John 1:14 teaches “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” This is shocking news because the Word is said to share in the divine nature–he eternally “was” whatever God is (Jn 1:1). However, some today believe the Son of God changed or metamorphosed into a human at the incarnation. This doctrine of the incarnation is popular, but it is also closer to Apollinarianism than historic Christianity. The solution may seem difficult, but you already know the key–Jesus was both true God and true man.
Two Distinct Views of God’s Nature: Classical Theism and Theistic Mutualism
It is important also to note the reality of “Two distinctly different models of Christian theism are presently vying for the heart and mind of evangelical Christianity.[1] The historic and majority view is that of classical theism. Dolezal summarized classical theism this way:
This approach is basically in keeping with the view of God as found in the works of patristic and medieval Christian theologians such as Athanasius, Augustine, Anselm, and Aquinas. It is marked by a strong commitment to the doctrines of divine aseity, immutability, impassibility, simplicity, eternity, and the substantial unity of the divine persons. The underlying and inviolable conviction is that God does not derive any aspect of His being from outside Himself and is not in any way caused to be.[2]
On the other hand, there is the contemporary view of “theistic personalism” which is held by many contemporary theologians and is likely the dominant view of “people in the pew.” Dolezal described this view as “an effort to portray God as more relatable, theistic mutualists insist that God is involved in a genuine give-and-take relationship with His creatures.”[3] A representative of theistic personalism would be Jürgen Multmonn’s view of the impassioned God dependent upon his creation for the expression of his love, suffering with each of his creatures, and finding self-realization through his creation.[4] Theistic mutualists affirm a “ontological openness” which allows for “God to acquire and shed actuality of beingin the divine nature.”[5] Classical theists reject this theistic mutualism because “To the extent that theistic mutualists believe God to exist in such a relationship with the world, they appear to undermine His perfection and fullness of being. In short, God has been reconceived as deriving some aspects of His being in correlation with the world, and this can be nothing less than a depredation of His fullness of life and existential absoluteness.”[6]
Theistic mutualists are free to affirm change in the Logos which would allow for the Son to function as a human. This Christology is similar to Apollinarianism and Neo-Apollinarianism which affirm the Logos was the functionally human mind of Christ in a human body. Classical theists reject this view of the incarnation because 1) there would be change and thus imperfection in the divine nature; 2) there would not be a true divine nature present in Christ; 3) there would not be a complete human nature in Christ; and 4) there would be soteriological ramifications because “that which is not assumed is not healed.”
[1] James E. Dolezal, All That Is in God: Evangelical Theology and the Challenge of Classical Christian Theism (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 2017), 1.
[2] Ibid., 1.
[3] Ibid., 1–2.
[4] See Jurgen Moltmonn, Trinity and the Kingdom
[5] James E. Dolezal, All That Is in God, 1–2.
[6] James E. Dolezal, All That Is in God, 6.
The Unchanging Nature of God
The possibility of God becoming not God or other than he was seems to violate historic understandings of Scriptures which affirm both God’s timelessness and God’s immutability. Psalm 102:26-28 contrasts the changing (mutability) of nature with the immutability (unchangeableness) of God. Malachi 3:6 describes will of God as changeless. James 1:17 rejects the notion of any change in the nature of God. Numbers 23:19 and 1 Samuel 15:29 affirm God does not change his mind. Hebrews 6:17-18 grounds the certainty of God’s promise in his unchangeableness. Jesus spoke of divine timeless when he quoted Exodus 3:6 to prove that God is timelessly the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Since he is timeless, “all live to him” (Lk. 20:38). In John 8:58 Jesus spoke of his own divine timelessness when he said, “Before Abraham was I AM.” It is in the divine nature that Jesus is “the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow” (Heb. 13:8).
Historically, theologians have argued that God cannot change because there cannot be in “passive potency” in God.[1] Citing Psalm 102:27 John Owen argued, “In this state of infinite, eternal being and goodness, antecedent unto any act of wisdom or power without himself to give existence unto other things, God was, and is, eternally in himself all that he will be, all that he can be, unto eternity. For where there is infinite being and infinite goodness, there is infinite blessedness and happiness, whereunto nothing can be added. God is always the same.”[2] Aquinas argued:
It is therefore impossible that in the same respect and in the same way a thing should be both mover and moved, i.e., that it should move itself. Therefore, whatever is in motion must be put in motion by another. If that by which it is put in motion be itself put in motion, then this also must needs be put in motion by another, and that by another again. But this cannot go on to infinity, because then there would be no first mover, and, consequently, no other mover; seeing that subsequent movers move only inasmuch as they are put in motion by the first mover; as the staff moves only because it is put in motion by the hand. Therefore it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other; and this everyone understands to be God.[3]
Dolezal summarized the historic position this way: “Because He depends on nothing outside Himself, one can only conclude that God simply is that act of existence by which He is. Classical theists insist that God is being, not becoming. He has no passive potentiality or capacity by which He might become more or other than He is. This means that even His relation to the world as its Creator and Sustainer does not produce any new actuality in Him.”[4] Likewise, Steven Duby argued, “that God is actus purus. If God is entirely a se with no one and nothing back of him to account for him, then he is without causal susceptibility—without being moved or, indeed, a capacity to be moved—and therefore without the root of such causal susceptibility, namely, passive potency.”[5]
The humanity of Christ was not timeless (Gal. 4:4). The divine Logos is timeless. This union of timelessness and timefulness is possible since in Christ both natures were present. As B. B. Warfield said, “No two natures, no incarnation; no incarnation, no Christianity in any distinctive sense.”[6]
[1] James Dolezal, All That is In God, 16.
[2] John Owen, The Works of John Owen, ed. William H. Goold (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, n.d.), 368.
[3] Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, I q.2 a.3 resp.
[4] James E. Dolezal, All That Is in God, 15.
[5] Steven J. Duby, Divine Simplicity: A Dogmatic Account (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2016), 121.[5]
[6] Warfield, Works of Benjamin B. Warfield, Vol. III, 259.
The Incarnation
The incarnation then, is what you have really known for a long time: Jesus was true God and true man. While he was “in the form of God” he also was “in the form of man” at the incarnation. This union of the divine nature and the human nature did not change the divine nature neither did it exalt the human nature above the rank of creature. Jesus was true God and true man. Jesus was one person with two natures (dyothelitism).
Since Jesus is both true God and true man, we have confidence God will welcome us to himself. The divine Son has already welcomed humanity to his person, as we are saved he welcomes us to his fellowship.
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