IMPECCABILITY OF CHRIST, SINLESSNESS IN HIS NATURE

Part Four

I want to add John MacArthur’s point of view here: from Hebrews 4:15

• Jesus was the very Son of God, yet His divinity did not prevent Him from experiencing our feelings, our emotions, our temptations, our pain.
• God became man, He became Jesus. (As I said above (some where Jesus was God-Man) to share triumphantly the temptation and the testings and the suffering of men, in order that He might be a sympathetic and understanding High Priest.

Some ask, "If Jesus not only didn’t sin, but He could not have sinned, nor even had the will to sin, how then could He really identify with us?"

• Just to experience something does not give us understanding of it. Jesus understood better than any man He has seen sin and temptation more clearly and fought it more diligently than any of us could ever be able to do.
• Sinlessness alone can properly estimate sin. Jesus Christ did not sin, could not sin, had no capacity to sin. Yet His temptations were all the more terrible because He would not fall and endured them to the extreme.
• His sinlessness increased His sensitivity to sin. "For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you may not grow weary and lose heart. You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin."

Hebrews 12:3-4. If you want to talk to someone who knows and understands our weakness. Whatever Satan brings our way, there is victory in Jesus Christ. He understood; He has been here."From John’s New Testament commentary on Hebrews.-

Just a note from A.W. Pink

• who has been tempted in all things according to our likeness, apart from sin" i.e. in spirit, and soul and body."
• "An Exposition of Hebrews" Baker; fifth printing 1970 pages 1307. I bought this book while pastor/teacher at Madison Missionary Baptist Church, Minford Ohio 1971 I did teach the book of Hebrews while at Madison.

As I said, temptation can be good or bad. It is but a trial. A trial to see if we will react to something

We as humans when tempted to sin, by sin, to actual sin by habitual sin, to outward sin, by indwelling sin. Humans sin because we are sinners and have the sin principle in us.

Christ on the other hand, as the Apostle reminds us, Jesus Christ was holy and pure. Jesus never found Himself susceptible unto any such temptations unto sin from within Himself as you and I are susceptible.

With Christ while He was tempted, none of the temptation had any effect on Him.

John Owen remarks:

• "He was absolutely in all things ‘without sin’; He neither was tempted by sin, such was the holiness of His nature; nor did His temptation produce sin, such was the perfection of His obedience."
• The Man Christ Jesus was the Holy One of God, and therefore He could not sin.
  Remember Jesus was not created as Satan and Adam. Jesus "was God manifest in flesh." In His humanity He was "holy" Luke 1:35.

THUS HE WAS NOT ONLY IMPECCABLE GOD, BUT IMPECCABLE MAN.

The point: We have a High Priest, in heaven, who has passed through the conflict and temptation, thus we can be strong, and of a good courage, and not be afraid. Why? Because we have a High Priest who maintains us on His loving heart, and as the Shepherd of the flock holds us in safety forever. Therefore as the text says "boldly we come to the throne of grace.

Because Christ faced all that Satan threw at Him, we can with confidence come to the throne of grace and know Christ will intercede for us.

It’s true that we sin because of our sinfulness. We are weak because of our flesh. We are never free from a sinful consensus of the will, yet Christ knows this. He knew on earth His own disciple’s sinfulness, yet He loved them, watched over them, and prayed for them. And thus He is ever ready to strengthen and comfort, to heal and restore.

Drafted by Charles E. Whisnant 02 09 07 Checked by Charity Whisnant 2/11/07