The Word Made Flesh
Second Sabbath — The Coming Down
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Sequence 8 is the Chet standing alone — the fence and the enclosure, the letter of life, and the number that stands one beyond the completed seven and therefore beyond the natural order. The Chet is drawn as two strokes joined by a bridge across the top: two separate things roofed over into one. That is precisely the doctrine of this Sabbath. In the incarnation, what belongs beyond the natural order entered an enclosure of flesh, and two natures were bridged in one Person without either being lost.
The theme.
Last Sabbath we established where the Son was before. This Sabbath we follow Him into our condition. John's prologue moves in one direction only — downward — from the Word who was with God to the Word who took on flesh and pitched His tent among us. Teach the congregation to feel the scandal of it before they feel the comfort. God did not send a message about Himself; He arrived in a body that could be tired, hungry, grieved and killed.
The School of Scriptures.
I.Dwelt Among Us
John's verb describes pitching a tent rather than building a house — a provisional, portable, deliberately temporary residence. Teach what that says about the manner of God's nearness: He did not arrive in a fortress but in a form that could be moved, wounded and removed. Nearness of that kind costs the One who draws near.
II.Full of Grace and Truth
John names two qualities together that most people hold in tension and most churches hold in imbalance. Grace without truth produces sentiment; truth without grace produces cruelty with a verse attached. In the Son they are not blended in careful proportion — He is full of both. Ask the congregation which of the two they habitually sacrifice, and to whom.
III.He Has Explained Him
The word John uses is the root of our word exegesis: the Son is the exposition of the Father. Set this beside John 14:9 — he who has seen Me has seen the Father. This is the interpretive rule for all of CMI's teaching: no doctrine of God may be preached in this house that could not be preached with the Son standing in front of it.
IV.Made Like His Brothers in All Things
Hebrews 2:14-18 gives the purpose of the incarnation in three verbs: to partake of flesh and blood, to render powerless the one who had the power of death, and to become a merciful and faithful high priest. Close on the pastoral edge of it: He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted because He was tempted, and that is not sympathy from a distance.
The Table.
This week, go where you would rather send a message. Choose one relationship you have been managing at a distance and close the distance in person. And in one conversation where you usually choose either grace or truth, carry both.