Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas

NT Framework - Confusing the Union

• Jeremy Thomas • Season 6 • Episode 101

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Have you ever bought a 2-in-1 tool, or perhaps a reversible jacket? You often get in inferior product. Jesus Christ is the only successful 2-in-1 ever. And let us not confuse the two entities by mixing them.

More information about Beyond the Walls, including additional resources can be found at www.beyondthewalls-ministry.com 

This series included graphics to illustrate what is being taught, if you would like to watch the teachings you can do so on Rumble (https://rumble.com/user/SpokaneBibleChurch) or on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtV_KhFVZ_waBcnuywiRKIyEcDkiujRqP).

Jeremy Thomas is the pastor at Spokane Bible Church in Spokane, Washington and a professor at Chafer Theological Seminary. He has been teaching the Bible for over 20 years, always seeking to present its truths in a clear and understandable manner. 

Speaker 1:

Welcome to Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas and our series on the New Testament Framework. Today a smaller, bite-sized piece from the larger lesson. We hope you enjoy it.

Speaker 2:

Have this mindset in you, which was in Christ Jesus, right? And the word for mindset there means to develop this through careful thought about what Christ Jesus did. And what Christ Jesus did, right, is he humbled himself by taking to himself a true humanity. We're talking about the God of the universe. I mean the God who doesn't need you, doesn't need me, doesn't need to eat, doesn't need to drink, is always brimful of energy, knows all things, never learned anything. Okay, we're talking about the infinite personal God, and this God took to himself a true humanity like you and I. He came down here and he lived in the filth of this world. He walked in this world among people who were full of sin and expressing sin, and in a world that is run by the God of this world, who's Satan. And yet he was tempted in all things and he didn't sin, and we'll talk a little bit more about that now as we get into this person. But think about what he did, think about the condescension, how he came down to us and went through what we go through Now. Allah didn't do that. Allah is this imaginative God that how many ever Arabs believe in. He never came down here and walked among us. He doesn't know what it's like to go through what we go through, but the one true God, the second person of the Trinity, he came down here and he lived in the same world that we lived in. He went through all the slop that we have to go through and yet he didn't sin. And so I'm going to talk about that, because that's a tremendous position for him to be in.

Speaker 2:

Now, to get started, just to review Doctrine of Hypostatic Union. We developed this over I don't know 15 weeks. But Jesus Christ, this is just a statement of the doctrine. Jesus Christ is undiminished deity, united with true humanity in one person, without mixture or separation, forever. So what does all this mean? Well, first of all, an undiminished deity means he's fully God, right Now. That means he has all the attributes of God he's sovereign, he's righteous, he's just, he's loving, omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, immutable, eternal veracity, personal, so forth. Okay, all the attributes of God.

Speaker 2:

So we say another way of saying that is he has a divine nature, a nature. Divine nature. Now, that's important because, when you look at the next phrase, he's united with true humanity. True humanity means he's fully man, but he also has a human nature, so he has two natures. That's the point I'm trying to make here One divine, one human. So as a human he has all the characteristics of a human meaning, he has a true human body, he has a true human spirit and he's a true human soul, and these two came together in one person. So by doing that, of course, taking on a true humanity, he's taking on the limitations of humanity in that nature. But he's only one person. That's the thing. Two natures but only one person. He's not two people, he's not a split personality, he's only one person with two natures in that person. Obviously that's unique, right? I mean, nobody else has anything exactly like that. So he is a unique person Without mixture. So these two natures are not mixed together, like the divine nature with his divine attributes does not somehow coalesce with or intermingle with his human nature.

Speaker 2:

Now, some denominations have mixed, for example in Lutheranism and I'm not trying to be critical, but in Lutheranism and really Martin Luther is the one who started this in the communion, when they take the bread, they talk about the bread in terms of the real presence of Christ in the elements. And so when you take the element, the bread, in a Lutheran church, they are thinking not that the bread itself changes substance or anything like that, but that there's a real presence of Christ in connection with the element itself. What did they mean? Well, they meant that the Lord Jesus Christ, because he's omnipresent, right, he's everywhere, okay, as God, right. I mean, he doesn't go places.

Speaker 2:

We used to say with the kids, we used to say God doesn't go places, he's already in all places, right, and he's not parted out throughout the universe, he's completely present at every point in space. I mean, if you go to I don't know Pluto, which they now debate as a planet or not, anyway, if you go to I don't know Pluto, which they now debate as a planet or not, anyway, if you go to Pluto these days, is God with you there as much as he is here on planet Earth. Yes, he's not parted out throughout the universe, he's completely present at every point in space. He's also completely present outside of space and time. So there's that concept.

Speaker 2:

So the Lutherans would say that because of that, there's a real presence of Christ in connection with the bread that we take. But here this is a problem, because the bread represents his true humanity, not his deity. It represents his true humanity, his flesh, which was offered for us on the cross, right? Well, what they're doing is they're bringing the omnipresence of God into the humanity, they're mixing them. That's why, in their communion, they hold to what they call consubstantiation, this idea of the real presence of Christ in the element, because they have mixed divinity with humanity rather than keeping them separate, as the hypostatic union doctrine teaches. So I'm just saying these things have practical ramifications.

Speaker 2:

When you go into other local churches, you don't know what the Lutherans think or what they believe, or why they're doing what they do. All these things are tied to doctrines and things that have been taught. Okay, so understand that he's not in the elements. You know, the Roman Catholics went even further. They do this too. They actually say that the elements become the body and blood of Christ, and for most of the Roman Catholic Church history, the blood was reserved for the priests only and the people could only take the bread. There was like a wall or a barrier back at the time of the Reformation between the people and the priests, because the priests are on like a higher status or something like that. We're all believer priests. The Bible says we're all believer priests in 1 Peter, 2, and other places, revelation 1-5, and other places. So anyway, all that is just a confusion. On the hypostatic union, though, okay.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for joining us on Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas. If you would like to see the visuals that went along with today's sermon, you can find those on Rumble and on YouTube under Spokane Bible Church. That is where Jeremy is the pastor and teacher. We hope you found today's lesson productive and useful in growing closer to God and walking more obediently with Him. If you found this podcast to be useful and helpful, then please consider rating us in your favorite podcast app, and until next time, we hope you have a blessed and wonderful day.