Life with God "The Son"

So far in our series on experiencing God in all his fullness, enjoying God in all aspects of our life, we've had two sermons, and then last week we had a pause as we had our Thanksgiving service, our celebration Sunday. And today we're going on again, hopefully finishing next week with this sort of mini series. At the first sermon three weeks ago, we looked at the concept, the theological concept of the Trinity. How God exists as one being, one entity, and yet He is three distinct persons within that. And we wrestled with that.

It is a tough concept to try and understand for human beings that are, you know, body, mind, soul, one entity. We wrestled through that a little bit. And then the week after, we started looking and identifying the distinct persons within the Trinity and we started with God the Father. And you might remember when we spoke about that two weeks ago, we saw that God the Father is the giver of all good things. He is the source of our life.

He's the source for our existence. In His mind, the Father willed for us to live, for the universe to come into existence. He's the giver of all good things. But then we also see that He is the sustainer and the provider of every part of our life.

He is the God of the small things as well as the big things. And so He is also the giver of hardship. He's the giver of refining grace that grows us as His children. He has become, through the work of Jesus that we'll look at today, our father. We've been adopted into His family.

But so we come then today logically to the second person of the Trinity. The second person of the Trinity who is God the Son. God the Father, God the Son. And the Bible identifies God the Son with a name and that name is Jesus.

Jesus was a man born in time and in space. Not outer space, in physical location. He really lived. He really existed. In fact, you can get on a plane today and you can fly there and go to Bethlehem.

You can go and see Nazareth where he grew up. A real man in real time and in a real place. He lived to be about 30 years old. He was seen. He was touched.

He was smelled by many people. Non-Christian historians of his day may mention that there was a real man by that name, who said incredible things, who did incredible things. Those historians not necessarily believe that he did those things, but they attest to the fact that people said he did all those things. Yet this man, Jesus, was utterly astonishing. He was God of the universe at the same time.

Even in the limitations of a human body. And he didn't come to earth to sort of take a break from being God and have a summer break, you know, do a bit of fishing in the Sea of Galilee or something like that. He didn't come to, you know, take some time out of being God. He came for a purpose. He came for a reason.

And in accomplishing that reason, that purpose, in what we will explore today, we gain understanding of who the second person of the Trinity is. Who He is. This Jesus, the second person of the Trinity, the Son of God. And so we're going to explore, I guess, four different elements of Him. The first two is that Jesus is the Son of God, our creator and our redeemer.

We're going to turn to Colossians chapter one, verses 15 to 20. You may do so in your Bible. We are going to flick through the verses on the screen as well, but it is helpful to have the whole passage there because we will be unwrapping it a little bit. Colossians chapter one, verses 15 to 20. There are just so many examples of Jesus as creator and as redeemer.

But Colossians is a wonderful capsule of the two being placed next to each other. And so we're going to look at that as our example. Colossians one, 15 to 20. Paul the Apostle writes this: He who is Jesus, He is the image of the invisible God. The firstborn of all creation.

For by Him, who is Jesus, all things were created in heaven and on earth. The things that are visible, the things that are invisible. Whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all those things. And in Him, all those things hold together.

But He is also the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything He might be preeminent. For in Him, all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell and through Him to reconcile to God, to God Himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace by the blood of His cross. Jesus is the Son of God and He is the creator and redeemer. In verse 15 of Colossians, the Bible says that Jesus Christ is God Himself.

He is said to be the image of invisible God. In other words, Jesus is the invisible God made visible. If you ever were to wonder, where is God? Why doesn't He show Himself to me?

Look at Jesus and you will see God. Read about Him and you will see God. There's no doubt for Paul as he writes these words that he is stating Jesus' divine nature. If you ever come across a Jehovah's Witness or a Muslim denying, or a non-Christian denying, that Jesus was anything more than a man, saying that, you know, he was just a bloke two thousand years ago that lived and died.

Bring him to this passage: invisible God made visible. But this passage does more, doesn't it, than stating that Jesus was just God in the flesh. It's explaining also the role, some of the roles he had within the Godhead as the Trinity. Paul highlights Christ's divinity again when he says in verse 16: He, Jesus, existed before all things and in that Godhead, through that Godhead, created all things in heaven and on earth.

