The person of Christ; who He is, is a fundamental Christian doctrine. Proudly, evangelicals deny the Arian heresy that claims Jesus was merely a created man. Again, the stalwarts of orthodoxy refute, on the other extreme, Docetism which claims that Jesus only appeared to be flesh and was, in fact, pure Spirit. Walking the fine line of affirming the hypostatic union is something that has been handed down to us from the vast manual of history. It may seem surprising, then, to accuse evangelical thinking of practically denying this truth. To write an article that grabs readers though, one must do surprising things, and this is the accusation brought by this blog today.
It was Jonathan Edwards in his “Religious Affections” who said that, “holy desire, exercised in longings, hungerings, and thirstings after God and holiness, is often mentioned in Scripture as an important part of true religion.” Perhaps it was Paul's letter to the Philippians that inspired him to such a notion. For college Greek we were required to write a blog and about something that the Greek was illuminating for us and so I chose to have a look at Philippians 2:1-11. Paul is exhorting the reader to “Let the same kind of thinking dominate you as that which is also in Christ” (v5). He wants his readers to aspire to obedience exemplified by Christ (v12) but before he gets there, he gets side-tracked in ecstasy over Jesus' incarnation and glorification.
Colourful booklets and smart attire make it easy for the person on the other side of the spyhole to figure out that the pair standing outside the door is a Jehovah's Witness team. I had the chance to walk into a kingdom hall yesterday and picked up their tract "What the Bible Really Teaches" (all 200 pages of it). Paging through it, one is immediately presented with the name Jehovah; packaged as the way to get near to God. "If you want someone to get to know you, what might you do?
