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The Incarnation - A Sermon on the Doctrine of Jesus Christ | MLJ Trust | YouTubeToText
YouTube Transcript: The Incarnation - A Sermon on the Doctrine of Jesus Christ
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Summary
Core Theme
This content delves into the biblical doctrine of the Incarnation, emphasizing its crucial role in the broader doctrine of redemption. It meticulously breaks down the Incarnation, clarifying what it is and what it is not, to ensure a precise understanding of Jesus Christ's person and work, which is foundational to Christian belief and salvation.
we are considering the general subject
of the biblical doctrine of
redemption and we began of course by
considering God's covenant with men the
Covenant of Grace the Covenant of
redemption and we saw that that all
along in the old expression of it and in
the new always points to the one person
the Lord Jesus Christ Redemption is in him
him
and last Friday evening we spent our
time therefore in looking at him we have
started in other words the consideration
of the biblical doctrine of the person
of the Lord Jesus Christ that as you
notice I put under the general heading
of the doctrine of
redemption and I think one must do so we
have looked at the person of Our Lord in
dealing with the doctrine of the Trinity
but specifically when you consider the
the doctrine of redemption you must of
course concentrate your attention upon
the person and the work of our Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ now then last week
we found that the whole Bible looks to
him and points at him he is the
Fulfillment of all the Old Testament
promises and
prophecies the whole Bible points to him
the old forward to him the new backward
to him it is in him that everything is
done it is in his hands that all power
lies according to the Bible and it is
above all he by whom the world shall
finally be judged therefore the Bible
everywhere calls upon us and urges us to consider
consider
him and then we saw that when you do
come to consider him you're at once
confronted by the first particular
Doctrine with respect to him and that is
the doctrine of the
Incarnation I just mentioned that at the
end last Friday and we defined it in
general only on that
occasion we reminded one another that it
states this that the Eternal Son of God
the second person in the Blessed Holy
Trinity took on him and unto
himself human
nature we said that it didn't mean that
a new personality came into being but
that God the Eternal son became
incarnate my final word was
this that it was necessary to take that
statement that general statement and to
break it
up and that for this reason that it is
something that has been so frequently
misunderstood and as our salvation and
our Eternal Destiny depends upon our
relationship to the Lord Jesus Christ
what can be more important than that we
should be clear and certain in our ideas
and in our thoughts concerning him and
of course history shows very clearly
indeed before you come to history the
New Testament itself shows us very
clearly that the devil is concerned
about nothing more than he is about
leading people astray with regard to the
person and the work of our blessed Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ
that is why I say we can take no risks
and we cannot content ourselves with a
mere general statement of the doctrine
of the
Incarnation we must break it up we must
analyze it we must show what it does say
and what it doesn't say lest any of us
inadvertently should fall into error
very well then I propose to make to you
now the following series of
statements the first clearly is
this the doctrine of the person of our
Lord and the doctrine of the Incarnation in
in
particular shows us again the all
importance of the doctrine of the
Trinity now we considered that doctrine
of the Trinity many months ago and as we
come to consider this Doctrine now we
shall see why it was so important for us
to have considered it
then the whole Christian position in a
sense depends upon the doctrine of the
Blessed Holy
Trinity if we don't believe in the
doctrine of the Trinity we cannot be
Christian it's impossible a person who
doesn't believe in the
Trinity cannot really believe in the
Christian position because he cannot
really believe in the doctrine of
redemption therefore as we talk about
the person of the
sun we see how important it is always to
realize that the Blessed God exists in
three persons Father Son and Holy
Spirit that's my first comment the second
second
is that what the doctrine of the
Incarnation asserts
is not that the Eternal Triune God became
became
flesh but that the second person in the
Triune God became
flesh the scripture puts in like this
doesn't it it says the word was made flesh
flesh
now this is is surely something which we
must emphasize we often speak rather
Loosely I'm afraid in talking about the
Incarnation and many of our hymns tend
to do the same
thing but to me it seems always to be
wise not to say that God became man that
is a loose statement which we' better
are not used we often do say that God
became men well that's a very loose
statement what we should say is that the
word was made
flesh or that the second person in the
Blessed Holy Trinity was made flesh and
appeared as men if we merely say God
became man well we may be saying
something that is quite wrong and if
people do say something wrong as the
result of our statement we can't really
blame them we must be particular we must
be specific believing as we do in the
three persons in the Trinity we should
always be careful to say that what we
say is that the second person in the
this that the doctrine of the
Incarnation does not
say that it was not merely an appearance
or a form that was taken
on by the second person in the
Trinity but that it was indeed a true
Incarnation he did come in the
flesh uh it wasn't an appearance it
wasn't a mere form now you notice why
I'm emphasizing that I do so because
it's quite clear that in the very early
years of of the Christian Church there
were people who went into error and into
heresy about that the so-called
gnostics they said that our Lord had the
mere appearance of Flesh it was the mere
Phantom body an appearance of a body the
doctrine of the Incarnation doesn't say
that it says it wasn't an appearance it
was real it was a true
Incarnation the word was made flesh and
dwelt Among Us
uh Point number four is again a negative
one the doctrine of the
Incarnation does not say that it was
merely the divine
nature that somehow became United with
human nature and so formed a
person it isn't merely the divine nature
it is the second person himself the
person who became flesh
now there were many in the early ages of
the church and they've persisted
throughout the centuries who haven't
really understood that what they think
you see in Jesus Christ is divine nature
human nature forming a person that isn't
true it was the second person the
Eternal person in the Blessed Trinity
himself that took unto him human nature
and appeared in that
form and you see this significance of
that you remember perhaps that last
Friday night I did put it like this that
the doctrine of the Incarnation does not
teach the creation of a new
person what it teaches is that the
Eternal second person in the Trinity
took unto him flesh and appeared in this
world in the likeness of men not a new
person this eternal person
one the doctrine of the
Incarnation does not
teach neither does it involve the idea
that a change took place in the
personality of the second person of the
Trinity there was no change in his
personality there was a change in the
form in which he appeared
there was a change in the states in
which he manifests himself but he is the
same person
always in the womb of the Virgin Mary is
still the second person in the Blessed
Holy Trinity lying as a helpless babe in
the manger he is still the second person
in the Blessed Holy
Trinity there was no change in his
the next definition I put in this
form we must never so State the doctrine
of the
Incarnation as to give the impression
therefore that we say that the Son of
God was changed into a
man that is why that phrase about God
becoming men is is is
misleading we do not mean I say that the
Son of God was changed into a man no
that is not
so now you remember the statement in John
John
1:14 the word was made flesh and dwelt
Among Us that very phrase was made has
often caused people to think that the
Son of God was changed into a man it's
partly due to the fact that it isn't
really the best translation instead of
saying the word was made flesh what we
really mean was he became if you like or
took on
flesh the idea of making gives the
impression of being changed into but
that's wrong in other words the way in
which the scripture generally puts it as
this in Romans 83 for instance we are
told that he came in the likeness of
sinful flesh that's better or take it as
you get it in the first Epistle of John
4th chapter second verse 1 John
4:2 hereby says John know ye the spirit of
of
God every spirit that confesses that
Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of
God that's the idea Jesus Christ is come
in the
flesh it's this eternal person who has
come in the flesh he hasn't been made
men he hasn't been changed into a man he
has come in the F that's the right way
it the next principle will take this
form that our Lord did not merely take
the appearance of human nature but it
was real true human
nature now let me explain that in this
way we have accounts have we not in the
Old Testament of various Angels
appearing to VAR people and we are told
that they appeared in human
form now when we say that the Angels
appeared in that way in human form we
are not talking about an
Incarnation that is an
appearance the Angels didn't change
their nature they didn't add to it in
any way they just took on that form
indeed we saw you remember long ago that
our Lord himself had appeared in that
way we spoke about about the angel of
the Covenant the angel of the Covenant
in the Old Testament is undoubtedly the
Lord Jesus Christ himself and he
appeared more than once to various
people in the form of a man that is what
we call a
theophany now theophany t h e o p h a n y
y
theophany is entirely different from
Incarnation theophany means that an
Angelic or a Divine person appears
in this form for the time being but the
Incarnation says the doctrine of the
Incarnation asserts that the Lord Jesus
Christ has rarely taken on human nature
not its appearance but real human nature
itself now there are many statements
which say that let me give you two
Hebrews 26 Hebrews 2:16 for in Hebrews
2:14 I'm sorry Hebrews 2:14 far as much
then as the the children are partakers
of Flesh and Blood he also likewise
himself took part of the same he really
did take unto him human
nature not unto Angels does he stretch
forth a helping hand says that same
chapter but he does so to the Seed of
Abraham and that's what he's taking
on take also The Second Epistle of John verse
verse
7 we read there that many deceivers are
ENT entered into the world who confess
not that Jesus Christ is come in the
flesh there is no doubt at all that John
wrote his three Epistles in order to
counter that terrible dangerous heresy
that had come in in that way as I was
mentioning just now this denial that he
really had come in the flesh that it was
a mere appearance some would say do you
see that the Messiah entered into this
man Jesus
at his baptism and left him on the cross
and others say that the whole thing was
a phantom and an appearance now the New
Testament John especially in those
Epistles not only denies that it
denounces it as being the most dangerous
error that is the very lie of the
Antichrist and therefore we must be very
sure and certain that we are clear about
these things in our
minds that brings me to the next
statement the doctrine of the Incarnation
Incarnation
asserts that our Lord took unto himself
a full and a complete human nature it
wasn't merely partial it was
complete he didn't merely take a body to
himself now there are people throughout
the centuries whove taught that they say
that the Son of God only took on a human
body that's
wrong there are others who say that he
took on a body and a kind of animal soul
but that the spiritual part of the Soul
was provided by the Eternal person
that's wrong also the doctrine of the
Incarnation teaches that he took on him
complete Human Nature body and soul
including spirit that he was truly man I
shall have to emphasize this again but
it has to be emphasized at this point
also it wasn't a partial Human Nature it
was an entire complete a whole human
nature that he took unto
himself and my last uh Point under this
General heading is this
one that he took on this real and
complete human
nature from the Virgin
Mary in other words that means
this we must not say that a new human
nature was created for him some people
have taught
that that God created a new human nature
for his
son and that this human nature as it
were merely passed through Mary that's
wrong the doctrine states that he
derived got his human nature from his
mother the Virgin Mary he received Human
Nature from her it was not a new
creation he didn't bring his human
nature with him he found it he received
it he obtained it from
her and therefore as the scripture often
emphasizes he is truly of the Seed of
Abraham and of the seed of David here it
is in the first verse in this first
chapter of Matthew the book of the
generation of Jesus Christ the son of
David the son of a abrah now if a
special human nature had been created
for him he would not have been the son
of David nor the son of Abram but he was
the son of David and of Abraham because
his human nature came from his mother
the Virgin
Mary again let me emphasize this that
what he had was not a human nature that
was merely like
ours but um not
rarely a part of our
was and not organically related to it he
actually did
receive our nature go back again to that
verse in the second of Hebrews which
I've emphasized he really does belong
therefore to the human race he is one
with us in that race because he has
received his human nature in that way
now I mustn't stop with as tempted as I
am to do so I'm concerned about all that
for for this
reason that the doctrine of our
Redemption ultimately depends upon
that if it was not our human nature he
could not have saved
us as the second chapter of the Hebrews
argues so clearly because we are
partakers of this Flesh and Blood he had
to partake of the same it's the only way
in which he can save us so we can't
afford to take any risks about this
Doctrine we can't afford to say oh well
it doesn't matter matter what your
precise statement is that is to be utterly
utterly
unscriptural we must be precise and
clear and certain and definite in all
our statements otherwise without knowing
it we may make the doctrine of our own
Redemption quite impossible very well
there then we have had a detailed
definition of this doctrine of the
Incarnation that is what it says that
the second person in the Eternal blessed
Holy Trinity
has taken unto himself and to himself
human nature and thus as appeared in the
likeness of men and in the likeness of
sinful flesh here in this world of
time very
well having said that we've been looking
at the mystery of the Incarnation and at
once the question arises how did all
this come to
pass how did it take
place how how did this extraordinary
thing become
actual that you see leads us immediately
to the doctrine of the Virgin
birth I do trust that uh we are all
observing the order in which we are
taking them I do indeed conceive it to
be my main function in these addresses
to show you the order the details and
the facts you can derive from the
scriptures themselves my main idea is to
give you the order the idea as it's
worked out in the scripture and so by a
logical inevitability we arrive at the
doctrine of the Virgin birth what is
this well you remember the Apostles
Creed the first Creed of all the first
great confession puts it like this that
he was conceived of the Holy Ghost and
born of the Virgin
Mary now here as I need scarcely tell
you is again one of those great and
difficult subjects full of mystery full
of difficulty a doctrine that has been
much debated and argued about and
misunderstood and frequently denied and
people seem to derve to find great uh
difficulty about this doctrine of the Virgin
Virgin
birth how therefore are we to approach
it well there is nothing it seems to me
more important as we approach this
Doctrine than this
that we should bear in mind everything
that we've considered in all our previous
previous
lectures I mean
this if you have agreed with me in what
I've been saying in the previous 23
lectures you should have no difficulty
about the doctrine of the Virgin
birth if you really have agreed about
the doctrine of God and the doctrine of the
the
Trinity if you really have believed what
I've said about the doctrine of the
scriptures as being the infallible word
of God in breathed by the Holy Spirit
and not merely the ideas of
men if you've agreed with all that we
said about the Miracles and the
Supernatural and how all this is
inevitable when God acts and deals with
this world well then I say there really
should be no difficulty and no trouble
about the doctrine of the Virgin
birth and it is of course a fact the
people who have difficulty with the
doctrine of the Virgin birth
are the same people who have difficulty
with the doctrine of the scripture the
same people who have difficulty with the
doctrine of Miracles they're rarely in
trouble about the doctrine of the
Incarnation itself because they set up
their puny
Minds as the ultimate test of all truth
and because they can't understand the
thing they won't believe
it but surely by now we must be in
agreement that in all these
matters we are out inside the realm of
natural human reason and
understanding we started at the very
beginning with a whole concept and
category of
revelation we know nothing apart from
Revelation I don't stand here to put
forward theories and philosophies I
start on this premise that what I am
announcing is what God has done what God
has revealed I know nothing apart from
what I find in this book I am entirely
shut up to this I am utterly dependent upon
upon
it and therefore it is my business to
come to it as a little child the World
by wisdom knew not God well very well
then if that was true and is still true
I'm must depend upon this I must accept
its Authority I must receive its
statements even though my little mind
can't always understand them very well
that is I say the frame of mind and the
appropriate attit
ude to adopt as we come to consider this
extraordinary and amazing and yet glorious
glorious
doctrine of the Virgin
birth what does it teach what are we
told well I read to you those two
portions of scripture at the
beginning because they are the basis of
the doctrine of the Virgin birth you
notice the order in which I took them I
always feel we should start with that
statement in Luke because it gives us
the announcement of the great thing
itself to
Mary and you remember the details in
connection with that
announcement you remember the facts you
remember how the angel came you see if
you haven't agreed with my doctrine of
angels you're already in trouble but if
you did accept that doctrine of angels
well there's no difficulty about this at
all it's what we'd expect and do you
remember how we are told about Mary surprise
surprise
and Mary's
surprise of course was was something
which was quite
natural it's obvious is it not from her
very surprised that she understood the
significance of what the angel said to
her here is a a an unmarried woman a
virgin to whom this announcement is made
and at once she sees the difficulty and
she doesn't hesitate to express her
difficulty the problem is how can she be
the mother of such a
child while she has never known a
man and the angel gives her the
explanation he announces to
her that this is going to be something
that is going to be done by the Holy Spirit
Spirit
himself he tells her that she shall be
overshadowed by the
almighty the Holy Ghost he says shall
come upon thee and the the power of the
highest shall overshadow thee therefore
also that Holy thing which shall be born
of thee shall be called The Son of God
conceived of the Holy Ghost born of the Virgin
Virgin
Mary but then the account in the first
chapter of Matthew from verses 18 to 25
is equally important and surely equally
interesting because there we are told
Joseph Joseph
discovered that this virgin to whom he was
was
betrothed was with
child was confused and unhappy he was a
good man he was a righteous man he was a
loving man he decided he wouldn't make a
public example of her but he must of
necessity put her away otherwise he
wouldn't be keeping the law and he was
meditating and pondering about all this
himself as to how he could do it when
the angel appear to him in a
dream and what the angel did with Joseph
of course was to explain again to him
exactly what was
happening Joseph thou son of David fear
not to take thee Mary thy wife for that
which is conceived in her is of the Holy
Ghost he's given a exactly the same
explanation and I am afraid we often
forget as we read that story to notice
and to observe the extraordinary faith of
of
Joseph he believed it he accepted it
without any demur without any hesitation
and he proceeded to act upon it now that
is what we are told in the record what's it
it
mean well what he teaches us is
this that this
work of the birth of the Lord Jesus
Christ as a
man is entirely the work of
God the doctrine of the Virgin birth
must always be considered first and
foremost in a negative way and what it
says negatively is
this that he had no earthly
father he was not born of the will of
men or of the will or the energy of the
flesh at
all let me put it still more
strongly the
male human
being does not enter into the question
of his conception or birth at
all now that's a very remarkable thing
because as we've seen already in working
uh with the great doctrines at the
beginning of the book of Genesis
the glory of God as as it were is in the
man and the woman is under the men you
remember you remember how we work that
out but here the man is put on one
side he has nothing to do with it you
notice that the very word the promise
that was given by God to the man and the
woman in the Garden of Gethsemane was
this the seed of the woman shall bruise
the Serpent's head and so it proved to
be the man had nothing to do with it the
very one whom God had appointed Lord of
creation and to whom he gives power over
the woman and to whom the woman is
subject by God's Own decree and
ordination as the result of creation and
especially as the result of the
fall in spite of all that when it comes
to the question of the Incarnation the
male is put on one
side and God uses the woman only
and surely the significance and the
importance of that must be quite obvious
to all of us it is to emphasize again
the total inability of [Music]
[Music]
men man as such is seen in his utter
failure and incapacity in the person of
Joseph and God takes hold of human
nature at its weakest and at its lowest
as it
were in
order to produce out of
it this human nature for his own son now
I've come across a very beautiful phrase
which I'm going to pass on to you which
I think will help you to remember
this here it is as our Lord's divine
nature had no
mother so his human nature had no father
I think that puts it very well as our
Lord's divine nature had no mother
so his human nature had no
father it was entirely the work of of
God he took on him human nature from
Mary but it was done you remember
through the instrumentality of the Holy
Spirit what happen says someone I can't
answer no one can answer that is the
great mystery but what we know is this
that the power of the Holy Spirit came upon
upon
Mary and out of Mary out of a cell in her
her
body the human nature of Our Lord was
made we can't go further it's a great
mystery but we have to go as far as that
it was this operation of the Holy Spirit
and it was obviously done in such a
way that this human nature that he took
unto himself was
sinless you notice the angel tells Mary
that this holy
thing this sinless this
pure thing which shall be born of
thee so the operation was worked in that
way now it doesn't mean that Mary
herself was made sinless and
holy it doesn't even imply of necessity
that any part of Mary was all we know is
this that something was taken and was
cleansed rendered free from all
pollution so that his human nature was
sinless and entirely free from all the
effects and the results of the Fall such
was the effect of the operation of the
Holy Spirit upon
her now then what of this
Doctrine what have we to say about it in
general especially having in mind those
who find it
difficult well I would suggest once more
that it's a Doctrine which seems to me
to be quite
inevitable if you really do believe the
Incarnation if you really do believe
that that babe in the manger in
Bethlehem is the second person in the
Blessed Holy
Trinity and that is the
truth then I cannot see that there is
any difficulty about this doctrine of
the Virgin birth indeed I would find
myself in much greater difficulty if I
didn't have the doctrine of the Virgin
birth to
believe what I mean by that is
this that the fact of the
Incarnation is so unusual it's so
exceptional it's so miraculous it's so
mysterious that I would expect
everything about him to be the same and
so it proves to be
the Virgin birth if you like therefore
is the sign of the mystery of the
Incarnation it's the kind of sign of the
mystery you can't get at the mystery
this is a kind of sign or symbol of that
mystery there it is in a tangible form
this virgin birth the whole thing is
mysterious but that is the kind of
external sign of the
mystery oh everything about our Lord is mysterious
his coming into the world was mysterious
his going out of it was
mysterious he didn't enter into life
like anybody else he didn't go out of it
like anybody else the resurrection is as
unique as the Virgin birth quite as
unique it had never happened to anybody
before he is the first begotten from the
dead he's the first born amongst many
Brethren the resurrection is equally
startling so that I would say to anybody
who stumbles at the Virgin birth do you
stumble in the same way at at the
resurrection you see if we start with
the doctrine of the Incarnation and
realize what we are
saying and realize that we are really
speaking about this second person in the
Blessed Holy Trinity well then I say
surely you would expect his birth to be
entirely unusual and
exceptional and so it was he is
Exceptional from beginning to end it is
something quite
different but let me try and help you by
putting it in this
form if you do not believe in the
doctrine of the Virgin
birth how then do you account for his
sinlessness how do you account for the
fact that he was without
sin are we not entitled to put it like
this if he had been born in the ordinary
way of a father and a
mother then then surely he would have
been an ordinary person like every other
person and if he had been a person like
every other person he would have been in
direct sequence in the direct line from
Adam and therefore it would be true to
say that as in Adam all die he would
have died in Adam he would have been
guilty of original sin and of original
guilt but you see the doctrine of the
Incarnation at once tells us that that
isn't what happened
a person I say did not come into being
there the person is the Eternal person
the second person in the Blessed Holy
Trinity when a husband and a wife come
together and a child is born a new
person a new personality comes into
being that didn't happen in the
Incarnation but given father and mother
you get a person and that person I say
in the direct line from Adam therefore
sinful therefore fallen and he no longer be
be
sinless the only way that one could
answer that would be this would be to
say that some similar kind of operation
as was performed by the Holy Spirit on
Mary should also be performed on Joseph
but surely that doesn't help us if
you're already in difficulties and in
trouble about this miraculous operation
on Mary well now you're doubling it
you're asking for two instead of one and
it's still more
impossible no no my
friends if we take a firm hold of the
doctrine of the Incarnation
itself that this blessed person took
unto himself a human nature that had to
be sinful otherwise he couldn't have
United with it he couldn't Unite with
anything that was sinful well then there
was only one way for it and that is that
he should have been born not in the
ordinary way of
generation but in this special
way you notice the whole Doctrine is
surrounded by pitfalls and difficulties
when I put it like that I'm sure that
many of you are thinking in your minds
ah I see God created a special human
nature for him did he no he didn't I've
already denounced that as
heresy he got his human nature from
Mary but it was acted upon by the holy
spirit in such a way that it was
rendered holy free from sin and from all
pollution and so we stand again before
him we stand before this mystery of godl
godl
God In the
Flesh the strangest the most amazing the
most astounding thing that has ever
happened yeah I don't hesit to say the
Supreme Act of
God and so Supreme that I expect it to
be unusual in every respect and I find
the scriptures tell me that it was he was
was
conceived of the Holy Ghost he was born
of a
virgin named Mary man is entirely
excluded the male doesn't come
in Joseph is there ever to remind us of
that it is
and as we part do we all realize and
remember that it all happened and it all took
took
place not that a phenomenon might enter
into this
world but that you and I might be
saved that your sins and mine might be
forgiven the Son of God became the son of
of
men that son son of
men might become sons of God we do hope
that you've been helped by the preaching
of Dr Martin lyd Jones all of the
sermons contained within the mlj trust
audio library are now available for free
download you may share the sermons or
broadcast them however because of
international copyright please be
advised that we are asking first that
these sermons never be offered for sale
by a third party and second that these
sermons will not be edited in any way
for length or to use as audio clips you
can find our contact information on our
website at mlj trust.org that's mlj t.org
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