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Hebrews 13:8 - Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
Could Jesus sin? If you've ever discussed this question with a large group of
Christians, you are well aware that all believers are not in agreement as to the answer.
There is no disagreement concerning the question, "Did Jesus sin?" All
true believers agree that the Bible clearly teaches that Jesus was sinless. 1 Peter 2:22
states that Jesus "committed no sin." Our Lord was "without sin"
according to Hebrews 4:15 and "knew no sin" according to 2 Corinthians 5:21. The
angelic announcement to Mary and Joseph that the Son of God would be the "holy
offspring" (Luke 1:35), and "conceived by the Holy Spirit" (Matthew 1:20),
makes it clear that the nature of Christ was sinless from conception. The statement in 1
John 3:5 that "in Him is no sin" leaves no doubt about the permanency of the
sinless nature of Christ. (See also John 14:30, Acts 3:14, Hebrews 7:26 and Hebrews 9:14.)
The Lord Jesus was the perfect Man. Not even the whitest of lies ever escaped His lips and
not even the slightest of selfish thoughts ever crossed His mind. Because Scripture is so
clear concerning the sinlessness of Christ, orthodoxy has always answered a resounding
"No" to the question, "Did Jesus sin?" However, in reference to
the question, "Could Jesus sin?" some Christians throughout Church
history have held that the Scripture is not so clear in its answer. They have therefore
concluded that Jesus was peccable. That is, He was able to sin--even though He did
not sin.
While a peccable Christ may at first appear to be a more empathetic and
human Jesus, a Christ who was able to sin is robbed of His full deity. Only an impeccable
Christ measures up to the teaching of Scripture that the Son of God was fully God. Jesus could
not sin because He was God. The term impeccable implies more than just the ability
not to sin. Impeccable means not able to sin. Adam, before the fall, had the
ability not to sin, but he was not impeccable because he had the ability to sin. Jesus was
impeccable because as God He was not able to sin.
"Wait a minute!" you may say. "Isn't that one-sided
logic? Wasn't it stated above that the Bible taught that Jesus was Man as well as God?
Isn't it logical to conclude that, as Man, Jesus was capable of sinning?" While the
God-side of the logic seems to be straightforward and conclusive, how is the man-side of
the logic to be answered? Once again the God-side of the logic equation is as follows:
Since Jesus is God and God cannot sin, then Jesus cannot sin. The man-side of the logic
equation seems to contradict this conclusion. Since Jesus is man and man can sin,
then Jesus can sin. What's the answer to this apparent contradiction in logic? The
answer lies in the fact that there is a flaw in the man-side of the logic. The premise
that man can sin is not 100% correct. A person does not have to sin or even be able to sin
in order to be classified as man. The fact that we humans are all capable of sinning is
not intrinsic to the definition of mankind. In our glorified bodies in the eternal future,
for example, we will not sin or be able to sin (praise God!), but we will still be
mankind. We are not going to be changed into angels or some new kind of creature--we will
still be human and yet we will be sinless! To be capable of sinning is not a necessary
part of what makes up the essence of man. So for Jesus to be fully Man, as the
Bible teaches, does not necessitate His capability of sinning. Don't be thrown off by what
appears to be sound logic. Even though every other person in history has been able
to sin (in fact, not able not to sin!), this characteristic of mankind is not what
defines the essence of man. However, for Jesus to be fully God as Scripture teaches does
mean that Jesus could not sin. Here the logic is very sound and cannot be disputed.
One of the strongest Scriptural statements for the impeccability of
Christ is found in Hebrews 13:8. "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and
forever." Can Jesus sin today? No! Will He be able to sin in the forever future? No!
Well, what about yesterday? Is He the same or isn't He? If He was the same yesterday as He
is today, then He could no more sin yesterday than He can today or forever. The constancy
of Christ's character is demanded by Hebrews 13:8. The fact that Christ does not and can
not change is known as the doctrine of immutability. Immutable means "not capable or
not susceptible to change." The attribute of immutability applies just as much to the
Person of the Son in the Trinity as the Persons of the Father and the Holy Spirit. In
fact, a section of Psalm 102 which speaks of the unchangeableness of God is applied
directly to Christ, the Son, in Hebrews 1:10-12. "But about the Son He says...'In the
beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of
your hands. They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You
will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed. But you remain the
same, and your years will never end.'" There was no "time out" period
for the Son's immutability when He walked on this earth. Colossians 2:9 emphasizes that
all the attributes of Deity were present in the Son during His earthly ministry. "For
in Christ all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form." The attribute of
immutability not only implies impeccability during the Son's earthly ministry, it demands
it!