He, Jesus, created all things in heaven and on earth, whether visible or invisible, thrones or powers, rulers or authority. God created all things through Christ and for Christ. Now that is really significant because as a Christian and even in light of what we read or heard about two weeks ago when we talked about the Father, we might be familiar with Jesus being saviour. We hear that every week when we come to church. Jesus is our saviour.

We believe as Christians perhaps that He is divine. We believe in that powerful sacrifice on the cross that was sufficient for us. That sacrifice that once and for all saved us, we read in Hebrews 10 again. But do you know that He was the creating power behind creation itself? All things were made by Christ and for Him.

Now other passages of the Bible will say that God the Father created the world. But God the Father created that world in the sense that He willed. It was His decision for the universe to exist. Remember, God in perfect Trinity dwelt forever together in eternity, perfectly satisfied in Himself. But at one point, out of grace, we're going to create something other.

Something that can engage with the perfection that is God. God the Father willed creation. God the Son was the power that gave creation its shape. But then Paul says, not only was Jesus the creating power of creation, but verse 16 says that all things are dependent upon Him. All things hold together in Him.

Like muscles in the body holding their skeleton together, giving shape to the body. So Christ is the power that keeps it all going. He is therefore, Paul says, king over all creation. He was the one that created it, but He is the one that sustains it, keeps it going, holds it together. But then in the same breath, Paul moves on into verse 18 and this is the great capsule that I talked about.

He talks about the second half of the work of Christ and saying that He is the king of salvation for us as humanity. Verse 18 calls Him the firstborn from among the dead. The firstborn. What's this referring to? Well, this is talking about the resurrection of Jesus.

When Jesus comes back to life after His death on the cross and He shows us, He's the first one to do so. He shows us that there really is an afterlife. There is life after death. Death does not have a final say. And so He is the firstborn, like I am the firstborn in my family, the one that was born first, the oldest brother, to show us that physical death has been conquered.

The consequences of sin, which is death, even eternal death, separation from God has been crushed. This is why Jesus in John 14, verse 19, the night before He goes to the cross, as He sees the cross looming, He says to His disciples, because I live, you too will live. Jesus is reassuring His disciples that when they see Him again, as the resurrected Christ, they will know that it's true. Death has been conquered.

Sin has been dealt with. And it was in this death, and it was in this resurrection that the Trinity accomplished the great plan of God the Father. God the Father was the sender, again, in eternity past, or maybe really in time and space after the fall of Adam and Eve. But the Trinity must have, in their way, said, this is what Adam and Eve have done. This is what humanity has done in rejecting us.

And God the Son, Jesus Christ, said, I will go. God the Father said, I'm sending you. Because of our sin and our rebellion, we break our relationship with the triune God. But then Colossians one, verses 19 to 20, says that in Jesus, the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. Imagine that the power of God, the fullness of Him was pleased to dwell in Christ so that through Him, Christ was able to reconcile the world, all things, back to God.

Again, listen to the far-reaching language. Through Christ, all things were reconciled to God. It's not just humanity. Creation itself. The creation that is burning around us in the bushfires.

The creation that is mourning as in pain because of the fall of mankind, the chaos that we have unleashed. Creation itself is being restored. The all things that Christ created are now being redeemed by the same Christ. A poem by someone called F.W. Pitt. I don't know, but I read this poem.

It's beautifully written and it portrays this amazing connection between Christ as the creator, but Christ as the redeemer as well. It's a poem called 'The Maker of the Universe'. It says: His holy fingers formed the bow where grew the thorns that crowned His brow. The nails that pierced His hands were mined in the secret places He designed. He made the forest whence they sprung the tree on which His body hung.

He died upon a cross of wood, yet made the hill upon which it stood. The sun which hid from Him its face, by His decree was poised in space. The sky which darkened over His head, by Him above the earth was spread. The spear that spilt His precious blood was tempered in the fires of God. The grave in which His form was laid was hewn in rocks His hands had made.

