Chapter Eleven: The Greatness of the Love of Christ is Displayed in That Our Redemption Uniquely Declares His Divine Glory

The Greatness of the Love of Christ

Chapter Eleven: The greatness of the love of Christ is displayed in that our redemption uniquely declares his divine glory.

God’s great and final purpose in all of creation and redemption is to display his divine glory, the sight of which becomes the eternal and ever-increasing joy of his people (e.g. Isa. 43:7; Rom. 9:23; Eph. 2:7); but what is it, ultimately, that displays this glory and provides this joy? It is only the love of Christ. God is faithful, merciful, just, righteous, good, patient, pure – and we may see all those attributes gloriously displayed in Christ’s accomplishment of our redemption. But of no other attribute is it said, as it is of his loving us, that it is what God “is”. But God is love. And that he is love may be seen nowhere more clearly than his redemption of us in Christ Jesus. This is the unique and highest glory of the godhead; and this glory is displayed in us, as vessels of mercy (Rom. 9:23); it is shown in the heavenly places in God’s everlasting kindness toward us in Christ (Eph. 2:7); it is seen in how the Name which the Son of God won in the accomplishment of our salvation became the Name which is above every names (Phil. 2:5-11). “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son as the propitiation for our sins” (John 4:12).

1. The ultimate reason for which God created the world and governs it according to his eternal purpose is the display of his glory

The most fundamental truth of all creation is that it exists in order to proclaim the glory of God. “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork” (Psalm 19:1, ESV). It is an innate and irrepressible urge in the heart of man, whenever he honestly considers the created realm around him, to swell up in admiration of the glory there displayed. This response is often suppressed and stifled in the darkened hearts of men, who pervert the glory that they know and recognize because of their impenitence and self-willed bent to rebellion and autonomy (Rom. 1:18-25; Eph. 4:17-19); and yet, for all this, they are without excuse, inasmuch as the true glory of God is self-evident and unavoidable in creation all around them; and in their eternal souls, perverted by sin as they may be, there is a necessary response to this revealed glory of recognition and affirmation. Originally, there was not just a response of recognition, but also a response of worship and delight; but this soon became overwhelmed by the instinct of terror and shame and guilt, as soon as mankind had first sinned against the glorious God (Gen. 3).

So it is beyond cavil that the purpose of the original creation was to display the glory of God to sentient, moral creatures, who could delight in that glory and worship God because of it; but it is equally certain that God’s primary purpose in all of redemptive history, which followed immediately after the first sin in the Garden, is also self-revelatory. Moreover, this redemptive purpose is not just a contingency to which God was driven when his original purpose had been precluded by sin; but it was in the mind and will of God before sin had ever entered the picture. The divine plan of redemption was not just a response to the exigencies created by man’s fall; on the contrary, the Lamb was slain before the foundation of the world (Rev. 13:8), the subjects of redemption were chosen before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:4), and in fact, all of God’s works were known and designed before the foundation of the world (Acts 15:17-18). Another way of expressing this truth is that, the plan of redemption is ultimately doxological; that is, it is designed to display the nature of the all-glorious God.

The scriptures that support this assertion are legion. From the earliest pages of the bible, the truth is everywhere proclaimed that what God does, especially as he steps into human history to redeem a people, he does so that the world, and especially his people, might know who he is.

Consider, for example, the redemptive accomplishment par excellence of the Old Testament: the Exodus. Before God ever delivers his people from the land of Egypt, he declares to Moses that he will harden Pharaoh’s heart, so that he might show his wonders in the land (Ex. 3:19-20; 4:21); and the ultimate purpose of this design, in hardening Pharaoh’s heart and pouring out fearsome judgments and signs, is so that his people, whom he is redeeming, might “know that I am Yahweh your God, who brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians” (Ex. 6:6-7). From the beginning, then, God is purposing through his accomplishment of redemption to display his terrible judgments, as exemplified by his plagues against Egypt; he is doing so in order to magnify the greatness of his covenant-faithfulness and unfailing mercy to his people; and in this conjunction of sovereignly-expressed wrath and free, unstoppable mercy, he is intending ultimately to make himself known to his people. He is Yahweh: and to be Yahweh is to be one who hardens sinners and pours out his wrath upon the ungodly, but who, in this very wrath-bearing, works a great salvation for those whom he has called to be his people. In other words, God is basically declaring to Moses that the purpose of his redemptive plan is “to show forth his wrath and to make known his power [by bearing] with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, and to make known the riches of his glory in the vessels of mercy prepared ahead of time for glory” (Rom. 9:22-23).

