Interstitial

Jesus. Yes, that Jesus. God? Man? Both? What? Of all the subjects I can think of, none stirs up such passions as that one. Fists were thrown over it back when it was being formulated in the fourth century. Men were excommunicated and exiled over it. I'm sure men were killed because of it.

I have come to the conclusion that the only position we can really hold is this dramatic tension. Jesus is in such a position, based on the writings we have about him, that he sits in between. Mediator, yes. But the nature of the writings are such that we can't exactly pinpoint who he is. Just when we think we have him figured out, he shifts on us and appears to be something else. No matter where we are in our life, in our thoughts, in our hearts, we find that he is present. No matter how low or how high, he is there. So we can't nail him down, no pun intended. He is elusive, shifty, yet in the same breath very Real.

One Scripture seems to indicate he is God yet in the same breath another one says he is a man. The phrase thrown out by apologists that if he is "just" a man is bait for a preplanned retort. I don't know of anyone who think he is "just" a man, as if he were somehow ordinary, average, no different than of us as this would do little to explain how it is that his name has been passed on for 2,000 years. Even those who refuse calling him God do not believe his humanity somehow lessens his status.

So the Church formulates a God-man. While it can stimulate the intellect and lead to mental gymnastics bar none, in the end he sounds like Aquaman or Superman, Batman or Spiderman, quite comic bookish. The term gets thrown around as if we should hold our head up high over it.

The New Testament revelation, the Gospel, is that Jesus is the God-man?

I don't think so. I'm pretty sure that's not what is preached in the New Testament. I'm pretty sure this is not what the earliest Church Fathers preached. I'm pretty sure that the first Christians were not made because of this idea.

It can obviously be argued that this is a conclusion to be drawn but it is not the essence, the essential, of the faith. If it was there would be no new Christians until they believed this to be true. No, people are not asked this prior to accepting Christ. People are asked to recognize that they are sinful, separated, cut off from God and that through Christ's death, burial and resurrection, this connection can be reestablished as it was in the beginning, thus being born again, i.e. "from above."

Everything else stems from here.