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FAQ # 177
QUESTION 177 : How could God
make all things by Jesus, being Jesus?
The
text reads,
“And
to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from
the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things
by Jesus Christ” (Eph 3:9).
Here
is a similar statement two chapters before,
“According
to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his
own will” (Eph 1:11). This opening thesis from the book of Ephesians has
to be used to understand Eph 3:9.
Is
a person and his counsel separate or different? No. Similarly, God and
Jesus are not separate; being that Jesus is God.
The
dictionary defines counsel as ‘advice’, so Eph 1:11 should state that
he worked all things by his own advice. In other words, no one helped
him. He himself said, “I am the LORD that maketh
all things; that …spreadeth abroad the earth by myself” (Isa 44:24).
God is his own counsel as much as God is his own word (John 1:1). No wonder
Hebrews 11:3 stated,
“Through
faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God.”
Notice the operative phrase in this verse, “through faith.” In other words,
only through faith one will be able to understand that God made the earth
by his very word. Similarly, only through faith we can understand that
Jesus is God and God is Jesus, and by himself made all things (Isa 44:24).
Faith being “the substance [tangible] of things hoped for the evidence
[of the tangible] things not seen” (Heb 11:1).
Part 2
"Hebrews 1:2 states that God made the worlds by
the Son. Similarly, Colossians 1:13-17 says all things were created by
the Son, and Ephesians 3:9 says all things were created by Jesus Christ.
What does creation "by the Son" mean, since the Son did not
have a substantial pre-existence before the Incarnation? "Of course,
we know that Jesus as God pre-existed the Incarnation, since the deity
of Jesus is none other than the Father Himself. We recognize that Jesus
(the divine Spirit of Jesus) is indeed the Creator. These verses describe
the eternal Spirit that was in the Son - the deity that was later incarnated
as the Son - as the Creator. The humanity of Jesus Christ could not create,
but God who came in the Son as Jesus Christ created the world. Hebrews
1:10 clearly states that Jesus as Lord was the Creator. "Perhaps
these scriptural passages have a deeper meaning that can be expressed
as follows: Although the Son did not exist at the time of creation except
as the Word in the mind of God, God used His foreknowledge of the Son
when He created the world." {Source: Bernard, The Oneness of God,
p. 115}
Elsewhere Bernard added,
"According to Hebrews 1:2, God made the worlds
by the Son. Certainly, the Spirit (God) who was in the Son was also the
Creator of the worlds. This passage may also indicate that God predicated
the entire work of creation upon the future manifestation of the Son.
God foreknew that man would sin, but He also foreknew that through the
Son man could be saved and could fulfill God's original purpose in creation.
As John Miller stated, "Though He did not pick up His humanity till
the fullness of time, yet He used it, and acted upon it, from all eternity."
{ Source: Bernard, Essentials in Oneness Theology, p. 21}
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