This motif, that God’s ultimate purpose in redeeming a people is the display of his glory through judging the enemies of himself and his people, and so showcasing his free mercy in greater relief, continues throughout the Old Testament. A thorough survey would be far beyond the scope of this chapter, but mention may at least be made of the rich Isaianic suffering servant passages; there, a common refrain is that, “I, [only] I am Yahweh; and there is no Savior besides me” (Isa. 43:11); “I, [only] I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake” (Isa. 43:25); “Turn unto me and be saved, all the ends of the earth; because I am God, and there is none other” (Isa. 45:22); and in sum, “Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth, everyone [of whom] who is called by my Name; I created him for my glory, and I formed him, and I made him” (Isa. 43:6-7). In the design of redemption, God here makes it emphatically clear that he will not give his glory to another (Isa 42:5-8; 48:9-11). A similar refrain is found numerous times throughout the prophecies of Ezekiel: there, every act of God which relates to the accomplishment of his redemptive design is done for this purpose alone: so that all the world might “know that I am Yahweh” (This refrain, with minor variations, appears in Ezek. 6:7, 10, 13, 14; 7:4, 9, 27; 11:10, 12; 12:15, 16, 20; 13:9, 14, 21, 23; 14:8; 15:7; 16:62; 20:12, 20, 26, 38, 42, 44; 22:16; 23:49; 24:24, 27; 25:5, 7, 11, 17; 26:6; 28:22, 23, 24, 26; 29:6, 9, 16, 21; 30:8, 19, 25, 26; 32:15; 33:29; 34:27; 35:4, 9, 12, 15; 36:11, 23, 38; 37:6, 13; 38:23; 39:6, 7, 22, 28.).

2. The ultimate display of the glory of God is his accomplishment of redemption through Christ

So then, the ultimate purpose of God’s economy of redemption is the revelation of himself as the only triune God. Of course, this design of God’s self-revelation through redemption is centered on Christ. Thus, when God first promises to redeem a people for himself, after the fall of our first father, Adam, he solemnly asseverates that he will do so through a Seed of the woman; which is the first and foundational indication that God will reveal his nature to mankind by becoming a man, and as a man bringing his fellow men back to himself (Gen. 3:15). From this point on, throughout the Old Testament, we find no unmediated revelation of God: all of God’s self-revelation comes through Christ, who, as a foretaste and pledge of what he will finally do in the fullness of times by taking on human flesh, reveals the triune God to his people in types and shadows. To go back to our example of the Exodus, we must note that God’s first act of self-revelation to Moses came at the burning bush, which was a lowly plant springing up from the dry ground, as the Messiah should be (Ex. 3; compare also Isa. 53:1-2), and which burned as if with all the wrath of God, and yet was unconsumed (even as the Christ should be made to drink all the fiery wrath of God, and yet would rise again to eternal life). In this event also, he reveals himself as the Angel of the Lord (see Ex. 3:2), who throughout the Old Testament would receive worship as God, and yet converse with God as a distinct person (Gen. 16:7-14; 22:11-12; Jud. 2:1-4; 6:11-24; 13:21-22; Zech. 1:12-14; 3:6-7; 12:8), and who at the climactic act of judgment against Egypt would bear the death penalty against the firstborn (Ex. 12:29); and yet at the same time, he would be presented before the people in the type of the Passover Lamb, who should bear in his own body the wrath that he himself held forth against all sinners, and so redeem those who fed upon him in faith (Ex. 12:1-14). Then, in the Isaianic and Ezekielan passages we have already observed, Christ is everywhere promised to the people in the clearest of terms, and in conjunction with the overarching motif of God’s self-revelation through redemption. Such passages as Isaiah 42:1-8; 52:13-53:12; and Ezekiel 34 make clear beyond cavil that God will proclaim his glory and make known his Name to his people above all in the salvation that he would accomplish through his Christ.