But what about the temptations of Christ? Doesn't the fact that Jesus
was tempted imply that Jesus was "temptable?" No, not necessarily. Temptation is
the attempt to ensnare and does not define the temptability of the target. A
rowboat may attack another rowboat or it may attack a battleship. While the attack may be
the same in both cases, the attempt in no way defines the vulnerability of the object
attacked! In the case of our own bouts with temptation there may be an inward response
without an outward "committing the act." This is because we have a sinful nature
and are therefore temptable. As James 1:14 says, "Each one is tempted when he is
carried away and enticed by his own lust." But the case of the Lord Jesus is unique.
Without a sinful nature, the temptations of Christ were strictly a test from without with
no inward response whatsoever. In terms of the illustration above, our Lord is like the
battleship. Even if rammed by the rowboat, the attack causes no damage whatsoever.
Well then, if Jesus could not sin, are the temptations of Christ a sham?
No! The temptations of the Lord Jesus were not to see if He would sin, but to show
that He could not sin. Show whom? Well for one thing, Satan and his fallen angels.
Satan did not necessarily know that Christ could not sin. He's not omniscient! As the
wonder of the incarnation became evident to Satan, he was determined to thwart the
purposes of God in any way he could. He tried on more than one occasion to attack the Lord
Jesus with temptation. (See Luke 4:13.) But Satan learned to his undoing that the prophecy
made in the Garden of Eden concerning the "Seed of the woman" could not be
thwarted. (See Genesis 3:15.) The triumph of Christ over temptation demonstrated to all
the angelic hosts, and to us as well, that the eternal Son of God was not susceptible to
sin even though He became Man.
If Jesus could not sin, can He sympathize with us when we are tempted?
Does the fact that Jesus was not able to sin make Him less "human" and less able
to understand what we go through as fallen humans? Not according to Scripture. Hebrews
4:15 says that "We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our
weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are--yet without
sin." This verse seems to imply that Jesus experienced the force of temptation the
same way we do, but is that possible if Jesus could not sin? What is the answer to this
apparently difficult question? One possible answer that has been suggested by Christians
over the years is that Jesus may not have known that He could not sin. We do know that in
the eternal counsels of God it was decreed that certain facts would not be in the
conscious mind of the incarnate Son of God. As a Boy, He would learn facts about
His own creation, and even as a Man He would be able to say that He did not know the
"day or the hour" of His second advent. (See Mark 13:32 and Luke 2:52.) On the
other hand, as God, our Lord may have known all along that He could not sin. The Lord's
statement to the Pharisees in John 8:46 would imply that this was the case. In response to
the Pharisees' argument against His deity, Jesus said, "Which one of you convicts Me
of sin? If I speak truth, why do you not believe Me?" But even if Jesus knew He could
not sin, He still felt the force of the temptations. Doesn't a tree feel the full force of
a hurricane even though it doesn't fall? Consider an infinitely strong tree that cannot
fail during a hurricane. Does this tree experience and feel the force of the storm as much
as the trees that are more vulnerable? Of course it does. In fact, the tree that cannot
fail experiences a greater force of the storm than a tree that falls.
What kind of a High Priest do we want, anyway? Do we want a High Priest
who was so susceptible and vulnerable to sin when He lived on this earth that He almost
sinned on certain occasions? Do we want a High Priest who had to struggle with His thought
life before He overcame temptation in order to "feel" the force of the
temptation the way we do? Do we want a High Priest who only had limited moral strength to
resist temptation? Or do we want a High Priest who had infinite resistance against
sin? Praise God, we have a High Priest who was not susceptible or vulnerable to sin in any
way. He did not struggle to keep His thought life pure. He was the perfect Man. He was
attacked but it was like a hurricane against the Rock of Gibraltar. He had infinite moral
strength and therefore infinite resistance against sin--because He was God and could not
sin. We have a High Priest who was the same yesterday as He is today and will be forever.
The immutability of the eternal Son of God demands that He has always been impeccable.
David R. Reid
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