768
T H E K I N G ’ S
B U S I N E S S
December 1924
Does it Make Airy Dijference?
or The Question of the Virgin Birth By I. M. Haldeman, D. D. Pastor First Baptist Church, New York City .
OES it make any difference who was the father of Jesus?; There are those who say it does:' not. There are even preachers in the pulpit who say I affirm it does. I affirm it makes a difference as wide as eternity. If our Lord Jesus Christ were begotten by a human father,— as Joseph protested he was not that father, then Jesus was born of a mother stained with the sin of unchas tity. If our lo rd Jesus Christ were begotten by a natural father, and that father was not Joseph,— as Mary was betrothed to him, and in the eye of the law as solemnly bound as a married woman, in giving birth to Jesus she became as guilty as a wife who breaks her marriage vow. If Jesus were begotten by a natural father; as that father was not Joseph; as that natural father has never been known,-—then Jesus was begotten by an unknown father of an unmarried woman; as the child of an unmar ried woman and unknown father is both illegitimate and bastard, He whom we call the Son of God entered the world with the bar sinister of His mother’s unchastity and faith lessness, stamped with the seal of an unknown father’s cowardice, and stands before men as an illegitimate and bastard son, having no legal or decent right to live. • If our Lord Jesus Christ were begotten by a natural father; as personality comes hot from the mother, but from the father (Heb. 7:9, 10)—-He was the seed of the man and not the seed of the woman. If He were not the seed of the woman, the promise made at Eden’S gate that such ~a seed should bruise' the serpent’s head has never been ful filled; and whatever else Jesus of Nazareth may be, He is not that seed. If our Lord' Jesus Christ were begotten by a natural father; if, as is true, personality comes from the father, the personality of Jesus was natural. If He were a natural per son, He was not God. If He wefe not God (and since for giveness of sin belongs only to God) He had no right to forgive sin. He had no right to make Himself the object of faith and the,issue of salvation. As He claimed the right to forgive sin and to consign to eternal wrath all who did not believe in Him, He was either a wanton deceiver or a blindly deceived man. In either case, as mental weakling or moral degenerate, He would stand outside the category of a Redeemer and Savior of men. * * * * If our Lord Jesus Christ were not begotten by God the Father of the very seed of the woman; if the act of God were not an absolute generative act; if the generative act were that of a natural man and the conception wholly natural, our Lord Jesus Christ is reduced to, the level of a merely natural man. If He were a natural .man; if He were not true and real God; if He were not God of God, very God of very God, God the Son as well as Son of God, He was not the second person of the Trinity. If He were not the second person of the Trinity the question may be asked: Who is the.second person, of the Trinity? To this, under the circumstancesj there can be only one answer: it does not.
No one is. There is no second person of the Trinity. If there be no second person of the Trinity— there is no Trinity. Thus, if Jesus of Nazareth had only a natural father, the doctrine of a triune God, thé doctrine that God subsists as three distinct persons in one undivided substance or being, falls to the ground, and the Church is landed into the front yard of open Unitarianism. * * * * If our Lord Jesus Christ were begotten py a natural father; if as the son of' such a father His personality was only natural; as a natural person is*not infinite; as only an infinite person can atone to an infinite person; as only God can satisfy the law, the government and being of God; and since our Lord (as begotten by a natural father) could not be God, and was no more at any time than a finite pèrson, He could not offer atonement to God. If, therefore, the father of Jesus were a natural man, the death of our Lord on the cross was not an atoning sacrifice. This is true upon the side of His personality. It is true upon the side of His humanity. It is true in this wise; To be an acceptable victim for sacrifice, to fill the function of a substitute, our Lord Jesus Christ must be free from the penalty of sin. To be free from the penalty of sin He must be sinless, not only in deed, but in essence and nature. A sinless humanity can be produced only from a sinless father; but, if our Lord Jesus Christ were begotten by a natural man, He was begotten by a sinful father. If He were begotten by a sinful father, He inherited His sinful nature. He would have sin in Him. He would be under the penalty of sin. Under the penalty of sin, He could neither be a substitute for sinners, nor yet a sacrifice for sin. * * # * If it could be proven that Jesus had a natural father (and as the 1 Son of such à father could die neither as a sub stitute nor sacrifice:) it would be plainly proven that the cross was a bloody, brutal, barbarous, useless and excuse less murder, without the basis of a single principle, without profit to man, and without glory to God. If our Lord Jesus Christ were begotten by a human father; if as a natural son, with a natural personality and a nature of sin,-He could not offer an atoning sacrifice, nor act as a substitute, it would be evident, since God alone can raise the dead, in falling to be true and actual God, He could not fulfil His own promise that after laying down His life He would take it up again; it would be evident He could not of Himself raise Himself from the dead. And, further, as God the Father is said to have raised Him, and the Holy Spirit is said to have raised Him, and it is said He should raise Himself; and the Father and the Spirit are repre sented as co-operating with the personal power of the Son to raise Himself, since He was a natural man and not God, He could not co-operate with the'Father, and the Spirit in a supernatural 'act; and as His failure to so co-operate would break down the Scripture doctrine of the invariable co-ordi nation o f the Trinity—^-resurrection could not take place— He never was raised from the dead. (Continued on page 819)
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