Holy Boldness

over the question of Jesus’ divinity versus His humanity. The great conflict revolved around a heresy known as Arianism . Global councils were called to discuss this doctrinal matter and there were massive religious and political implications from the outcome. Once the dust cleared, one was hard-pressed to find any emphasis on the humanity of Jesus. Some of the early church fathers were so focused on defending the deity of Christ that in some cases they inflicted the penalty of death upon those who opposed it. Predictably, any emphasis on the humanity of Jesus got lost in the discussion. The danger of losing Jesus’ humanity in favor of His divinity is that it limits our understanding of what Jesus came to accomplish. When the church lost its emphasis on the humanity of Jesus and His full identi fication with mankind it forfeited the full purpose of His coming, focus ing on His sacrificial death and the forgiveness of sins and yet failing to understand His role as the restorer of sonship and with it the restoration of the original purpose of man. This loss of emphasis on Jesus’ humanity was foreign to the New Testament. The New Testament affirms both the humanity and the deity of Christ. The early church heresy called Gnosticism denied the human ity of Jesus provoking Paul and John as well as the author of Hebrews to address it. John’s Gospel takes dead aim at this misconception by decisively declaring that Jesus came in the flesh.

John 1:1, 14

(1) In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and was God. The same was in the beginning with God…. (14) And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

John reasserts this truth again in his first letter to the church.

1 John 4:2-3

(2) By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God,

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