Thursday, December 08, 2016

Person and Work

Who is Jesus and what has he come to do?

A simple but profound point from George Hunsinger (in Disruptive Grace, 131):  "The work presupposes the person just as the person conditions the work."  And then in more detail:
In any Christology, at least when internally consistent (which cannot always be presupposed), the person (p) and the work (w) of Christ mutually imply each other: If w, then p; and if p, then w.  Insofar as modern Christology has typically abandoned a high view of Christ's person, it has also abandoned the correspondingly high view of Christ's saving work...
If what we need is just an example, a very enlightened human will do - a relatively small w requires a relatively small p!  But if we need a saviour, we need God - only the divine p is sufficient for this w!

Or to think it forwards from Christmas, if the Messiah is really God of God, light of light, true God of true God, begotten not made - well, if he really is this p, we can assume that he has come to do a very great w...

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