Recently I had lunch with a good friend. He commented that he accepted that Jesus was “fully God and fully man,” and that was enough for him. He didn’t feel the need to dig deeper into it than that. And, in all honesty, he doesn’t.
Paying rent and putting food on the table keeps so many of us busy that we barely have time to think. Once while leading a men’s study group I began by asking what they did in their free time. They answered with blank stares. Free time? What’s that? They were kept busy at work, then busy at home, and as for free moments? They were spending it here. This was it.
I don’t need to be a microbiologist to benefit from the use of antibiotics. But I am aware of how much I owe to the work of microbiologists. We benefit from the work of others; the ministries of others, their music, their studies, the entire community, and this includes, not only the local church, but the historic Church as well. The ecumenical councils stand out not only as the historic Church’s clarification and declaration, on who and what Jesus of Nazareth was, but what he means for us.
The Theme: Truly God and truly human.
Agree with the historic teachings or not, these councils followed a theological and spiritual path blazed by the ancient Apostolic Tradition as expressed in Scripture and earliest creeds. Jesus Christ is recognized as being fully and truly God (Nicaea I); not a lesser deity or creature, but the Creator of the cosmos. This was nothing new for this message was clearly expressed from the pages of Scripture through the letters and sermons of the earliest Christian writers. Christ was also recognized as having become a creature, fully and truly human (Chalcedon, confirmed by Constantinople II). He is God in the flesh (Ephesus) as an actual man with no loss of deity, no distortion of humanity. God became one of us. He joined us.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind…. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.” (John 1)
This cannot be explained or described as a chemical reaction or mixture of species. The only reason this incarnation is possible is because God is such that cannot be comprehended, and this incarnation, this joining with the creature is an attribute of the Divine. Creaturely existence may force us to speak of hybrids and split personalities, but the Divine is another nature with other potentials entirely.
Look to Christ to see the fullest revelation of God.
If you want to understand what God is like then look to Jesus. The Gospels describe the heart of God more fully than the laws of Moses can. The laws and prophets are shadows of Christ (Hebrews 1). I don’t think it wrong to say that Moses foreshadowed Christ, and Christ fulfilled Moses’ expectations beyond his wildest dreams.
Look to Christ to see what it means to be truly human.
Humans are created “in the image and likeness of God,” as Christ reveals both. Our Creator’s intention is that we will be “conformed to the image of his Son” (Romans 8:29). If you want to understand what it means to be human, look to Jesus. The first Adam reveals the brokenness in our relationship with God, creation, and ourselves. The second Adam (Jesus) reveals our healed relationship, what we are meant to be.
Christology is soteriology for Jesus is our salvation.
As Irenaeus wrote so long ago, “The glory of God is man fully alive.” The joy of God is the health and welfare of his creation as it deeply longs to be. We are created to be united with God (John 17). We are formed for union. The human predicament is a broken relationship. The broken relation that is revealed in Adam is healed in Christ. We are grafted into Christ, the new head of the family, the firstborn of all creation. This is not a limited story of an individual salvation, but of all creation (Nicaea II) as all creation waits for in anticipation (Romans 8). We are adopted, and even more, for we are transformed to be, as Irenaeus states, “fully alive” (2 Corinthians 3: 18). The goal of our salvation is the restoration of this image and likeness of God. It is to be God-filled.
What are we saved for?
We are saved, not merely from our sins, but for the goal of being united with God.
Blaise Pascal wrote of the “God-shaped void” within each of us… “What else does this craving, and this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace? This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words by God himself.”
The Gospel of John records a prayer of Jesus, “My prayer is not for them alone (his disciples). I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 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.I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”
The theme of Jesus’ prayer is unity; union of his disciples on earth, our union with Christ himself, the oneness of Christ with God the Father, and our corresponding union with the Father. The ancient Christians would have referred to this union as “theosis.” Athanasius of Alexandria in his classic work, On the Incarnation of the Word, wrote the confusing words, “God became man so that man might become God.” God joined creation in the incarnation, so that creation may join God. The phrase, translated as “become God,” is a bit strong for some readers, but what is being stressed is union, not essence. Remember, in the incarnation the union is of two natures unconfused. Peter’s words may help as he states that we “participate in the Divine nature,” we do not become the Divine nature or essence (1 Peter 1:4).
Our salvation means the restoration of the Divine image and likeness as well as the natural union with and participation in the Divine nature. We will remain fully human as we are fully united with God, participating in his Divine nature. For the ancient Christians, the goal of creation is to be united with the Creator, not confused with God, but joined with God, an intimacy that reflects the incarnation.
What is saved?
