The Glory of God (2): Released through Christ’s Crucifixion and Resurrection

The incarnated Christ, as the embodiment of the Triune God, concealed the divine glory within the shell of His humanity (John 12:24; Col. 2:9; Phil. 2:6-8; see Part 1 here). As a man in the flesh, Christ longed and prayed for the divine glory within Him to be released through His death and resurrection (Luke 12:49-50; John 12:23-24; 17:1, 5). The Father’s will was for Christ to drink the “cup” of death on the cross, and the Lord Jesus fully submitted to His Father’s will in this matter (Matt. 26:39; Phil. 2:8). As Jesus was crucified on the cross, the shell of His humanity was broken, and the divine glory that was formerly concealed within Him was released.

While the Lord’s crucifixion was the beginning of this release of the divine glory, His resurrection continued the process. Three key verses use the words glory or glorify to refer to the Lord’s resurrection: “Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son that the Son may glorify You” (John 17:1). “Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and enter into His glory?” (Luke 24:26). “The God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified His Servant Jesus, whom you delivered up and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he had decided to release Him” (Acts 3:13). The Lord prayed that the Father would glorify Him through death and resurrection, resulting in the reciprocal glorification of the Father. The Father answered this prayer, as mentioned by the Lord to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus in Luke 24 and testified by Peter and John in Acts 3. Hence, although the divine glory was released through the breaking of the shell of Christ’s humanity on the cross, this process was not completed until the Father glorified Him with the divine glory through resurrection. Therefore, resurrection and glorification describe the same process; resurrection is the cause, and glorification, the result.

The Father’s glorification of Christ through death and resurrection was no mere external matter. Rather, in resurrection, Christ became the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45). As such, He was transferred from the stage of His incarnation, where He was a man in the flesh, to the second stage of His ministry where He transmits the divine life and glory into His believers as the Spirit (John 10:10; Eph. 4:18; John 17:22; 2 Thes. 2:14). It is significant that in the second part of His prayer to be glorified in John 17, the Lord asked that His glorification result in the oneness of the believers for the corporate expression of the Triune God, the ultimate glorification of the Father (vv. 21-23). This corporate expression is the issue of the glorified Christ’s transmission of Himself as the life-giving Spirit into His believers.

Further Reading:

Witness Lee, The Issue of Christ Being Glorified by the Father with the Divine Glory, Chapter 2 (Print).

Witness Lee, Incarnation, Inclusion, Intensification, Chapter 2 (Print).

Witness Lee, The Life-study of John, Chapter 3 (Nook, Kindle, iBooks, Print).

Holy Bible Recovery Version, all verses mentioned in this post and their corresponding footnotes (NookKindleiBooksPrint).

(Most references in the Further Reading can also be viewed on www.ministrybooks.org.)

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