So then, the purpose of redemptive history is the self-revelation of God; the culmination of this self-revelation takes place in the person and work of Christ; and, as I shall now demonstrate, the extent of this self-revelation is so broad in scope as to be nearly paradoxical. The glories of God are so rich and manifold that it is a wonder almost beyond conception that they should all exist without contradiction in the same person; and the history of redemption is meticulously designed to display this harmonious diversity of excellence, climactically in Christ. Consider the culminative revelation of God to the premier prophet in Israel’s history, in the account of Moses’ being hidden in the cleft of the Rock, as the back parts of God’s glory passed by. In that event, God revealed himself as “Yahweh, Yahweh, a God merciful and gracious, longsuffering and great in covenant loyalty and faithfulness, keeping covenant loyalty to thousands [of generations], forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin”; but at the same time, “who will not at all clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and upon the children’s children, unto the third and the fourth [generations]” (Ex. 34:6-7). This paradox of God as freely merciful and faithful to forgive, and yet unwilling to justify the ungodly by any means, exists at the very heart of the Old Testament, and is only relieved in the expectation of a coming Messiah, who will perfectly reveal God to men, and bring them back into his presence. Thus, the days of the Messiah are anticipated as days in which paradoxical glories co-exist, days when “covenant loyalty and truth have met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other” (Psalm 85:10). In the days of the Messiah, God’s loyalty and faithfulness to his promised blessings will co-exist without contradiction with his righteousness and unwillingness to overlook sin. Redemption is designed to display the nature of the God who is diversely excellent; and therefore, the culmination of redemption is in the Christ, who will reveal the diverse glory of the godhead through his own diverse excellence. In Christ, at once the perfect man and eternal God, are met together all the “lionlike” attributes of glory and majesty, strength and dominion; and all the “lamblike” attributes of humility and gentleness, condescension and mercy (For a fuller treatment of this theme, see Jonathan Edwards, “The Excellency of Jesus Christ,” The Works of Jonathan Edwards, Volume 1 [Edinburgh: The Banner of Truth Trust, 2005), pp. 680-689]). And the climax of Christ’s redemptive work is the cross, which paradoxically displays all the diverse glory of God; at the cross, God’s righteousness and wrath against sin are displayed as fully as his willingness to forgive sin at no expense to the sinner; his faithfulness is displayed as clearly as his implacable fury; his free salvation is displayed as clearly as his righteous retribution.

3. The love of Christ, as it was perfectly displayed on the Cross, brings together in a coherent whole all the diversely excellent attributes of the trinity which it is the purpose of redemption to display

But if Christ’s work of redemption, culminating on the cross, exists to display the diversely excellent glory of God, then how may it be said that his redemptive love is the ultimate and all-inclusive display of trinitarian glory? Is not the love of Christ rather just one facet or attribute of that divine glory?

No, for the love of Christ is broad enough that it swallows up, as it were, every other attribute; or rather, every attribute is shot through and held together by the great principle of divine, inter-trinitarian love, which is both displayed for us and given to us fully on the cross.

The inter-trinitarian love is perfectly displayed on the cross

Let us first consider how the inter-trinitarian love is perfectly displayed on the cross, in such a manner as to comprehend in itself every other divine attribute. First, we see nowhere more clearly than on the cross that God is utterly holy: throughout the history of the world, it has been made overwhelmingly clear that God is too pure and holy to look upon evil (Hab. 1:13); the highest angels of heaven must veil their eyes before the brilliance of his holiness, as they utter the mysterious and worshipful trisagion (Isa. 6:1-5); and to this truth Job also gives his ardent testimony, proclaiming that, “Behold, God puts no trust in his holy ones, and the heavens are not pure in his sight” (Job 15:15, ESV; cf. also Job 25:5).

Even beyond this, the whole tenor and character of the Mosaic administration of the Covenant served to confirm and display God’s utter holiness. There is no theme more central to the book of Leviticus, itself central to the Pentateuch, which is foundational and formative for the whole bible, than this great truth, “You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy” (Lev. 19:2). God demonstrated the truth and severity of this great proclamation in many ways, as when he slew Nadab and Abihu for offering up unholy fire (Lev. 10), or when he made a breach against Uzzah for daring to touch the holy Ark of the Covenant (2 Sam. 6:6-9).

But where did God ever display his holiness so emphatically and perfectly as he did upon the cross? He had made it known that even the heavens could not be pure in his sight; he had demonstrated that he would put to death any man, created in his own image, who dared in any way to violate his holy demands; but what of his Son, who is higher than the heavens, yes, and by whom the very heavens were created? What of the Only-Begotten, who has not just been stamped with the image of God, but is in himself that very image in all its radiance and glory (Heb. 1:1-4)? Surely, his holiness would not be so great that it could demand the death of the utterly holy and altogether Beloved Son of God? And yet, on the cross, the unthinkable transpired, and the holiness of God blazed forth in a brilliance never before displayed even in the brightest lightnings that flashed forth from Mount Sinai – for there, God was pleased, rather than to defile his holiness, to put to death his only Son for the sins that had been imputed to him. What utter and unspeakable a holiness is the holiness of God, displayed on the cross!

