The Spirit of holiness here is in contrast to the flesh in v. 3. As the flesh in v. 3 refers to the human nature of Christ in the flesh, so the Spirit in this verse does not refer to the person of the Holy Spirit of God but to the divine essence of Christ. This divine essence of Christ, being God the Spirit Himself (John 4:24), the divinity of Christ, is of holiness, full of the nature and quality of being holy.
Not the Holy Spirit but the Spirit as Christ’s divine essence (Rom. 1:4; cf. John 4:24a). The crucifixion put Christ to death only in His flesh—which He received through His incarnation (John 1:14)—not in His Spirit as His divinity. His Spirit as His divinity did not die at the cross when His flesh died; rather, His Spirit as His divinity was made alive, enlivened, with new power of life, so that in this empowered Spirit as His divinity He made a proclamation to the fallen angels after His death in the flesh and before His resurrection.
Prayer: Lord, we worship You as the Son of God. Especially we worship You as the God-man. You are the real God and the perfect man. Lord, You are even the consummated God and the uplifted man. We are looking unto You. Lord, You are everything, and we are nothing. You are the center of God’s economy and also the goal of our pursuit. Lord, we want to know You, to comprehend You, and to gain You. You are the reality of all the revelations. We do not just want the vain revelations without the reality. Lord, in these days while we are seeking You, grant us to experience You every day as the reality of all the revelations You have shown us. Lord, cover us. We surely need Your covering. You know how the enemy is struggling to fight against the release of Your word in a deeper way. Lord, show us how You became man in Your divinity to bring Your divinity into man and how You became the life-giving Spirit and the firstborn Son of God bringing humanity into divinity. We worship You as such a One. Amen.
In this message we want to see the designation of Christ’s humanity. Christ is the very God, the triune, eternal, self-existing, and ever-existing God. According to His heart’s desire, one day He became a man. By becoming a man, He brought divinity into humanity. Then He lived on the earth for thirty-three and a half years. He lived a human life but by the divine life. Then He went to the cross, was crucified there, and entered into resurrection.
The first marvelous and excellent thing which transpired in Christ’s resurrection was the designation of His humanity. Designated means “resurrected.” Designated in Romans 1:4 refers to His resurrection. In resurrection Christ’s humanity was uplifted into His divinity. In His incarnation He brought divinity into humanity, and in His resurrection He brought His humanity into divinity. This divine traffic mingles God and man as one. Thus, He became the God-man.
In order to help us get into such a deep word, I want to present the designation of Christ’s humanity in the following way. First, we have to see Christ’s two natures—divine and human. The Bible is a divine revelation. Quite often, some revelations in the Bible are too deep, far beyond our human understanding. Apparently, all the Christians who read the Bible have come to know that Christ has two natures. Because He is both God and man, He possesses the divine nature and the human nature. In order to enter into the depths of the divine revelation concerning the designation of Christ’s humanity, we need to see the two natures of Christ.
According to the flesh, Christ was a human being that came out of the seed of David (Rom. 1:3). The seed of David is a descendant of David. Christ, according to the flesh as a human being, was one of the descendants of David. He was out of the seed of David, not to be the Son of God, because David was not God. David was a man. Therefore, Christ, according to His flesh, came out of the seed of David to be the Son of Man (John 3:14). In the four Gospels, the Lord referred to Himself as the Son of Man seventy-eight times.