What is saved is all of us, not just portions of us. Gregory of Nazianzus wrote, “What is not assumed is not redeemed.” He was addressing the heresy of Apollinarianism, the idea that Jesus had a human body and soul, but a Divine mind; kinda as if Jesus was two parts human and one part Divine.
Gregory insisted that Christ became truly and fully human, so that “the entire humanity, fallen through sin, might be created anew.” Christ became flesh so that our flesh is raised with his. He became a living soul so that our souls, also, will be raised and redeemed. His mind, a human mind for the healing our minds (Constantinople I). His will, also human, for its restoration (Constantinople III).
The message of the ancient councils is, fully God and fully human. If Jesus was not fully God, then we will not be fully united with God. If Jesus was not fully human, then we will not be fully human in our union with God.
Note on Atonement
Many modern Evangelicals have reduced discussions of the incarnation to a focus on substitutionary atonement, often emphasizing that Jesus saves us from our sin, with, what Christ saves us for, as an afterthought. For the ancient Christian writers this wasn’t an afterthought. This was their destiny.
Suggested Reading
Athanasius (with a preface by C. S. Lewis), On the Incarnation, St Vladimir’s Seminary Press; Standard Edition (January 3, 2012).
Gregory of Nazianzus, On God and Christ: The Five Theological Orations and Two Letters to Cledonius, Popular Patristics Series (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2002).
Check out Scott Buchanan’s article for more information on early teaching on Atonement…. https://letterstocreationists.wordpress.com/2020/08/26/the-atonement-wars-what-the-church-fathers-actually-wrote/
Next: Picture This – The Great Councils: Part Ten – Nicaea II
The Early Church for Today 
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“God became man, that man might become God”. Since it is not possible to become something that is not already present within as a seed, like an oak tree present in an acorn; the fathers understood that it would not be possible for man to become God if he were not already God, as a seed. They understood the Divine Image in the human heart as that God seed, the presence of God already in the depths of the heart; not merely a reflected image as in a mirror; but the actual presence of God. Scripture speaks of Christ being the “express image of God”(Heb. 1:3), and surely it does not mean that Christ was merely a reflection as in a mirror, of the Divine Reality, when it is clearly said that the “Word was God”. So likewise, man as image means that man also bears within his heart the true seed of Divinity. Christ actually partook i.e. took on human nature, He became fully man, so that man could actually take on Divinity, become God. One of the ways the fathers understood this mystery was to see Divinity as being both Essence and Energy; with Essence being utterly inexcessible to man, and Energy being the aspect of Divinity that is partaken of by man, with both Essence and Energy being fully God. This seems a bit technical, but this line of theology made it possible to understand man’s Deification as truly becoming Divine through Grace; thus fulfilling the theology of the Incarnation, that “God became man, that man might become God”.
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Hi Harry,
I like your statement: “One of the ways the fathers understood this mystery was to see Divinity as being both Essence and Energy; with Essence being utterly inexcessible to man, and Energy being the aspect of Divinity that is partaken of by man, with both Essence and Energy being fully God.” This distinction between essence and energy was clarified in the writings of Gregory of Palamas (c. 1296-1357). While the western church, for the most part reject this distinction, the eastern churches accept it. I think Athanasius’ statement, “God became man, that man might become God,” confuses some because they do not recognize the distinction of Essence-Energy of God. To “become God” sounds as becoming confused with God, or forfeiting our humanity and creaturehood. As you stated, “Essence being utterly inexcessible to man.” The “Energies” of God, according to the eastern churches, is another matter. I take John 17 as a primary statement that we are to be one with each other, one with Christ, and thus, one with God. As the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are one in essence we will be one with God in participation. The councils took the incarnation to be our future in Christ. What Christ is by nature, we are to be by grace. In the incarnation (according to the councils) the Divine and human natures were united but not confused. In light of John 17 I take this unity to be shared by all. God created us to be fully with him and fully with us. Our union with God is not an afterthought. It is not merely a return to Eden as a location or a state of being, but a return to the original expectation of creation. Whatever this image of God we are created as is, it is to be filled with God, joined with him, united in him as God becomes “all in all.” Much of Evangelical theology focuses on the courtroom drama and forgiveness of sin, while many of the ancient Christians looked also to the healing of our souls and bodies and union with God, what many would call a more mystical theology. The incarnation here may serve as an illustration of our future state. If we are going to take the council’s description to heart, then the two natures are united yet unconfused in one person. If we are parts of the body of Christ, then we are parts of the incarnate God, does this mean that we are the flesh of God? As God joined us, we join him. Whatever our future holds, God will be all in all and within his fullness we will have our being in indescribable fullness.
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