God Reveals Himself Supremely Through One Person -- Jesus Christ

The entire Old Testament has a forward look about it. Some of the prophets talk about an Anointed One ("Messiah" is the word in Hebrew) who will come from God to show the people who God is, and what he demands of them. In other words, among all the things that were to happen in Jewish history, one thing was going to happen that would have more meaning than anything else; among all the persons of Jewish history there was going to be one person who would be more meaningful than anyone else, and through the events of the life of this person, the revelation of God would be made more fully than it had been made before. The Old Testament waits for "the fullness of time" when these things shall come to pass. At one stage, the people cry to God in a vivid image, "Oh that thou wouldest rend the heavens, that thou wouldest come down" ( Isa. 64: 1).

The New Testament claim is that the cry has been answered. God has come to men, since men could not get to God. He has come in the only way they could possibly understand, as a person like themselves. This, so Christian faith claims, is the supreme revelation of God to man: God makes himself known most fully in the events clustered around one Jesus, who is called the Christ. ("Christ" is the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew "Messiah." The words can be used interchangeably.) While the Old Testament talks in general terms about the Word of God, or creative power of God, the New Testament says in very specific terms as it looks at Jesus Christ, "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us" ( John 1: 14).

The implications of this momentous claim, the most staggering ever made, will occupy much of our attention throughout this book. What we must see clearly at this point is that when the Bible speaks of God it does not just talk about God; it shows us God at work on the human scene, in a human life. How, then, does God make himself known to us? Finally and conclusively, God makes himself known by coming to us himself in Jesus Christ, who enters into fellowship with us, taking upon himself the limitations of our human lot, even suffering and dying as the ultimate expression of God's love for us and of his desire to enter into fuller fellowship with us. And we have to decide what to do about him.