The Eternal Son — Pre-existence and Deity
The New Testament opens by claiming something extraordinary: the one born in Bethlehem was not a new being. He had existed from eternity as the second Person of the Trinity, the Word (Logos) by whom all things were made.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. John 1:1–3
John's prologue deliberately echoes Genesis 1:1 — "in the beginning." The Son was not created; he was already there before creation, the agent of all that came into being. Jesus himself asserted his pre-existence: "before Abraham was, I am" (John 8:58) — an unmistakable use of the divine name (Exodus 3:14).
The New Testament attributes full divine titles and prerogatives to Jesus. He is called "God" directly in John 1:1, 20:28, Romans 9:5, Titus 2:13, and Hebrews 1:8. He possesses divine attributes: omniscience (John 21:17), omnipresence (Matthew 28:20), and omnipotence (Philippians 3:21). He exercises divine functions: creating (Colossians 1:16), sustaining all things (Hebrews 1:3), and raising the dead (John 5:21).
Philippians 2:6–11 is likely an early Christian hymn and the most theologically rich Christological passage in Paul. The Son "was in the form of God" (morphē theou) — possessing the very nature of deity — yet "did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped" but "emptied himself" (ekenōsen), taking the form of a servant. The self-emptying was not a surrender of divine attributes but the voluntary concealment of divine glory in the act of becoming human for our salvation (Philippians 2:6–8).
The Incarnation — God Becomes Flesh
The most staggering event in all of history: the eternal Word "became flesh and dwelt among us" (John 1:14). God did not appear to be human — he became genuinely, fully human without ceasing to be fully divine.
For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Isaiah 9:6
The incarnation was effected by the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit (Luke 1:35). The virgin birth is not peripheral but theologically essential: it preserves the sinlessness of Christ (he did not inherit the guilt of Adam through ordinary generation) and confirms the unique identity of the one born — the eternal Son entering history in a wholly new and unrepeatable way.
Scripture gives several purposes: to provide atonement (1 John 4:10), to be a merciful high priest by sharing in our weakness (Hebrews 2:17–18), to reveal the Father fully (John 14:9), to destroy the devil's works (1 John 3:8), and to be the second Adam who succeeds where the first failed (Romans 5:19).
The incarnation was anticipated throughout the Old Testament. The promised seed of the woman (Genesis 3:15), the son of David who would reign forever (2 Samuel 7:12–13), the suffering servant of Isaiah (Isaiah 52:13–53:12), and the son of man given dominion over all nations (Daniel 7:13–14) all converge in Jesus of Nazareth.
The Two Natures — Hypostatic Union
The central Christological question of the patristic era was: how can one person be both fully God and fully human? The church's answer, refined through centuries of controversy and articulated at Chalcedon (AD 451), is the doctrine of the hypostatic union.
One person (hypostasis) in two natures — divine and human — without confusion, without change, without division, without separation. Each nature retains its own properties. The Son is "complete in Godhead and complete in humanity, truly God and truly man."
His Full Humanity
Jesus was no phantom. The Gospels insist on the reality of his human nature: he was born (Luke 2:7), grew in wisdom and stature (Luke 2:52), was hungry (Matthew 4:2), thirsty (John 19:28), weary (John 4:6), and grieved (John 11:35). He truly died and was buried. His humanity was real, not apparent.
Crucially, he became human "in every respect" like us — yet "without sin" (Hebrews 4:15). The sinlessness is not the absence of humanity but its perfection. Jesus is what humanity was always meant to be.
His Full Deity
Alongside the evidence of his genuine humanity, the Gospels present equal evidence of his divine nature. He forgave sins — which only God can do (Mark 2:5–7). He commanded the wind and sea with a word (Mark 4:39–41). He raised the dead (John 11:43–44). He claimed to be the resurrection and the life itself (John 11:25).
Because Christ is fully human, he is a sympathetic high priest who can be touched by our weaknesses (Hebrews 4:15–16). Because he is fully divine, his mediation is infinitely sufficient. We approach God through one who is both bone of our bone and the brightness of the Father's glory.
The Threefold Office — Prophet, Priest, King
Reformed theology has organized Christ's mediatorial work under three offices that Israel's covenant history anticipated. Each office addresses a specific aspect of our need as sinners: ignorance, guilt, and bondage.
Prophet
Moses had promised: "The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me" (Deuteronomy 18:15). Jesus is the final and greatest prophet — not merely one who speaks God's word but who is God's Word (John 1:1). "Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son" (Hebrews 1:1–2). His teaching carries divine authority: "You have heard it said… but I say to you" (Matthew 5:22).
Priest
As prophet he speaks to us from God; as priest he represents us before God. The entire Old Testament priesthood and sacrificial system was a shadow pointing to him. He is both the priest who offers (Hebrews 9:14) and the sacrifice offered — the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29).
But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God… For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. Hebrews 10:12–14
Unlike the Levitical priests who stood and repeated their offerings daily, Christ sat down — the work is finished. His priesthood is eternal and inviolable: "He holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever. Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them" (Hebrews 7:24–25).
King
The promised son of David was to rule on an eternal throne (2 Samuel 7:13; Psalm 2:6–9). After his resurrection, Jesus declared: "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me" (Matthew 28:18). He rules now — not waiting until his return — over all things, including the church (Ephesians 1:22) and the nations (Psalm 110:1–2).
Christ's three offices correspond to humanity's three deepest needs: our ignorance of God is met by the Prophet; our guilt before God is met by the Priest; our bondage to sin and death is met by the King. No other mediator fills all three.
The Atonement — Substitution and Satisfaction
The central event of redemption is the cross. Christ did not merely die as a martyr or moral example — he died for sinners, bearing their punishment in their place. The New Testament uses multiple images to describe what happened at Calvary, each illuminating a different facet of the one inexhaustible event.
