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

IMPECCABILITY OR PECCABILITY OF CHRIST

PART THREE OF FOUR

Of course the argument is, if JESUS was really human he must then have been capable of sinning. Because we think man has a free will to sin. What one needs to know is that Jesus was not only man, but he was God.

Which is to say, even though a man, Jesus still retained all of the attributes of his divine nature (even though through the kenosis or self-emptying, he willingly did not exercise all of his divine attributes.} In humanity, Christ was totally human; in deity, Jesus was unalterably God.

Here is the point: Yet in Jesus Christ was a single, undivided personality in whom these two natures are vitally and undividedly combined. So that Jesus Christ is not God and man, but the God-man. You need to remember that Jesus was first God and thus took on human manhood.

Quote: "The second Trinitarian person {Jesus Christ} is the root and stock into which the human nature is grafted, or god in becoming man did not diminish his deity, but added a human nature to the divine nature."

So while Jesus was absolutely man, He preserved his divine attribute of holiness. And it was this holiness which contributed the strength and will power to guarantee that Christ escaped sin and could not sin.

So did Jesus have "free will" we asked? Though Christ was of both human and divine desires, he had only one determinative will. That determinative will is the eternal logos.

Even though Jesus was human, remember that he was God, and his divine side was more powerful and prevented him from sinning because "a holy will may be perfectly free, and yet determined with absolute certainty to the right."

What I am saying then: as God, Christ is absolutely going to do only good, and yet he is a moral agent making choices. He need not have the capacity to sin. His free will is free to do right all the time.

I have read that since Christ was the second Adam, that Christ must have the ability to sin. They missed the point. Adam was a perfect man when he was created. "Adam was created in holiness without inward compulsion toward sin that now characterizes his descendants. Jesus did not possess a sin nature because it was not a part of the original nature of man.

In the garden of Eden Adam did not know sin, nor did he know the consequences of sin when he was created. At the point of creation, Adam had no experience of sin. Until Satan and Eve presented him the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. God added sin to Adam’s perfect nature. We thus cannot make the blunder of taking our defective lives as the standard, and regarding Christ as human only as he conforms to our failures. We can not see Jesus’ humanity as our humanity is. Christ is showing us what a perfect human life is without sin and is capable of not sinning.

It is my thinking that from these arguments for peccability of Jesus. they do not prove he could have sinned if He had wished to sin:

• that in order to have a true human nature Jesus had to be able to sin;
• that in order to be really tempted as man is tempted Jesus had to be able to sin
• that temptability necessitates susceptibility to sin
  that if Jesus were a true man he would have to be able to sin because sin is part of the human condition.
  

Drafted by Charles E. Whisnant 02 09 07 Proof Checked by Charity Whisnant

IMPECCABILITY OR PECCABILITY OF CHRIST

part two

If it is possible that the Lord Jesus Christ could have yielded or been deceived by sin, then one must also conclude that it is possible for him to have given inaccurate information about eternal things when he was growing in wisdom and stature and favor with God and man.

So the question becomes: we know Jesus did not sin but could he have sinned in order to have experienced temptation as we do? Was Jesus capable of sinning? while we think of temptation as "the possibility of sin." we want to say as human beings, "temptation implies the possibility of sin. If a person has no susceptibility to sin or if sin has no appeal for him, the temptation is a farce. Some will argue this point.

To understand Hebrews 4:15 we need to understand what "temptation" means.

The Greek word to "tempt" does not mean to induce evil. the word means 'to try, to make a trial of, put to the test... it means to signify the trying intentionally with the purpose of discovering either good or evil. The power or weakness was in the person or thing.

Therefore Christ faced real challenges in the desert where he proved the good that was in him. In the desert Christ was faced with the enticement of a person (Satan) to commit sin by offering some seeming enticement... power, wealth or food.

Jesus was God and possessed the attributes of God. There was nothing that Jesus could be enticed to have or obtain, just as Satan was unable to entice Jesus.

Yet in the temptation of Satan, Jesus was asked to do the things he could do and the things he wanted; the results of which would have come from doing what Satan asked.

The nature of his temptation was..the fact that he as God was tempted to do the things he could do. the things Christ was asked to do...appear to be valid requests.

Therefore, because Satan asked Christ to do the things he was capable of, e.g., turning stones to bread, etc, we can see that the temptations Christ faced were real.

The temptations of Jesus were different from those that we face. "Jesus was tried as no other was ever tried. He faced the temptation in the garden of Gethsemane to abandon the plan of God and to "let this cup pass from me." Matthew 26:39.

So Jesus in reality experienced worse temptations than we do. the temptations of Jesus were real for sure, because they were tests of and trials of his power.

