the major city of Mosul.

As the buses passed through the various security checkpoints on their way into Mosul, there were two explosions. Improvised car bombs charged with deadly explosives were detonated causing serious damage to several of the buses. Inside, many of the students lay injured.

Initial reports stated that one person had died and 80 were injured but in the coming days the total number of wounded rose to nearly 200. Of those, at least 25 students were very seriously injured and had to be airlifted to hospital in Turkey.

Iraqi Christians are sadly no strangers to bomb blasts and other atrocities. Indeed, killings, kidnappings, threatening letters and other hostile actions have become a near permanent feature of everyday life for a section of society now increasingly set apart because of their religious beliefs.

But the bus blast took the intimidation to an altogether more serious level. That such a large-scale attack should take take place in a confined area between checkpoints was cause for alarm in itself. But add to it the number of indisputably innocent people involved and the incident suggests that the region is now just too dangerous for Christians. The attack bore the hallmarks of a well-organised operation, clear in its objectives to target Christians and certain of the resources necessary to do maximum damage.

The demonstrations in Christians towns outside Mosul made clear that the general population was only too aware of the gravity of the crisis it faces.

For Iraqi Christian leaders, meanwhile, the immediate aftermath of the tragedy was taken up with measures to ensure the injured received care and that relatives and friends received the support they needed.

In an emotional encounter just a few days after the attack a delegation of seven bishops from across the different Christian denominations and rites met 300 of the students, many of them with faces and limbs bandaged.

In an interview with Aid to the Church in Need a day later one of the bishops present, Chaldean Archbishop Louis Sako of Kirkuk, told me: “When we met the students, we were very moved. There was crying and a lot of sadness. One student told us it is a miracle that only one person is dead.”

But beyond bringing the present crisis under control, the bishops clearly need several miracles to solve the deeper problems that threaten the long-term survival of the Church in this ancient land of Christianity.

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I have blogged previously on the growing influence of Christian Evangelical’s on the Conservative party, here, here and here, and have asserted that we in the UK are witnessing the rise of a US styled Christian Reconstructionism within Evangelicalism, which seeks a Dominionist authoritarian form of pseudo-Christian society.

Given this, I found the following Theos article written by Lauri Moyle of RealGrassHopper thoroughly informative:

Two articles recently appeared in the British press arguing that there was an alignment between the Conservative Party and ‘fundamentalist’ or ‘evangelical’ Christians (depending on which piece you read) with their socially conservative ‘moral’ agenda.

The first was entitled ‘The right hand of God’ and appeared in the New Statesman written by Sunny Hundal. It was published before the election. The other, entitled ‘Tories and the new evangelical right,’ was published in the Guardian’s ‘Comment is free’ belief section on Andrew Brown’s blog after May 8th.

While both are about the same subject, only the first betrays a tone of scaremongering.

This difference illustrates and partially delineates where the real UK culture war lies. The line is not party political or between the sacred and secular. It is drawn between, on the one side, the religious and the secular who are willing to take a hospitable, if robust, view of their disagreements, and on the other, those religious and secular ‘fighters’ who seem unwilling to concede that a real humanity lies behind the ‘other’, and often resort to demonizing the opposition while claiming victimhood for themselves.

Andrew Brown represents the first sort. He understands that reporting on the changing landscape of the churches’ involvement in the public sphere in terms of US-style ‘culture wars’ is unhelpful for conservatives and liberals alike. More importantly, he understands that such comparisons are broadly inaccurate and too narrow. He recognises that the main players of the social conservative side of the Tory party have an agenda that is bigger than abortion or homosexuality. They have a desire for structural change to alleviate poverty, promote civil society and political engagement.

Sunny Hundal is the editor of the blog Liberal Conspiracy which ‘campaigns for liberal-left policies and causes.’ It should not be a surprise that he uses thermal language to ‘re-invigorate the liberal-left in Britain.’ As with parts of the fundamentalist ‘right’ Hundal’s conspiratorial-liberals are concerned about more than equality for homosexuals or women’s reproductive rights. It would be unfair to caricature his concerns as being purely about scaremongering. However, he has regretably agitated against legitimate relationships between a Conservative MP and socially conservative Christian pressure groups. The relationships are worth reporting on if only for the sake of transparency and accountability, but his stories tend to lack a bigger picture.

Brown and Hundal are right to warn about invisible but smellable combustible particles in the air. However, adding fuel to the incipient fire and thereby actually creating a US style culture war is not the same as pointing out the smell that precedes only a possible full-scale fire.

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I have a tendency to focus on the divinity of Jesus almost at the expense of his humanity. In view of this detractor and the fact that I personally suffer from bouts of intense low mood, I found the following article by Michael of Parchment and Pen thoroughly edifying and encouraging, in that it provoked the sense that Jesus fully perceives our suffering.