But consider how even this greatest display of that central and all-encompassing attribute of the holiness of God was enacted on the cross out of inter-trinitarian love. Christ could have taken all the nations as his heritage and property by sheer force, having at his command more than twelve legions of angels to do all his bidding (Mat. 26:53), and what’s more, possessing the omnipotence of very deity; or else, for a single act of unholy worship, he could have received all those kingdoms without struggle from the hand of the Enemy (Mat. 4:8-10); but he refused those options, and chose instead to give himself up as a ransom and sacrifice for those people whom God had promised should be his inheritance? And why was it that he gave himself up entirely so that he could accomplish God’s will without violating his holiness, but on the contrary upholding and manifesting it as it had never been manifested before? The answer could only be that it was out of immense love for the Father, and illimitable respect for his holiness, that he chose the bitter cup of wrath rather than to mar that holiness at all.

But just as it was out of love for the Father that the Son displayed his holiness to perfection on the cross, so it was out of love for the Son that the Father gave him this work; for it has ever been those whom he has loved that the Father has set apart to himself, and made holy unto himself, so that they might dwell with him in love; even as Moses has proclaimed, “For you are a people holy to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt” (Deut. 7:6-8, ESV). Because the Father loved Israel, he made her holy unto himself, and chose her to display his holiness to the world. But whom did he choose to set apart as holier than all, whom did he count worthy to display and guard his own holiness perfectly and finally? Only Jesus Christ, the true Israel of God, who became God’s holy representative on earth, and won a matchless name and unspeakable honor. God the Father would not condone Jesus’ winning his people through any other way than that of utter holiness, because he wanted the universal praise of his Son, for the work of redemption that he did, to be utterly unstained by the ability of any man or angel to point a finger at him and say, “But you accomplished this through unsatisfactory means”. Because the Father loved Jesus, he wanted him utterly holy so as to fellowship with him in perfect complacency; and also, so that his name might be set apart as holy and praiseworthy throughout all creation. He wanted every knee to bow without reserve and every tongue to confess without dissembling the sacred glory of the Name of Jesus.

Then again, the holiness of God displayed upon the cross is also a demonstration of the inter-trinitarian love of the Holy Spirit; for he it was that guided the Anointed Savior through all his redemptive task; and he refused to guide him to a lesser way of finishing it than the cross, because of his love for the Father and his desire to show forth his holiness to the world, and his love for the Son and his desire to preserve him perfectly without stain, so that he might enjoy unreservedly the holy delights of the trinity and be perfectly glorified on the earth.

In the second place, we may see the majesty and honor of God displayed on the cross as nowhere else; never before had God’s divine honor and majesty shone so brightly as they did on the cross, where God refused to be dishonorably willing either to disregard his promise of salvation, or else to overlook the imperfections of his chosen people; but on the cross, he fulfilled all his oath through Christ, and found an honest and honorable way to do so in spite of the blemishes of his people. Thus did Christ fully reveal and upheld his majestic and divine honor; and this too, was done in love, the Son giving himself up fully to uphold the Father’s majesty and honor, and the Father willingly entrusting all of his honor and majesty into the capable hands of the Son, whom he loved and would see majestic and honorable in all that he did even unto death. So the majesty and honor of God was also demonstrated in exercise of the inter-trinitarian love.

Third, God’s wrath, justice, and righteousness are never so fully demonstrated as they were on the cross, where Christ suffered infinite wrath against the sins of his people, and offered up instead of those imputed sins for which he was suffering a perfect righteousness, and so satisfying both the negative and positive demands of divine justice. But he was doing this also out of love for the Father and in the desire that his justice and righteousness should be upheld at any cost, even the cost of his own spotless life; and the Father was giving up the Son in love, for he desired that the Son should thereby win the glory of being the only Righteous Champion of his people, and an altogether sufficient Savior for them.

Fourth, God’s faithfulness and covenant loyalty are finally sealed on the cross, where, out of regard for the Father’s oath, who cannot lie nor deny himself (Heb. 6:18; 2 Tim. 2:13), Christ submitted to become as the severed animal halves, through which he walked with our father Abraham at the first (Gen. 15); as the psalmist said, he swore to his own hurt and did not change (Psalm 15:4), but suffered the penalty for the fracture of the Covenant so that God’s integrity and faithfulness might remain. So in this, too, Jesus was showing love to the Father and the Father in love was setting Jesus forth as the Covenant Champion, the second Adam in whom all are made alive (1 Cor. 15:22).

Fifth, no greater victory or display of almighty power was ever seen that when Jesus bound the strong man and plundered his goods on the cross (See Mat. 12:29). God had displayed his power when he swallowed up Pharaoh in the Red Sea (Ex. 14), and destroyed one-hundred eighty-five thousand of Sennacherib’s soldiers (Isaiah 36-37), and many other things; but never did he display such power as when on Calvary he smote sin and death and the devil, and raised up Christ from the dead as the Victor over all these things; but this greatest stroke of divine power in the history of the world leapt forth from the Son’s hand in token of his love for the Father, at whose bidding he took up arms on the Cross; and the great power of the Father in raising Jesus from the dead, and the all-powerful operation of the Spirit who by the resurrection declared Jesus Christ to be the eternal Son of God (Rom. 1:4), was out of love for this same Savior.