So when the Bible says Jesus was tempted, it implies he was tempted in al his thinking, desires (emotions) and decision-making ability.

Christ was tempted in every part of his being as a person is tempted in every part of human nature.

One other point here is that one can be tempted to sin in an area that he is not necessarily susceptible to sin. I can be tempted by tv ads to drink beer and I am not at all susceptible to drinking the beer. While I am daily attacked, I cannot be conquered in this area.

One theologian said this "while the temptation may be real, there may be infinite power to resist that temptation, and if the power is infinite, the person is impeccable"

We thus say, that the argument that Jesus was tempted does not support peccability. As we said, for one to be tempted does not necessarily imply that one must be susceptible to the temptation. Yes Jesus was tempted, which does not imply that he was tempted to watch beer ads on tv, nevertheless what he did experience was real temptation.

And just because Jesus was tempted does not imply at all, that he was capable of sin. It is possible for Satan to do the impossible, i.e. tempt Jesus, even though there was no chance of success; and Satan knew it too.

Credit for helping me with this paper:

Leslie Whisnant who asked the question.

A paper written on this subject but the name was unregistered

The Complete Biblical Library The New Testament Sutdy Bible 15 Volumes

Evangelical Dictionary of Theology by Elwell

Linguistic Key to the Greek New Testment, Rienecker/Rogers

IMPECCABILITY OR PECCABILITY OF CHRIST

part one

Charles,

In our Sunday School class, we are studying/debatingthe peccability/impeccability of Christ. Any thoughts?

Leslie

Most of the articles I am finding are leaning towards impeccability. The reason is that although Jesus was human, He did not have the sin nature of humans because God subvented the human with the virgin birth.

However, taking the other position, the question that remains is: Although Jesus was undoubtable sin-free and was tempted by Satan, how can He truly guide and assist us with our temptations when He was not able give into the temptations of Satan?

Does Christ's impeccability mean that He had no free will?

Leslie/Eric Whisnant (Eric is my oldest son and live in Lexington KY.

My response to this required a little study you know:

Now the question arises, given the fact of Christ's sinlessness, is whether His alleged temptations were real. The text used is Hebrews 4:15 cf Luke 22:28 . "who in every respect has been tempted as we are."

The debate has been between whether the Savior was "able not to sin" or "not able to sin".

The first emphasizing His identification with sinful humanity and consequent struggle, and the second His identification with God and God's eternal purpose for the salvation of the world.

Here is the assumption: (if you take that Jesus had a free will and that he could sin) The assumption that what applies to us (you and me) applies to Christ; that if there be a close connection for us between our capacity for sin and our struggles, then there must be such a connection for Christ."

The assumption says, Christ was just like us in all forms.

However, in Jesus Christ, there is not the inner propensity (a natural inclination or tendency:) TO SIN THAT THERE IS IN EVERY OTHER MEMBER OF THE HUMAN RACE. Jesus Christ HAD THE holy SPIRIT WITHOUT MEASURE TO SUSTAIN him IN his EARTHLY MINISTRY.
THROUGHOUT JESUS’ EARTHLY SOJOURN, WHILE TEMPTATION WAS REAL, THE GOD WHOSE LIFE HE FULLY SHARED (Col. 1;19, 2:9) and who He was (John 1:1 10:30) kept Jesus Christ from committing any sin and, as important, dedicated to His messianic mission.

Did Christ have a free will? His will was totally dedicated to the will of the father. There was no thought of disobedience to the will of the father.

Hebrews 4:15, I Peter 2:2 I John 3:5 "witness that he (Jesus) did not give in to temptation, nor violate the moral standards of God, nor was he inconsistent with the nature of His character.

Jesus had to be sinless, and only by a sinless life could his death have been vicarious substitution and fulfill God's redemptive plan for man. Had Jesus sinned, or could have sinned, he would have died for his own sins and not for those whom God chose to save.

So the question of free will or could Jesus have sinned if he had wanted to is the debate. if he could, the term is peccability of Christ. the term impeccability says Jesus could not have sinned even if he wanted to.

Those in the peccable camp say: if Jesus was not peccable then just how "human" was He? could Jesus have been 'true man' if he were not able to sin like the rest of mankind? (a footnote: this is a question of whether Christ could have sinned; not that Christ had to have sinned in order to be human).

Humans have a consciousness of past sin. Jesus did not have any sin therefore no consciousness of past sin. So does this make him less human?
Jesus took on most of the qualities of the human nature, but shielded himself from the consciousness of sin.

The point of studying this issue is important:

Drafted by Charles E. Whisnant and Proof Checked by Charity Whisnant