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The accounts of Matthew and Luke begin with Jesus' incarnation. Mark's account picks up the life of Jesus from His baptism.(1) John, however, deals with Jesus' preexistence and His eternity with the Father. We believe that Matthew, Mark, and Luke were written in the mid-first century (A.D. 50, the early 50s, and the late 60s respectively). John appears to be the final Gospel written (toward the end of the first century). The inspired Christology of the gospel writers obviously became more sharply and clearly defined with the passing of time. In our own personal walk with the Lord, we have also often experienced the same thing. We did not see everything about the Lord all at once when we first came to Christ. But, He unfolded Himself to us over the years. The final writer, John, has the clearest insights into the deity and the humanity of Jesus. Critics of the Gospels and opponents of the deity of Jesus Christ seek to capitalize on this, attempting to discredit John's writings as inconsistent with the other gospel writers, and therefore in some ways invalid. But Christology is not the only New Testament doctrine to become clearer with the passing of time. Apart from a few passing references (such as Matthew 20:28; Mark 10:45), the Cross is not seen in the full and glorious light of its atoning value in the historical Gospels and in Acts as it is later seen in the apostolic Epistles. And this kind of doctrinal “evolution” (if we can call it that) is not peculiar to the New Testament. The writings of Moses contain the same progressive unfolding. Things that are merely mentioned in passing in Genesis (such as, the Sabbath, tithing, the sacrifices, etc.) are then more fully and carefully revealed and most clearly unfolded in Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers. Even the glorious name of our God, Jehovah, was not seen by the patriarchs as clearly as in the day of Moses (Exodus 6:2-3). Thus it is that “the path of the righteous is like the first gleam of dawn, shining ever brighter till the full light of day” (Proverbs 4:18). |
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Paul uses a most unusual expression in Philippians 2:5–11 to describe the incarnation event. Paul writes that Jesus, “being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped [clutched onto], but made Himself nothing, in taking the very nature of a servant [a slave], being made in human likeness…” The New International Version of v.7, “made Himself nothing,” is literally: “emptied Himself.” The Greek word for this expression is kenosis, derived from the word kenoo, which means “to make nothing, to empty, or to strip.” The incarnation event is described as the great “self-emptying” of Jesus, the great kenosis. Systematic theology (sometimes more of a bane than a blessing) explores various shades and nuances of the possible meaning of the kenosis—that Christ “emptied Himself of His divine consciousness,” or that Christ “emptied Himself of the eternity-form of His being,” or that Christ “emptied Himself of the relative attributes of His Deity,” or that Christ “emptied Himself of the integrity of infinite Divine existence,” or that Christ “emptied Himself of the Divine activity,” or (probably closer to the truth) that Christ “emptied Himself of the actual exercise of His Divine prerogatives.” But, perhaps, Charles Wesley's humble, poetic definition of the kenosis is best: “He emptied Himself of all but love [the Divine Essence], and bled and died for Adam's race.” Other mystical writers also defined the kenosis with similar simplicity: “He bound His mighty arm within Him!”
Whereas kenosis is nowhere doctrinally defined in the New Testament, it is amply illustrated for us in the Gospels, and most clearly in John's account.
The miracles of Jesus are frequently cited as proof of His Deity, for in reality only God Himself can multiply loaves and fishes, heal eyes, calm stormy seas, and bring the dead back to life again. In the Gospel of John, however, all of these miraculous works are but illustrations of the great kenosis, for Jesus attributed not one of His miracles, nor even one of His own words, to His independent Deity. Jesus declared that He did what He did and said what He said because it was His Father doing His works and speaking His words in and through Him. “My teaching is not my own. It comes from Him who sent me” (John 7:16). “I do nothing on my own, but speak just what the Father has taught me” (John 8:28). “I do not speak of my own accord, but the Father who sent me commanded me what to say and how to say it…whatever I say is just what the Father has told me to say” (John12: 49–50). “The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather it is the Father, living in me, who is doing His work.” Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the miracles themselves” (John 14:10–11). “These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me” (John 14:24). “All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you” (John 16:15).
Consequently, for Jesus to have known that the Samaritan woman “had five husbands,” and the “man [she] now [had was] “not her husband” (John 4:17), would not have been attributed by Jesus to the omniscience of His own independent (if we may call it that) Deity, but simply, as the “self-emptied” One, He was speaking “just what the Father has told [Him] to say” (John 12:49–50), speaking a divinely-given “word of knowledge” (a gift now available to us as members of His Body—1 Corinthians 12:8)! Consequently, for Jesus not to have known “about the day or hour” of His return—for “no one knows…not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father” (Matthew 24:36; Mark 13:32)—was simply because it pleased the Father to veil that information from His Son at that time. The NIV aptly comments on this verse (Mark 13:32), “While on earth, even Jesus lived by faith…”
Perhaps the greater wonder of the kenosis is that it has become the basis for the functioning of the people of God in the Kingdom of God—emptied of self, and filled with Him. We, like Jesus, are called to live an “exchanged life”—healing the sick by the power of Another, speaking the mysteries of the Kingdom of God by divine revelation from our Lord; with never anything from ourselves, but everything through Christ who gloriously lives within us, for “apart from me,” Jesus said, “you can do nothing” (John 15:5). And in union with Him, we can “do all things” (Philippians 4:13). Amen and Amen! |
