Mitch Chase
How should we talk of Jesus?
In one sense, talking about Jesus is easy. He’s our Savior and our redeemer. He’s the atoning sacrifice for sinners. He’s the Son of God who has demonstrated his great love for us by satisfying God’s righteous wrath in our place. He’s the risen and reigning king who has triumphed over death.
In another sense, talking about Jesus is dangerous, and sometimes people veer into heretical waters.
A goal we should have as disciples of Jesus is to grow in our understanding of Jesus without compromising orthodoxy. And as we help others understand the Bible, and specifically the doctrine of Christology, we will need to know how to teach things about Jesus that are biblically faithful and historically sound.
One such teaching we need to understand is the hypostatic union. If we do not understand it, we cannot teach it.
Table of contents
Not whoever you want him to be
Before we get into what the hypostatic union is and why it matters, we need to notice that, even in the early church, people couldn’t believe whatever they wanted about Jesus and still be considered true and faithful Christians. Sometimes what people believed about Jesus was more in line with an antichrist spirit than with apostolic teaching.
For example, if someone denied that “Jesus is the Christ,” that person was a liar (1 John 2:22 ESV).1 Conversely, evidence of the new birth was a confession that “Jesus is the Christ” (5:1 ESV). If someone denied that “Jesus has come in the flesh,” that person was not from God and therefore could not represent God in denying such an important truth (4:2–3 ESV). But the work of the Holy Spirit involved the conviction in a sinner’s heart that Jesus had come in genuine flesh, true humanity (4:2 ESV).
The apostles taught specific things about Jesus, and these things were not optional or extraneous features of their teaching (see Matt 16:16–18; 1 Cor 12:3; 15:3–5 ESV). So too today, Jesus is not whoever you want him to be. Jesus is who he revealed himself to be as well as what the apostles of Jesus taught about him. What people of true faith do is receive the revelation of the Scriptures, even if the teaching about Jesus is challenging to our understanding and even if we do not fully comprehend what is taught. We are, after all, dealing with special revelation about the Son of God.
Understanding the truth about Jesus’s identity is important because false saviors don’t save sinners.
Understanding the truth about Jesus’s identity is important because false saviors don’t save sinners. The real Jesus, however, is full of grace and truth (John 1:14). He pardons sin, sustains the saints, and is powerful enough to raise them from death upon his triumphant and glorious return. So, for the sake of our souls and the sound instruction of others (1 Tim 4:16), we need to meditate deeply and frequently on the staggering truths about who Jesus is.
The hypostatic union
The phrase “hypostatic union” is a useful shorthand to express the truth that Jesus is one person with two natures. Jesus is the eternal Son who has taken to himself a truly human nature.
The word “hypostatic” refers to the “hypostasis”—or subsistence, i.e., distinct mode or manner of being (more commonly, “person”) of the Son. “Union,” in the phrase “hypostatic union,” refers to the union of these two natures—divine and human—in the person (hypostasis) of the Son. Jesus, therefore, possesses a truly divine nature and a truly human nature.
You cannot understand what the incarnation means without this hypostatic union. The angel Gabriel told Mary, “Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus” (Luke 1:31 ESV). The Bible teaches that the Lord Jesus had genuine human flesh. Mary gave birth to her son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger (2:7). And over time, Jesus grew (2:40, 52). He moved from infancy to childhood to adolescence to adulthood.
A Bible reader may sense the mystery in these affirmations. The truths and features of Jesus’s deity and humanity transcend our full comprehension. Yet the reality of mystery is what we should expect when we contemplate the wonders of the Word who was with God and was God and became flesh.
4 heresies the hypostatic union corrects
When we teach about the incarnation of Christ, a useful track for teachers and listeners to pursue is what the incarnation does mean and what it doesn’t mean.
1. Docetism
The hypostatic union reminds us that Jesus did not just seem to be human. The heresy of docetism taught that Jesus did not bear a genuine physicality; he only appeared to be incarnate. Biblical Christianity, however, insists upon the substance, not merely the semblance, of his humanity.