Parchment and Pen Blog

One of the most terrifying things about going through depression is the idea that it will never end. Our minds are terrifically mysterious. Our minds play tricks on us. Whatever disposition we find ourselves in we believe it is permanent. When I experienced my time of depression last month, ignorance was not a friend. I did not know what was going on. I did not know why my mind was broken. This added to and, probably, prolonged the depression. Was it something I did? Was it something chemical in my brain? Did I need anti-depressants? Was there a lifestyle choice that built up over time and was taxing me? I did not know. Had I known it would have been much easier. If I had omniscience, I could have looked ahead into the future and known with certainty that it would subside in a few weeks. If I knew everything, I could correct the problem by taking the most definite measures to overcome it. But such is the plight of man. We don’t know everything. We don’t know the future. We have to live in such way where we attempt to make the most appropriate decisions as they seem to us at the time. We have to learn to trust the Lord, placing the future in his hands.

The Bible tells us that Christ can sympathize with us in all our weaknesses and that he has been tempted like us in everything (Heb 4:15). Many times I don’t really believe this. Think about it. There are some things that Christ was not tempted to do. For example, Christ was never tempted to tell a lie to cover up another lie! As well, there are certain weaknesses that I have which Christ does not seem to have had. For example, as I said above, I don’t know the future. Because of this, decision making is very difficult. It makes depression much more depressing. If I knew the future, this life would be much, much easier. Exhaustive knowledge of all things would be even better. So many problems and so much weakness would be done away with. Who should I marry? How many kids should I have? What vocation should I pursue? Why am I down? Should I send this email or not? How exactly should I respond in this or that difficult circumstance? If I could draw upon omniscience, all of these questions—all of these weaknesses—would be a snap. I would always know exactly what to do.

What were Christ’s limitations? Did he have any? Was he ever depressed, not knowing what the future holds? What did Christ know and when did he know it? What could Christ do and how could he do it?

Most Christians see Christ first through his deity. Sure we believe that Christ is both God and man, but when it comes to our default understanding of him as we read the Scriptures, we normally see only his deity. If he knew something which ordinarily could not be known, we attribute it to his deity. If he did something that could not normally be done, we credit his divine nature.

However, when it comes to some of the more troublesome passages, we often find our theology insufficient to cover the details. When Christ was in the Garden and asked that the “cup” of suffering pass from him (Lk 22:42), we are confused. When he asks the Father, “Why have you forsaken me” from the cross (Mk 15:34), we don’t know how to take it. And when he says that he does not know the day or the hour of his coming (Matt 24:36), we are baffled. In fact, so confused was some early scribe concerning Christ’s confession of ignorance, he omitted the phrase “nor the son” from the manuscript. The question is: How could Christ, who is God, not be omniscient (know everything, including the future)? Why didn’t Christ know the time of his coming?

There are a few options:

1. Christ really did know; we just don’t know why he said this.

2. Christ did not know for some unknown reason reason, but he knew everything else.

3. Christ did not know because, being a man, he was no longer omniscient.

4. Christ did not know since he did not access his omniscience due to the rules of the incarnation.

My contention is that number four is correct.

Let me be brief and clear with my thesis:

Although Christ was fully God, he never independently accessed any of his divine powers or knowledge. All of his miraculous actions and understanding were the result of his submission to God and came by way of the power of the Holy Spirit. Further, if Christ had at any time accessed his own power or omniscience independently, he would not be qualified as the second Adam and could not represent us in redemption.

This means that there were many things that Christ did not know. It was not simply that Christ chose on a one-by-one basis what not to know, but that he, like every human, had limitations of knowledge. He had to grow and learn just like all people. When he knew things that are beyond the abilities of normal humanity, like when he knew the background of the woman at the well (Jn 4:17-18), he knew them by the guidance of the Holy Spirit, just like the prophets. When he did things that are beyond the abilities of normal humanity, like walking on water, he did so by the power of the Spirit.

In summary, I believe that while Christ exercised divine prerogatives (forgiving sins, claiming to be God, receiving worship, etc.), he did not ever exercise his own divine attributes independently of the Holy Spirit’s guidance. His knowledge and miracles do not alone substantiate his deity, as parallels to all Christ’s miracles and knowledge can be found in the prophets. But his miracles substantiate his deity because they substantiate his testimony.

Concerning this, there is no one “orthodox” belief that all Christians of all time have held to.  There seems to be spectrum of belief here. While orthodox Christianity does not entertain the idea that Christ was no longer God in the incarnation (kenotic theory), it does not necessarily speak as to whether or not he used his own divine powers independently or submitted completely to the Holy Spirit.

I believe the latter is correct for the following reasons:

1. It seems biblically correct:

There are many places in the Scripture that speak of Christ’s limitations and about his complete submission to God and the Holy Spirit.

In Luke 4:1 we are told that Christ was “full of the Holy Spirit” and that the Spirit “led” Christ into the wilderness to be tempted. Why didn’t he lead himself?

When Christ is tempted in the wilderness, he responds to the devil by quoting the Old Testament Scriptures, not using his own words (which were inspired by definition). Why not just speak directly?

Luke 2:40 speaks of Christ’s growth in wisdom, implying a previous lack.

In John 14:10 we understand that Christ does not speak on his own initiative, but based on the Fathers. Why not his own?

Acts 1:2 tells us that Christ instructed the Apostles through the Holy Spirit’s authority. Why not through his own authority?