Jesus, the Son of God, the power of creation itself, is also the dying saviour of that creation. The God in flesh who redeems the things that He has made. But that's not all where the personhood of Jesus finishes. Because not only is Jesus our representative in His manness, not only is He the cause of our salvation through His death and resurrection, but Jesus also ascends back to heaven, doesn't He? Forty days after the resurrection, He doesn't just stay here on earth.

He goes back to the Father, He says. And now He stands in the presence of the Trinity. He is in a way reunited in the Godhead. And right now, as we speak, He is representing us. That is another part of His amazing role for us.

The Son of God is our mediator and friend. You could use friend if you're not uncomfortable with that. If you are uncomfortable, you can say our older brother. Our mediator and older brother. And an excellent passage that highlights this is found in Hebrews, Hebrews two, verses 5 to 18.

For it was not to angels that God, the Father, assumedly, subjected the world to come of which we are speaking. It has been testified somewhere. And then there's this quote from Psalm 8: What is man that You are mindful of him? The son of man that You care for him. You made him for a little while lower than the angels.

You crowned him with glory and honour putting everything in subjection under his feet. Then He goes on: Now in putting everything in subjection to him, this is in subjection to Christ, God left nothing outside of Christ's control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to Him. But we see Him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honour because of the suffering of His death.

So that by the grace of God, He might taste death for everyone. For while it was fitting that He, for whom and by whom all things exist, and we have those words there again, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. For He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source. So He who sanctifies, Christ who sanctifies, and we who are being sanctified have the one source, namely God the Father's will.

That is why He is not ashamed to call us, them brothers, saying, I will tell of Your name to my brothers. In the midst of the congregation, I will sing Your praise. It's another quote from Psalms. And again, from another part of the Psalms: I will put my trust in Him and again, behold, I and the children God has given me. And then just to round out the chapter: Since therefore, the children share in flesh and blood and He, Jesus Himself, likewise, partook of the same things that through death He might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.

For surely, it is not angels that He helps. He helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore, He had to be made like His brothers in every respect so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God. To make propitiation, an atoning sacrifice for the sins of His people. For because He Himself had suffered when tempted, He therefore is able to help those who are being tempted.

And there's a lot to unpack there, but it is a beautiful explanation of the dynamic of what was behind Jesus having to be man, God in man, God in flesh. But we see here those two things coming out: that Jesus is a mediator, or another term is called the high priest, and that He is our brother or our friend like us. Two weeks ago, like I said, we looked at God the Father and we said that one of the key understandings of our salvation and our restoration back to God is best described as a father-child relationship. Now we have been adopted into the family. So God the Father is our Father.

He has become our Father. We read that in Galatians and we looked at that last time as well. We have now, because of Christ, the Spirit of God in our hearts that makes us cry and desire and say to God, Abba, Father. Right? So we have been restored in that way.

But if God the Father has become our Father, what has Christ the Son become to us? Well, the picture in Hebrews two is that Christ has become our older brother. In the passage we read, we find all these references to Old Testament scriptures and all of them are pointing towards the idea that Jesus is leading a group of people to the heavenly Father. In verse 13, it sums up Jesus coming to God the Father and saying, Father, here I am and the children that You have given me. He's leading this procession of people to the Father.

We see Jesus being shown as a family member of ours. He's that older brother, the one that's just a step ahead of us the whole time, leading us back to God the Father. He says, here I am with the children You asked me to go and fetch. But not only is Jesus bringing us back to the Father, but He is also bringing the Father to us. Because Jesus becomes the high priest.

In the ancient days, in the ancient Roman times when this was written, a high priest stood in the place of God to the people. The high priest mediated God's promises to them. God's salvation and forgiveness to them. The high priest gave the blessing of God to the people. This is what the priest did on God's behalf.

But here in Hebrews two, we see Jesus doing the same thing but perfectly. Verse 12 says, Jesus is sort of illustrated as saying to the Father, I will tell of Your name to my brothers in the midst of the congregation. I will extol Your name. I will praise Your name with my people, with my brothers and my sisters. I will sing Your praise, He says.