2. Nestorianism
The hypostatic union also reminds us that Jesus’s human nature did not involve an additional person. This point is crucial to avoid the heresy of Nestorianism, which teaches that Jesus is a divine person and a human person. According to Scripture, Jesus is the person of the Son, and because of the incarnation, this one person possesses truly divine and truly human natures.
3. Adoptionism
The hypostatic union reminds us that Jesus’s deity did not begin at some later point in time. We must avoid the heresy of adoptionism, which teaches that the Son’s deity was granted during his earthly life and thus that his humanity preexisted his deity. The Son’s deity was not something he lacked and needed to receive.
4. Arianism
The hypostatic union also reminds us that the Son was—and is—eternal. This truth helps us to avoid the heresy of Arianism, which says that God created the Son. According to Scripture, the Son is not a creature whom God made, but God himself, the Creator.
In contrast to these errors, consider the various truths in John 1. According to the biblical author, the Son is the Word which preceded all created things (John 1:1–3), and thus the Son was not something that was made. The Son exists as God and is coeternal with the Father (1:1–2, 14, 18). The person of the Son—this eternal Word—takes to himself a truly human nature and becomes flesh (1:14). The glory of the incarnation refers to the wonder of the hypostatic union.
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All attributes secure
When people are learning about the incarnation, sometimes they assume that Jesus’s humanity had an effect on his deity.
One common way of expressing this error might be: “At the incarnation, Jesus set aside his divine attributes.” Such an idea probably has in mind the fact that Jesus was born, grew, asked questions, occupied one place at a time, could become tired, could suffer, and could die. These realities don’t sound like deity. They sound like humanity.
Those who believe Jesus set aside divine attributes might be basing this idea on a particular reading of Philippians 2. In Philippians 2:7, Paul says that Jesus “emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men” (ESV). That statement can be easily misunderstood. An interpreter might imply something that Paul didn’t say, such as: Jesus “emptied himself of his divine attributes, by taking the form of a servant.” This error is known as kenoticism.
When Paul said Jesus “emptied himself,” the subsequent phrases in Philippians 2:7 clarify what this “emptying” means: Jesus took the form of a servant and shared our humanity (“born in the likeness of men”). Paul doesn’t say that Jesus set aside, or turned off (like switches), his divine attributes. In fact, a proper understanding of the hypostatic union requires that we acknowledge all divine attributes to be intact and accounted for.
Jesus’s deity was not undermined or diluted in any way by the incarnation.
There are disastrous implications to the notion that Jesus emptied his divine attributes at the incarnation. If Jesus did so, then his deity is compromised, diminished, even denied. If Jesus sets aside divine attributes, in what sense could we say he still possessed a divine nature? Setting aside divine attributes would be setting aside what it means to be God. But God can never cease to be what he is. God is his attributes. Believers should want to affirm, and insist on, the unchanging divine nature of Jesus.
The doctrine of the hypostatic union teaches, therefore, that Jesus’s deity was not undermined or diluted in any way by the incarnation. According to his deity, the Son remained omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent.
Partitive exegesis
Christ’s dual natures are what justify the practice of partitive exegesis.
If you are a preacher, there are people in your flock who have questions about what Jesus means when he says he does not know the timing of his return (Matt 24:36), whether he genuinely did not know who touched the hem of his garment (Mark 5:30), and whether he truly grew in wisdom and stature (Luke 2:52). How do such things square with his deity?
Likewise there are passages where Jesus makes divine claims, forgives sins (Mark 2:1–12), treads the waves (Matt 14:22–33), commands the wind (Mark 4:35–41), drives out demons (Luke 11:20), and refers to himself as the world’s judge (John 5:22). How do such things square with his humanity?
The practice of “partitive exegesis” is helpful here. Partitive exegesis is the practice of understanding some passages as more prominently featuring either Jesus’s deity or his humanity. Jesus is truly divine and truly human, and those truths will impact the way we interpret words and deeds of Christ in the four Gospels.
