Sermon Central
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Seven Positions Of Christ Series
Contributed by Ed Mcneely on Dec 14, 2004 (message contributor)
Summary: Christmas: Jesus, our first Christmas gift is viewed from his seven unique positions as he seeks to rescue us from ourselves and place us in the position God created for us--a blessed member of his family forever.
CHRISTMAS: 7 POSITIONS OF CHRIST
The Eternal Gift of God
Today, we continue to unwrap our first Christmas present.
JESUS—whether the baby in the manger or the man on the cross—he is the same God… totally revealed and absolutely expressed in the same person. However, he is viewed from different angles by different disciples, but they’re all facets of the same precious stone—the rock of ages.
Matthew sees Jesus as the Messiah—the Christ—of the Jews, the long promised savior through the bloodline of David. This is the Jewish perspective!
Mark concentrates on the service or life of the savior. This is the Roman perspective—just do it!
Luke presents Jesus as the son of man emphasizing his humanity or the grace of the perfect savior. This is the Greek perspective.
Matthew and Mark emphasize the miracles of Christ, Luke, the parables or the teaching.
John, on the other hand, is the post-graduate course in Christology—everything you ever wanted to know about Jesus Christ.
He does not mention parables and only uses the miracles that help to build a total image—a complete revelation—of the deity of Jesus as the Christ.
On the surface, it appears to be the simplest of the Gospels, but it is, by far, the most profound.
It is the Gospel for believers, not so much for the lost, but for the babes in Christ.
It’s the Gospel to help us out of the manger—to wean us off of the milk of the Word and to give us a full-course understanding of the real meat—the real Christmas!
Jesus the Living Word:
John 1:1-5: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 The Word was with God in the beginning.
3 All things were created by him, and apart from him not one thing was created that has been created.
4 In him was life, and the life was the light of mankind.
5 And the light shines on in the darkness, but the darkness has not mastered it.
These 5 verses present us with the summit of divine revelation. It lifts us to the epitome of human thought and the rarified peak of Divine Revelation!
If anything can get the baby out of the manger, these verses will.
John starts in the first of 7 positions that God the Son occupies throughout scripture.
1. The first is: The preincarnate Christ—Jesus as he was “in the beginning,” literally, in eternity past… before creation… before time began.
Jesus Christ was already there.
He did not become…
He was not created…
He never had a beginning.
He “was with God” in eternity past. (John 17:5).
The word “was” means to have continuous existence, without beginning or origin.
Psalm 90:2 “Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou had formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God”.
Galatians 4:4-6 “But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons…”
Jesus is both voice and the face of the Father—the total revelation.
3 All things were created by him, and apart from him not one thing was created that has been created.
Colossians 1:17 He himself is before all things and all things are held together in him.
2. Second position: The Word!
How was John, a Jew, going to present Christ so that a Gentile could understand?
In the “Logos”—the Word—John found common ground.
Both Greek and Jew understood it.
To the Jews, a word was more than a mere sound.
It was something active and existing.
It was power—the power
• To express something ..
• To do something. This is seen in the many Old Testament references where The Word of God was seen as...
The creative power of God—the power that made the world and gave light and life to every man (Genesis 1:3, 6, 11; Psalm 33:6; Psalm 107:20; Isaiah 55:11).
The Gentiles or Greeks saw the Word more philosophically.
They saw that things were not chaotic, but orderly.
The Greeks said that behind the world was a mind, a reason, a power that made and kept things in their proper place.
This creative and sustaining mind, this supreme reason, this unlimited power was said to be the Word.
More importantly, the Word was the power by which
We come into contact with God and
Express our knowledge and trust to God.
John grabbed hold of this common idea of the Jews and Gentiles.
In expressing Christ this way, John tells us 3 things:
1. God has given us much more than mere words in the Holy Scriptures.
