This morning I read a post from RZIM entitled, God in a Body. In the post Jill Carattini asks, “Far from a subject for another time or place, how might God be speaking to your physical existence even now? How does your body accompany your questions and encounters with God? In the dark and corporeal moments of Holy Week, consider Christ who walked among the world as a human body, who shared a last meal and washed the feet of his friends, who set his face toward the anguish of the cross. Consider the body of Christ, who suffered through the weight of Holy Week and now sits at the right hand of the Father as our advocate, offering his body for the sake of yours, calling you to physically come further toward him even now.”
This past week in our Colossians lesson Wayne Barber made a statement, he said, “the purpose of a body is to give visibility to an entity.” This statement of his really resonated with me. I know it has because this is the third time it has come to me as I shared with others.
So why did God come in a body?
Jesus, came in a body to give us visibility to the Entity of God.
Dictionary.com states that an entity is something that has a real existence, being or existence especially when considered as distinct, independent, or self-contained, essential nature.
In Colossians 1:15-19 the Word of God states, that Jesus “is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything. For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him…” and then in Colossians 2:9 the Word of God declares, “For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form…” Jesus Himself said that, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father;” (John 14:9).
Jesus came to show us what He created us in His image to do in the very beginning. We were created to give visibility to the entity of God. We were created to display His glory. We were created to be who Jesus was as He walked this earth in real flesh and blood. So what does it mean to me that God came in a body just so that I could visibly see that He is indeed real and how does that correlate with the body that He has given me?
I watch Jesus.
Whether we like it or not what we choose to do in and with this body displays the essential nature of our being. The purpose of this body is to display our nature and beloved it does. Our bodies either display the depravity of our nature or the divineness of our nature. In the flesh Jesus displayed the divine, and He died so that we, in this body, could do the same.
To those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ: Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature…
2 Peter 1:1-4
What is the divine nature that we are to display? Is it speaking in tongues and casting out demons and making grand displays of signs and power? Is it the ability to out wit and persuade others by our grand knowledge and charisma? Is it the ability to be stoic and stern and unbendable in our convictions? Are these the things that Jesus did in His body that drew others to Him? Is this how He displayed the divine nature of God in His flesh?
No it wasn’t.
The divine nature that Jesus displayed was grace and truth. The divine nature that Jesus displayed was submission to the Word and will of God. The divine nature that Jesus displayed was love, for God is love (1 John 4:16).
Jesus could have walked around and shot lightening bolts from His fingertips and fire from His eyes. He could have shook the earth with every step He made. He could have used the thunder of His voice to silence the roaring waters of Niagara Falls… but He didn’t.
although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
Philippians 2:6-8
Instead he knelt down and gathered children into His arms. He stopped and noticed those that others stepped over on a daily basis. He listened to the cries of those who had so often been ignored. He spoke to those that others treated as less than stray dogs on the street. His divine nature was displayed through His heart of compassion, His gentleness, His kindness, His patience, His humility, and His self-control. This is the divine nature of God. It has been from the beginning…
The Lord descended in the cloud and stood there with him as he called upon the name of the Lord. Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin…
Exodus 34:5-7
Jesus displayed these things in His body all the way to the cross. The purpose of the body is to give visibility to an entity. It never stops doing that, even when faced with destruction, it can’t, for that is its purpose. The outside circumstances did not control the body of Christ, but His entity, the very nature within, controlled the body.
So what does God in a body mean to me?
The Scriptures tell me that when I believe on Jesus, then I am placed in His death, His burial, and His resurrection (Romans 6:3-5). The Scriptures tell me that it is no longer I that live, but Christ in me (Galatians 2:20). The Scriptures tell me that when I, by grace through faith, believe in Jesus and His gospel, then I am sealed with the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 1:13), and my body becomes the temple of God (1 Corinthians 3:16).
In other words, God in a body.
My body.
The entity within is no longer my old nature (Ephesians 2:3), but in Christ I have been given a new nature (2 Corinthians 5:17). I have been given Him within (Colossians 1:27). Therefore this body that once made visible me, my entity, and the nature of my sin now is to make visible the entity of Christ in me the hope of glory. God in a body, this body, my body.
As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. For their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth. I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me. The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.
John 17:18-23
This is why Paul would write to Titus in 62 AD concerning the false teachers and false prophets of Crete…
They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny Him,
Titus 1:16
God does not just call our hearts, He calls our bodies to follow Him. If our hearts have truly been changed then our body can’t help but follow, because the purpose of the body is to give visibility to an entity and if you have been truly born again, then the entity, the essential nature within, is now divine. It is now love. It is Christ in you. Therefore we too should be making known the mystery of God to others as Christ made it known to us, through grace and truth and love.
So take a look in the mirror. For once don’t look at the bags under your eyes or the wrinkles around your mouth or the blemishes on your skin. Don’t look at the skinny arms or bulging waistline or varicose veins or cellulite legs. Don’t strain to find the grey hair or run your fingers through the receding hairline. Instead look past all that to the deeds in this skin. What do they say about the entity that is being given visibility?
When I look in the mirror can I see Christ in me? Have I ever really been changed from within? Do I live what I say I believe?
Do others see Jesus in me?