Now many years ago, when I was at Bible College, we attended a synagogue. We were studying Hebrew at the time and we were very graciously allowed to go and sit in the synagogue in Brisbane City. And we were, you know, put in the Gentile section because we were, you know, full-blooded Jews obviously, but we were allowed to watch and engage as much as we could in the service. Throughout the whole procession, there was the rabbi, the representative who prayed and sung the blessings of God over the people, leading them, speaking on their behalf to God, and speaking back to the people the promises of God. And that is the same image we get here.

Christ bringing the procession of His brothers and sisters to God, but then also bringing God down to us. And so in a few chapters later, and we already started reading those passages in Hebrews eight this morning, the first two verses, we see that summary. We read it saying that Jesus is like a high priest, seated at the right hand of God the Father, and it uses the word, He is a minister in the holy places. He is a minister in the holy places.

Now that word minister in the Greek that is used here is actually the word where we get the word liturgy from. So we have an order of service which is called a liturgy, our shape of the service. And so it means that Jesus is the leader of our worship. He is the real worship leader, not Brendan, not Rob. Jesus is the worship leader of our worship.

And it means that Jesus who is standing in our midst now because of the Holy Spirit, He leads us and enables our heart and our voices and our souls to bring praises to the heavenly Father. And so we see these two truths: that just as Christ is the Son of God in His authority, in His kingship as creator and then redeemer, we also see that He is the mediator, the one that goes between us and the Father, but He's our brother in His humanness. He understands us. He is making our case to the Father saying, Father, these are Your kids. As much as I am, they are.

They are the ones I have died for. They are the ones I have brought to You. Then He says to us as well, sister, brother, God has forgiven you. God has forgiven you. God is accepting you.

It is done. The work is finished. The penalty has been paid and I have done it for you. So He's more than a mediator. He is that brother.

He is that friend. And so Hebrews two ends with saying that Jesus has done these two things. He has destroyed the power of death. We read that in the passage. It says He has destroyed the power of death, but almost more gloriously, has destroyed the fear of death itself, it continues to say.

And what this means is that He is the all-sufficient saviour who we can rest in. On the one side, we see that death is not final. He is the forerunner. He is the pioneer, the firstborn from among the dead. For people of all time and all places, death, which has been the enemy of life.

Death has been destroyed. Life will be given back to everyone because of the finished work of Christ on the cross. Death has been reversed. Now while we might die once, we will receive an undying life next. But here's the better news, if it can be better, because of Jesus, even the fear of dying, and it's not simply dying.

It's not the physical death that we fear. It's the fear of judgement. It's because in dying, we know that we will meet our Maker. But that fear, that fear has been destroyed as well. So friend, if you are sitting here this morning and you are in Christ, if you have put your trust in Christ, if you have placed your allegiance with Him against all others.

Since He is Jesus, the Son of God, the one who created the world by His power, the one who rose as the firstborn from among the dead as our redeemer. If you believe in Him, He is your brother and your mediator. And because of this, we can say with Hebrews seven, verse 25, that Jesus Christ is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through Him. He's able to save to the utmost. If there is any stretch of the limit of salvation, He has reached it through His love for us.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this truth. We marvel at the rich interconnectedness of it. We see that not only did You love us because You created us, You loved us because You've saved us. Not only were You God fully, but You had to become man fully in order to pay our price on our behalf as man, as humans.

But now because You were that, because You were fully man and perfectly God, You now stand as our representative in the presence of the Father, mediating, telling the Father that we are Yours, and also even at this very time telling us that we are His. We thank you, Lord Jesus. We pray that this will never become old news to us. We pray that we will never remain unmoved by these truths. And Lord, for some of us here who may be realising this enormity for the first time, we just pray that You will work in their lives, that they may grasp it, that they may be transformed by that.

And that they will simply be able to say, I may not have the skill to understand, but I know at the right hand of God stands one who is my saviour. I pray this for them today who realise it for the first time and I pray it for all of us who are warmed again by being reminded of that. We thank you, Lord, for this truth. In Jesus' name, amen.