paulrobertson
From St Silas, Glasgow
17 November 2009 - 3:45pm
Here's a thought I've been trying, and failing, to get my head around. Jesus is God incarnated - fully God and fully human. That's hard enough. But on the cross there is a sense in which Jesus is forsaken by God the Father as he bears humanity's sin and takes on himself the wrath of God for it. The Trinity is classically described as the eternal relationship of love between the three persons of God. So how do we understand what happens within the Trinity when, for that brief time, Jesus no longer experiences his Father's love and, in fact, actively endures His wrath?
larry
From St Bernard's, Belfast
7 December 2009 - 9:27pm
Such is the effect of sin, that we *feel* abandoned, whether we are or not. The wrath was poured out and satisfied in full, but it wasn't a hateful or vicious wrath like our human vengeance. God's wrath is holy and entirely justified, a loving wrath - if that doesn't sound like a contradiction.
It can for sure be testing to come to terms with the trinitarian aspect of the cross. Surely wherever Jesus is, there you find the Father and Spirit also? Yet Jesus didn't know the time the Father had chosen for the second coming, in his limited human capacity at least...so the humanity of Jesus (no better time of year to talk about it than now!) brings to the fore the importance of the incarnate form of the Son, more than the eternal "disembodied?" nature of the Word of God.
I'll keep this one short for now, but will watch this thread bloom - any good books on the subject or tuppence from other members?
If you are prepared to read a long article, I think this is quite relevant (not a direct answer to the question, but it might make you think about different possible meanings for " takes on himself the wrath of God for it")
http://www.fulcrum-anglican.org.uk/news/2007/20070423wright.cfm?doc=205
Daniel
PS I'd also recommend NT Wright's "Evil and the Justice of God" in this general area.
Also, I'd recommend reading Psalm 22. It doesn't take away from Jesus statement Why have you forsaken me, but it adds a bit more to the reason he said that specific sentence. During his time, the only way Jesus as a Rabbi could tell people to think or look up a passage from the scripture was to say the first line. In other words, for anyone who knew this scripture off by heart, would be replaying Psalm 22 in their heads while watching the crucifiction. I know i didn't help your answer in any way, but I hope this makes for interesting reading. My favourite translation has to be NIV, just as the way things are translated.
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm%2022&version=NIV
Hope this helps
Joe
Thanks all for the input. Good food for thought! I'm reading through Jurgen Moltmann's The Crucified God.
Larry, if the Father, Spirit and Son are co-existent in Jesus (the man) why do we talk of it being Jesus' sacrifice? In what sense is it Jesus work more particularly than the Father and the Spirit's? And if God's wrath towards the sin Jesus bears is "nice" (!) wrath, why is his wrath when directed against people so bad? And did God (in some sense) die on the cross? Too many questions... :o)
Dan, I enjoy Tom Wright's stuff. I'll check that out.
J.ABELL - good point about Jesus use of first lines. Hadn't thought of that before.
Hey Paul,
You asked about Jesus' particular role in the sacrifice as opposed to the rest of the trinity. What can Jesus offer that the Father and Spirit cannot, because of their particular nature? I think - a body. The very thing that was unique about Jesus' presence on the cross was that it was not just God taking upon Himself the sins of the world, but also man (not just any man, but the most complete version of man there has ever been - the type we all should be). So its humanity - that our salvation comes from God as its origin but also has roots in earthly flesh and bone, so like the Second Adam...its from our own stock that our Saviour has come, at least in a physical corporeal way. As far as I know at the moment, the Spirit and Father couldn't fulfill that particular aspect on the cross, only the Son of Man could.
As for the wrath - hmm, I suppose it's never nice as such - holy doesn't necessarily mean "nice". Perhaps it would be painful and uncomfortable for those experiencing for it, but if it was actually for your benefit then it may in fact be vented out of love. Like pulling someone's rotten baby tooth out so that it can heal and a new one grow back, pain-free; as it should be. Painful at the time for the person receiving it, but in retrospect - worth enduring because it's actually for your own good. So even when God directs his wrath against people...it is for their good and only because the way they are living is not for their own good.
Did God die on the cross? I'll let you think about that one - my thoughts would go back to what was unique about Jesus' offering? What part of Jesus' nature completely died and descended into hell?
Too many questions...so much to be thankful for ;o)
Interesting discussion. PS does the bible say Jesus decended into Hell?
I think there a difficult passage (1 Peter 3:19) - and possibly some other one I forget, which some people take to point in that direction. All a bit hard to interpret, though!
Hey FC, how's it goin up the road?!
Good question - caused me to dig up a few links that cover the topic if you haven't explored it yet urself:
http://www.allaboutjesuschrist.org/did-jesus-go-to-hell-faq.htm
and as I'm Catholic, the following sets out exactly why the Apostle's Creed mentions that phrase:
http://www.vatican.va/archive/catechism/p122a5p1.htm
Interesting how Hades and Gehenna get mixed up along the way - a few scriptural references there that point to how various people came to believe what they do today.
My gut feeling is that Jesus' human nature was totally dead while his divine nature remained fully intact and unaffected by bodily death. This is deep but rewarding stuff - it's because our Lord is fully human AND fully divine that his physical death was not the end, by his divine nature he was able to be raised bodily back to life as a new creation - as we hope we will be too one day. "Dying you destroyed our death, rising you restored our life - Lord Jesus, come in glory!"
To Daniel,
1 Peter 3:19
Refers to the spirits in prison, this is saying from my inturpertation as it says in Ephesians "what's in man is the spirit of man" We submit everything under Christ Lordship and everything in heaven and earth has been given unto him. Now The spirit of man can be interputed in various ways... 1. the spirit that the breath of God gave you, that was conceived before time. 2. the spirit of man through demonic umbrella and unknown mystery of God's will are spirits that navigate through the world in interaction to people who are not knowing of the unseen.
We have a mission that meet more than the eye... we are ambassadors to the things unseen by faith in the fruit that the Lord brings into our lives.
We make those spirits as well that are unseen obedient to the gospel and the seen by communion, fellowship, and congrigations.
Hey Larry, good to see northern ireland being represented on W.C! top notch.
Totally understand your point of view, explored the links you posted and have to say that without sounding offensive- Im not from a R.Catholic bacground myself and would disagree with alot of its teachings and traditions.... saying that I disagree with a lot of so called protestant teachings as well. I guess I asked the question because I'd recently listened to a fav speaker of mine address the topic... heres the video snippit of it.
God Bless
F.c
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGOVNX1ysEo
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