He was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned — every one — to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all. Isaiah 53:5–6
Penal Substitution
The foundational logic of the atonement is substitution: Christ bore the penalty our sins deserved in our place. He was "our substitute" before the divine law court — the innocent bearing the punishment due the guilty. This is not a later theological construction; it is the explicit teaching of the apostles.
"For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" (2 Corinthians 5:21). "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us — for it is written, 'Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree'" (Galatians 3:13). "The LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all" (Isaiah 53:6).
Propitiation
This is the great marvel of the atonement: God himself provides what his own justice requires. "In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins" (1 John 4:10). The God who condemns is the same God who redeems — wrath and mercy meet at the cross.
Redemption and Ransom
Christ's death is also described as a ransom — a price paid to liberate captives. "The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many" (Matthew 20:28). We were enslaved to sin, death, and the condemnation of the law; Christ's blood purchased our freedom (Galatians 4:5; 1 Peter 1:18–19).
Reconciliation
The atonement restores a broken relationship. We were "enemies" of God (Romans 5:10), "alienated and hostile in mind" (Colossians 1:21). Through Christ's death the hostility is removed and peace is made — "God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them" (2 Corinthians 5:19).
The cross is the permanent ground of the believer's confidence before God. Our sin has been fully dealt with — not minimized, not deferred, but actually punished in the person of our substitute. The believer can stand before God "holy and blameless and above reproach" because of what Christ accomplished (Colossians 1:22).
The Resurrection — Vindication and New Creation
The resurrection of Jesus is not an appendix to the gospel — it is, alongside the cross, the heart of it. "If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins" (1 Corinthians 15:17). Paul stakes everything on the bodily resurrection of Christ from the dead.
And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 1 Corinthians 15:17–20
The resurrection declares Christ's sacrifice accepted: he was "delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification" (Romans 4:25). It vindicates his identity as the Son of God "with power" (Romans 1:4). It is the beginning of the new creation — the first instance of the resurrection life that all believers will share. He is the "firstborn from the dead" (Colossians 1:18), the forerunner whose resurrection is the guarantee and pattern of ours (1 Corinthians 15:22–23).
The resurrection means that Christ's death was sufficient — God himself ratified it by raising his Son. It also means that death is defeated: the Christian's future is not annihilation but resurrection. "Because I live, you also will live" (John 14:19).
The Exaltation — Ascension, Session, Intercession
Christ's humiliation (incarnation → suffering → death → burial) was followed by his exaltation. Forty days after his resurrection he ascended bodily into heaven (Acts 1:9–11), where he was seated at the right hand of the Father — the position of supreme authority and honor.
Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Philippians 2:9–11
The Session — Reigning at God's Right Hand
The "session" (Latin: sessio, sitting) refers to Christ's present enthronement at the Father's right hand, fulfilling Psalm 110:1 — the most frequently quoted Old Testament verse in the New Testament. He reigns now, not merely in the future, over all things for the sake of his church (Ephesians 1:20–22).
Intercession — Our Ongoing Advocate
The exalted Christ is not absent from us in any meaningful sense. He intercedes for his people before the Father, presenting his atoning work as the perpetual basis of our acceptance. "Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died — more than that, who was raised — who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us" (Romans 8:34).
His intercession is more than prayer on our behalf; it is the perpetual presentation of his sacrifice before the Father's throne. "Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them" (Hebrews 7:25).
The Gift of the Spirit
A direct consequence of the ascension was the sending of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. "Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing" (Acts 2:33). The Spirit's presence in the church is the continuation of Christ's own ministry — he is the "other Comforter" sent in Christ's name (John 14:16–17).
Christ's ascension is not his departure from us but a change in the mode of his presence. He is no longer locally present in one body; he is universally present through his Spirit, "with you always, to the end of the age" (Matthew 28:20).
The Return — Christ Coming Again
The session is not the final word. The same Jesus who ascended will return bodily and visibly. His return will be personally ("this same Jesus"), bodily ("in the same way you saw him go into heaven"), and universally visible (Acts 1:11; Revelation 1:7).
For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. 1 Thessalonians 4:16
Christ returns to judge the living and the dead (2 Timothy 4:1; Acts 17:31), to raise his people in glorified bodies (1 Corinthians 15:52), and to renew all creation — establishing "new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells" (2 Peter 3:13). The consummation is the fulfillment, not the destruction, of the original created order.
The Christological story spans all of history: the eternal Son who created all things (Colossians 1:16), humbled himself to redeem all things, rose as the firstfruits of a new creation, reigns until he has put every enemy under his feet (1 Corinthians 15:25), and will at the end "deliver the kingdom to God the Father" so that "God may be all in all" (1 Corinthians 15:24–28).
The return of Christ is not a footnote to Christian hope — it is its goal. Every promise of the gospel finds its ultimate fulfillment when Jesus is seen, face to face, by those for whom he died. "We know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure" (1 John 3:2–3).
For Further Study
The Person of Christ, Donald Macleod. IVP, 1998. Lucid, pastoral, and theologically rigorous treatment of the incarnation and two natures. One of the best modern introductions to Christology.
The Atonement, Leon Morris. IVP, 1983. Careful biblical survey of the key atonement concepts: propitiation, redemption, reconciliation, sacrifice, and more.
Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning — see instead: The Mediator, Emil Brunner (1927). A thorough dogmatic treatment of the Person and Work of Christ; demanding but rewarding for those wanting depth.
Lectures in Systematic Theology, John Dick (1850). Public domain. Classic Reformed treatment of Christology in lectures 42–60; freely available online.