Acts 10:38 tells us that Christ’s anointing was through the Holy Spirit and his power was from the Father. Why not use his own power?

In Acts 2:22 we are told that it was the Father’s power that gave Christ the ability to do the miracles. Again, why didn’t he use his own power.

Mark 13:32 demonstrates that Christ did not know the day or hour of his coming. How do we explain this void of knowledge.

In Luke 8:45 Christ was ignorant of who touched him. What a mundane thing to be ignorant of.

John 11:34 tells us that Christ was ignorant of where Lazarus had been laid. Again, another mundane statement of ignorance.

Is seems theologically correct:

Have you ever wondered why the Devil’s first temptation to Christ was to turn a stone into bread? What is the big deal in that? It does not seem like a sin. If I had that power, would it be a sin for me to use that power? However, the Devil’s plan was much more strategic than we often think. His goal was not simply to have Christ turn a rock into a meal, but to have Christ independently access his own omnipotence (power) for self-satisfaction. You see, Christ had to become like us in every respect in order to represent us. This is why the dictates of Chalcedon (451) are so important. If Christ did not become fully man, then we lose representation. If Christ was not fully God, there is no power of salvation. Christ had to be fully God and fully man for redemption to be accomplished and applied. Satan was tempting Christ to do something that would forfeit his representation of us and therefore forfeit redemption. Had Christ turned the stone into bread based on an independent use of his own power and authority, he could only represent those of us who can do the same by their own power and authority. Since there is no one who has such abilities, no one could be represented.

With this in mind, it is perfectly understandable why Christ did not know certain things, including the time of his coming. Christ only knew what needed to be known for his mission. This is like us. For both Christ and us, we must rely upon and trust in God completely for the unknown future.

Least you think I am saying something novel here, let me quote a few sources:

Donald Macleod:

“The other line of integration between the omniscience of the divine nature and the ignorance of the human is that just as Christ had to fulfill the office of Mediator with the limitations of a human body, so he had to fulfill it within the limitations of a human mind.”

Concerning the temptation in the wilderness he writes,

“Part of the truth here is suggested by the first of the three temptations in the desert: ‘tell these stones to become bread’ (Mt. 4:3). The essence of the temptation was that the Lord disavow the conditions of the incarnation and draw on his omnipotence to alleviate the discomforts of his self-abasement. He could have turned the stones into bread; he could have (perhaps) known the day and the house of his parousia. But the latter would have undone his work as surely as the former. Christ had to submit to knowing dependently and to knowing partially. He had to learn to obey without knowing all the facts and to believe without being in possession of full information. He had to forgo the comfort which omniscience would sometimes have brought.”

He goes on,

“Omniscience was a luxury always within reach, but incompatible with his rules of engagement. He had to serve within the limitations of finitude” (The Person of Christ, IVP, 169).

Millard Erickson:

“Perhaps we could say that he [Christ] had such knowledge as was necessary for him to accomplish his mission; in other matters he was as ignorant as we” (Christian Theology, Baker, 726; Leon Morris shares the same thoughts in Lord from Heaven, 48).

Tomas Oden:

“During his earthly ministry, the communication of divine power to the human Jesus was administered by the Holy Spirit, upon whom he constantly relied. Jesus taught, acted, and suffered what the Spirit enabled, directed, and permitted.”

He goes on:

“[T]here was sufficient impartation of divine empowerment to Jesus as was needed for each stage of the fulfillment of his office of Mediator” (The Word of Life, Prince Press, 183-184).

One point of note that needs to be reiterated here: While Christ did not independently utilize his divine attributes to make it through this life, he always had immediate access to them. Christ never ceased to be God and did not give up his divine attributes at the incarnation. He simply chose not to use them in order to qualify to be our representative. This is made clear by the very fact that Satan tempted him to use his own power to satisfy his hunger. If Christ did not have access to this power, then the temptation is meaningless. According to this line of reasoning, Christ’s full deity is actually substantiated.

But don’t be misled here. Ignorance does not equal error. Just because Christ, living according to the rules of the incarnation, was ignorant of some things, this does not mean he was ever wrong. He never spoke in error.

Was Christ ever depressed? To the degree that depression was not based on his own sinfulness, yes, he could have experienced depression. He most certainly experienced frustration, sadness, and anger. Christ was fully human. Christ had to suffer with the same limitations as us. He could only do, act, and know what was given to him by the Father through the power of the Holy Spirit. These were the requirements of the cross.

Having said this, I do believe that such line of reasoning causes us to pause and reflect on just how much Christ can relate to us in every way as a mediator. He was just like us. He had to trust in God for his future as you and I do. He had to rely on the Holy Spirit for his mission and power just like us.

I will attempt to answer some very worthy objections to this in the next post. However, feel free to comment and voice your own thoughts.

This is an unusual one.

The website AlmightyTweets.com collects Tweets which contain the phrase; “God told me / you / us”, and from these they track God’s mood based on what He is [allegedly] telling folks.

There is also the facility to see God’s latest Twitter comments.

This is so weird I couldn’t help but mention it.

I stumbled on this intriguing letter written to the Belfast Times, by Rev Philip Campbell: