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Evidences from the Bible
Several
Verses in the Holy Bible Prove the One Nature:
(1) God
the Father Himself testified for Jesus Who was baptized by
John the Baptist saying, "This is My Beloved Son in whom I
am well pleased.” (Matt. 3:17). Certainly, He did not say
this about the human nature of His Son, as His human
nature is inseparable from His Divine nature. This verse
cannot indicate two, it refers to one, and here it
indicates the One Nature of the Incarnate Word.
(2) John
the Baptist gave the same testimony when he pointed at
Christ and said: "This is the One of whom I spoke. He that
comes after me is preferred before me for He was before
me. “(John 1:15,30). So how could He have been before hint
and come after him? Our Lord came after John the Baptist
by human birth and was before him by the Divine nature.
The
Baptist did not separate between the human nature and the
Divine nature, as he said, "This who came after me (the
incarnate Logos) was before me". Here the One Nature is
obvious, for the One Who John baptized was He Himself who
was before him.
(3) St.
John the Evangelist says in his Gospel "No Man has seen
God at any time, the Only-Begotten Son who is in the bosom
of the Father, He has declared Him.” (John. 1:18). The
Only-Begotten Son is God the Logos, and the Second
Hypostasis. How then did He declare the Father? Certainly
when He became Incarnate. Can we say then that the One who
declared this was the human nature? St. John Says about
Him: "The Only-Begotten Son Who is in the bosom of the
Father, He has declared" while we know that it is the Man
Jesus Christ who declared Him and this indicates the One
Nature.
(4) The
same words are spoken by the same apostle in his first
epistle, "That Which was from the beginning which we have
heard and which we have seen with our eyes, which we have
looked upon, and our hands have touched.” (I John. I:I).
He talks about Him Whom he has seen and touched, as the
One Who was from the beginning, that is, God. So how did
they see God and touch him unless He was the Incarnate
logos? These words are not about the human nature alone,
nor about the Divine nature alone because the human nature
was not eternal from the beginning and the Divine nature
alone cannot be touched.
(5) The
same meaning is conveyed in the conversation between our
Lord Jesus Christ and the man who was born blind. When the
Lord opened his eyes, the man asked Jesus "Who is the Son
of God" and the Lord told him "you have seen Him and it is
He that talks with you.” (John. 9:35-37). The Son of God
is God the Logos incarnate, that is, the Divine nature.
But who was speaking with the blind man, was it merely the
human nature? It cannot be the human nature alone because
the Lord Jesus Christ confirms that "it is He that talks
with you, the Son of God.” Thus He is the Incarnate God
who was manifest in the flesh (1 Tim. 3:16).
(6) St.
Paul the Apostle says about the Jews when they were in the
desert of Sinai, "As they did all drink the same spiritual
drink, for they drank of the spiritual rock that followed
them, and the Rock was Christ." (1 Cor. 10:4). It is well
known that those Jews were in the desert of Sinai fourteen
centuries before the birth of Christ, so how could He be
with them quenching their thirst unless St. Paul is
speaking about the Divine nature which is God the Logos?
Yet God the Logos was not called Christ until the time of
His Incarnation. But due to the One Nature the Apostle
Could not distinguish and spoke about the eternity of
Christ and His presence before His Birth. The Apostle
proceeds in the same manner: "Neither let us tempt Christ
as some of them also tempted and were destroyed by
serpents.” (1 Cor. 10:9).
(7) Before
whom did the Wise men fall down and worship (Matt. 2:11)?
Did they worship the Divine nature alone? No, they fell
down and worshipped a Child in a manger and they presented
unto Him gifts. Did they worship the human nature? The
human nature cannot be worshipped. Thus the only answer
left is that they worshipped the Incarnate God just as the
man born blind did later, and as those who were in the
ship did, when the Lord rebuked the wind and walked on the
water; They did not worship Him merely out of respect for
"Those who were in the boat came and worshipped Him,
saying, ‘Truly You are the Son of God’." (Mt. 14:23),
(8) We
also ask who it was who walked on the sea water and
rebuked the wind, was it the Divine or the human nature?
There is no doubt that He was the Incarnate Logos. The
same applies to all the other miracles of Christ; who
worked those miracles? Was it the Divine nature alone?
Then what is the meaning of the Phrase "and He laid His
hands on every one of them and healed them. " (Lk. 4:40)?
and what can we understand from the healing of the woman,
who had a flow of blood and it dried up when she touched
His clothes (Mk. 5:29)? In opening the eyes of the blind,
who was it who spat on the ground and made clay of the
spittle and anointed the eyes of the blind with the clay.
No doubt it was He Who performed all those miracles and
several similar ones, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Incarnate
Logos. St. John, the Evangelist, says "And many
s in the same manner: "Neither
other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of His
disciples which are not written in this book. " (John.
20:30). Notice here the use of the name (Jesus). We shall
be satisfied with presenting the above examples, because
if we follow closely the Holy Bible we may indulge in an
endless process, as the verses referring to the one nature
are extensively used throughout.
The
One Will and the One Act
Has the
Lord Christ two wills and two actions, that is a Divine
will and a human will, as well as two actions, that is, a
divine act and a human act? As we believe in the One
Nature of the Incarnate Logos, as St. Cyril the Great
called it, likewise:
We believe
in One Will and One Act: Naturally, as long as we consider
that this Nature is One, the Will and the Act must also
each be one. What the Divine nature Chooses is undoubtedly
the same as that chosen by the human nature because there
is not any contradiction or conflict whatever between the
will and the action of both. The Lord Jesus Christ said:
"My meat is to do the Will of Him that sent me to finish
His work.” (John. 4:34). This proves that His Will is the
same as that of the Father. In this context, He said about
Himself "The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He
sees the Father do, for what things so ever He does these
also does the Son likewise.” (John. 5:19). He does not
seek for Himself a will that is independent of that of the
Father. Consequently He says "Because I seek not Mine Own
Will, but the Will of the Father, who has sent me.” (John.
6:38). It is obvious that the Father and the Son in the
Holy Trinity have One Will, for the
Lord Jesus
Christ said: "I and My Father are One," (John. 10:30).
Hence, since He is one with Him in the Godhead, then He is
essentially one with Him concerning the Will. Again, the
Son, in His Incarnation on earth, was fulfilling the Will
of the heavenly Father. Thus it must be that He Who united
with the manhood had One Will. In fact, Sin is nothing but
a conflict between man’s will and God’s. But remember that
our Lord Jesus Christ had no sin at all. He challenged the
Jews saying: "Which of you convicts me of Sin?” (John.
8:46). Therefore, His Will was that of the Father. The
Saints who are perfect in their behavior achieve complete
agreement between their will and the Will of God, so that
their will becomes that of God, and the Will of God
becomes their will. And St., Paul the Apostle said "But we
have the mind of Christ.”(1 Cor. 2:16). He did not say
that our thoughts are in accord with the mind of Christ,
but that "we have the mind of Christ", and here the unity
is stressed. If this is said about those with whom and in
whom God works, then how much more the unity between the
Son and His Own manhood would be in all that is related to
the will, the mind and the power to act! He, in whom the
Divine nature has united with the human nature, a
Hypostatic and Essential union without separation-not for
a second nor
a twinkle
of an eye, If there was not unity between the Will of the
Divine nature of Christ and His human nature, this would
have resulted in internal conflict. Far be it from Him!
How then could Christ be our guide and our example... to
follow in His footsteps (1 John. 2:6)? The complete
righteousness which marked the life of our Lord Jesus was
due to His Divine as well as His Human will. The same is
true of the salvation of mankind, the message for which
Christ came and said: "For the Son of Man is come to save
that which was lost.” (Matt. 18:11). This is the same Will
of the Father who ‘Loved us and sent His Son to be the
propitiation for our sins. “(I John. 4:10). Thus, the
crucifixion was the choice of the Divine as well as the
human nature. Had it not been One Will, it would not have
been said that Christ died by His Own Will for our sake.
Since the Will is One, the Act is necessarily One.
Hence we do not distinguish between the two natures.
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