Partitive exegesis helps us steer clear of the errors of interpreting a biblical passage in a way that either negates Jesus’s deity or negates his humanity. John Calvin was right:
The Son of God descended miraculously from heaven, yet without abandoning heaven; was pleased to be conceived miraculously in the Virgin’s womb, to live on the earth, and hang upon the cross, and yet always filled the world as from the beginning.2
The past and future Jesus
As we explain the hypostatic union, we should emphasize its permanence. The Son who took on flesh, and who physically suffered and died, is the same Son who physically rose from the dead. Weeks after his resurrection, Jesus ascended to heaven (Acts 1:9–11). And right now, the embodied Son of God reigns over all things (Heb 1:3).
Jesus will forever possess truly divine and truly human natures. Their union in the person of the Son will never dissolve. When Jesus returns, it will be a bodily return. When Jesus raises the saints, their physical resurrection will conform to the glory of his own (Phil 3:20–21). In the unending peace and joy of the new creation, the Lord Jesus will dwell with imperishable physicality.
The Son’s incarnation, then, was not just for the seasons of his earthly ministry. And his death on the cross did not lead to a discarding of his humanity. Instead, Jesus’s humanity was restored, raised, and glorified. The incarnation is forever. His human nature will never become a divine nature, and his divine nature will never become human. Instead, the person of the Son will forever possess a truly divine and a truly human nature. His divine nature never began and will never end. His humanity came to be at a point in time, yet it will never be destroyed.
Counsel from a council
The affirmation of Jesus’s two natures is crucial to the Christian faith and is rooted in the history of Christ’s church. I noted several heresies above that we must avoid to remain sound in our Christology and helpful in our instruction to others. Paul told Timothy, “Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers” (1 Tim 4:16 ESV).
Watchfulness in doctrine will include precision in Christology. We are not the first to think about the identity of Jesus, so we are not trying to “reinvent the wheel,” so to speak. We need to be present disciples who are shaped by the church’s history. Part of how we will live in the context of church history is by growing in our awareness of how believers have spoken about critical doctrines of the Christian faith.
In matters of Christology, the Council of Chalcedon in AD 451 has guidance for us in how to think about and speak about the person of Christ (see also the Nicene and Athanasian Creeds). The following words from the Definition of Chalcedon illuminate our discussion about the hypostatic union.
We, then, following the holy Fathers, all with one consent, teach men to confess one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the same perfect in Godhead and also perfect in manhood; truly God and truly man, of a reasonable [rational] soul and body; consubstantial [coessential] with us according to the manhood; in all things like unto us, without sin; begotten before all ages of the Father according to the Godhead, and in these latter days, for us and for our salvation, born of the Virgin Mary, the mother of God, according to the Manhood; one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, Only-begotten, to be acknowledged in two natures, inconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, inseparably; the distinction of natures being by no means taken away by the union, but rather the property of each nature being preserved, and concurring in one person and one Subsistence, not parted or divided into two persons, but one and the same Son, and only begotten, God the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ, as the prophets from the beginning [have declared] concerning him, and the Lord Jesus Christ himself has taught us, and the Creed of the holy Fathers has handed down to us.3
Let’s gladly receive the articulation of the faithful saints who have gone before us. Let’s echo their words about the person of Christ. Let’s teach clearly and carefully about who Jesus is. Let’s identify and warn against heresies, that we may guard sound doctrine and rebuke false teaching. Cherishing the truth of the hypostatic union, let’s continue pointing sinners to the God-man, for whose glory all things were made, and for whose glory is the salvation of sinners.
Recommended resources from Mitch Chase
Biblical Reasoning: Christological and Trinitarian Rules for Exegesis
Regular price: $29.99
Biblical Reasoning: Christological and Trinitarian Rules for Exegesis
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All That Is in God: Evangelical Theology and the Challenge of Classical Christian Theism
Regular price: $10.99
The Person of Christ: An Introduction (Short Studies in Systematic Theology)
Regular price: $13.99
God the Son Incarnate: The Doctrine of Christ (Foundations of Evangelical Theology)
Regular price: $27.99
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- All scripture quotations are taken from the English Standard Version.
- John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 1997). Book 2, Chapter 13.
- As found in Rick Brannan, Historic Creeds and Confessions, electronic ed. (Oak Harbor: Lexham Press, 1997).
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Logos Staff
Mark Brians
Jake Meador