In many other ways could we demonstrate the same thing, but the sum of it is this, that Christ, in giving up himself for his people, was demonstrating by the operation and vindication of every divine attribute his perfect love for the Father; the Father, in sending forth his Son to win this glory, and promising in exchange, as an eternal heritage, a redeemed and glorified people to worship him forevermore; and the Spirit, in working to see this great transaction of divine love fully effected; all together shed forth in the sight of all creation a matchless representation of inter-trinitarian love, which governed and worked in and through the working of every other attribute that the cross so perfectly displayed. The whole character of God was displayed on the cross; but that whole character, in all its several parts, is that God is a God of love – yes, that God in fact is Love.

The inter-trinitarian love is fully given to us on the cross

But the inter-trinitarian love was not just fully displayed on the cross; it was also fully demonstrated to be something freely and fully given to us by the cross. The love of Christ for the Church is a love infinite in all its boundaries, for it is nothing less than the inter-trinitarian love, in all its fullness, poured out upon us; and we may see that when we consider that all those things which Jesus did on the cross out of love for his Father, and so that he might uphold and vindicate his holiness, majesty, righteousness, faithfulness, sovereignty, power, and so on, he was likewise doing for us, that he might perfectly redeem us, and give us as our portion this God whose character he so faithfully displayed.

The gift of Christ’s love to us is as great as the character of the God whom, in love, he glorified on the cross; for we are given that very God as our portion and heritage. If Christ had loved God less, and so been willing to follow an easier path in his pursuit of redemption, at the expense of some mar or flaw in his upholding of God’s perfect character, he would have been purchasing for us as our portion a God to be our God who was less just, or holy, or any other thing, than the God to whom he has in fact reconciled us; and therefore, he would have likewise been loving us less. But he loved us perfectly, and so won for us the favor and close relationship with the God whom, in love, he showed forth to be holy, just, faithful, sovereign, and majestic. He did this out of love for us, even though the price was his own soul, poured out to death.

But how much greater is the love of Christ than we can fathom, when we remember our condition when he so loved us! For when he did all the Father’s will, out of love for him, as hard as the path became, he was at least loving him who is utterly worthy of love. But when he did what he did out of love for us, when we were so unworthy, then he loved to the point of death on the cross even those who were eminently unworthy of such a love. In this way alone could the absolutely free and gratuitous nature of inter-trinitarian love been displayed. As free and perfect as the love of the Persons of the trinity for each other may be, at least that love is always merited; each Person is fully worthy of it. But in love for each other, the Persons of the trinity planned, accomplished, and applied the work of redemption, to display that inter-trinitarian love even more poignantly, by displaying its ability even to love the unlovely so fully and infinitely. Thus, the love of Christ, displayed on the cross, is the greatest spectacle of inter-trinitarian love that could ever have been accomplished.

And so it is that, all which the Son did out of love for the worthy Father, that he might give him something befitting his worthiness, he also did out of love for his unworthy people, that he might give them something befitting the very Father of Lights, in spite of their unworthiness. He suffered to uphold the holiness of the worthy Father; and he suffered to give us as an undeserved portion that utterly holy Father. He suffered to uphold the majesty and honor of the worthy Father; and he suffered to give us as an undeserved portion that utterly majestic and honorable Father; and so as well with his faithfulness, justice, sovereignty, and every other attribute we might mention.

In a similar way, the Father sent the Son to accomplish the greatest feat and most glorious work in all of history, so that he alone might have the glory of being the Redeemer, the Righteous Servant, the faithful Covenant Champion, the Victor over sin and death; but when in his love he sent the Son to be so honored for his work, he sent him to us, as our portion, as his gift of love to us. Everything that the Son is, the Father has given to us, for the Son is our Champion and Head and Bridegroom and Elder Brother and Portion and Savior and Priest and King. All that he is is ours, for he is ours, and he has given us his Holy Spirit, who, in love, communicates to us all the fullness of the Father and Son whom he loves with an infinite love. No glory has ever been displayed like the inter-trinitarian glory revealed on the cross; and all that glory is freely offered to us as an unmerited and eternal and unfathomable gift of purest love. This is the highest and ultimate way in which the greatness of the love of Christ may be demonstrated to his Church.

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