The Delightful Willingness of Christ

As I have personally delved into the incarnation this year, as I have decided to do each year at this time, I am particularly struck with the willingness of Christ to come to earth in fashion as a man. This is highlighted in a text that isn’t typically referred to during this season. The text is Hebrews 10:7,

“Then said I, “Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me,) to do thy will, O God.””

Willingness Context

Contextually the author of Hebrews is addressing that the sacrifices and offerings of the law were “a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things”, and with firm clarity, “can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect”. The proof – if they had made the comers perfect, “for then would they not have ceased to be offered.” Instead of ceasing to be offered, “there is a remembrance again made of sins every year” under the law with those sacrifices. Therefore “it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins.” Here the author quotes David in Psalm 40, a Messianic Psalm of Christ’s declaration of Himself “{coming} into the world” by communicating the will of His Father. The Son of God communicates to His Father by saying, “Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me: in burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hast had no pleasure.” Thus Christ heralds the truth of the Father’s will having no pleasure in the blood of bulls and goats, but the pleasure in Christ taking on the body prepared of the Father. The implication is evidently clear the Father’s will is pleased that Christ would come, take on flesh, and be the sacrifice for sin. The Father’s will would be propitiated, satisfied, and find pleasure in the sacrifice of His Son for sins “once for all” (Heb. 10:10).

Servanthood Willingness

Here we find the willingness of Christ in view of His Father’s will – “Lo, I come to do thy will, O God” (Heb. 10:7). He is willing. He is willing to come knowing the blood of bulls and goats His Father finds no pleasure in. He is willing to come knowing His Father is pleased with His sacrifice for sins. He is willing to take on the body prepared of the Father “and took upon Him the form a servant” (Php. 2:7). In Psalm 40:6 instead of a body, the body is hinted at by only a part of the body being described when David says, “…mine ears hast thou opened:” This could have a couple meanings. First it signifies, by ears, the body. The description of “ears…opened” could refer to Christ learning per Isaiah 11:11-4,

“And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots:  {2}  And the spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD;  {3}  And shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the LORD: and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears:  {4}  But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked.”

However, it may indicate Philippians 2:7 and the servanthood of Christ to carry out the will of the Father. This servanthood was signified in the Old Testament with the ear being bore through with an aul. Take note of Exodus 21:6 and Deuteronomy 15:17,

Exo. 21:6 – “Then his master shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an aul; and he shall serve him for ever.”

Deut. 15:17 – “Then thou shalt take an aul, and thrust it through his ear unto the door, and he shall be thy servant for ever. And also unto thy maidservant thou shalt do likewise.”

What was indicated in the Old Testament of full servanthood with the “opening of the ears” that is the boring through the ear with the aul is descriptive of full servanthood with the body in the New Testament.

Rom. 12:1 – “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.”

1 Cor. 6:13b, 20 – “…Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body.”

• “For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.”

What we were bought to do, serve God in our body, the Father prepared a body for His Son to do, and the Son willingly says, “Lo, I come to do thy will, O God.”

Redemptive Willingness Necessitates Incarnation Willingness

Before carrying out the will of the Father to offer Himself, shed His blood, and break His body in sacrifice for sins where the blood of bulls and goats couldn’t He must first take upon Himself that prepared body. Undoubtedly, in the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God the fashioning of man’s body, back in Genesis, when the Godhead made man in God’s image, after our likeness it was in part preparation for what He already knew would come – sin and the proper sacrifice for sin.

From the time of the fall in Genesis 3 God began to unveil to man what He foreknew. He began to reveal just how His Son would come and just how His Son knew He would come as He declared, “Lo, I come”. Before performing the wonderful and marvelous works of redemption in His body, He would come and declare “I come” through “the seed of the woman” (Gen. 3:15). This seed would come through a virgin conceiving and bearing a son (Isa. 7:14). This son, this child born, this son given would be the son of David, the Son of God, upon whom all governmental power on earth would be shouldered – for the zeal of the Lord of hosts would perform this (Isa. 9:6-7). This virgin would conceive performed by the Spirit of God and be born in Bethlehem Ephratah (Mic. 5:2).

When Paul states in Philippians 2:7-8a, “But made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: and being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself”, he has, in part, this in mind – the incarnation, the Word made flesh. The Father appointed His time and when it came He “sent forth His Son, made of a woman” (Gal. 4:4). The Lord Jesus Christ knowing the preparation of His body back in Genesis 1-2, the promise of Himself through the seed of the woman in Genesis 3, the lowly fashion of His first advent according to Isaiah and Micah says, “Lo, I come to do thy will, O God.” (This declaration is made in Psalm 40 prior to Isaiah and Micah’s days; however, communicates His total willingness.)

The Delightful Willingness of the Son of God

What is latently implied in the context of Hebrews 10:7 and the actual wording of “Lo, I come to do thy will, O God” is Christ’s delight in entering the world through conception and birth as a babe. His delight in offering up Himself on the Cross for the sacrifice of sins. This inkling of “delight” noticed here is plainly stated a few chapters earlier as the writer of Hebrews states, speaking of Christ coming,

Heb. 2:10 – “For it became Him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.”

Heb. 2:17 – “Wherefore in all things it behoved Him to be made like unto His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people.”

When Christ says, “Lo, I come to do thy will, O God” it became Him, it behoved Him, it delighted Him – what willingness. This is expressly stated in Psalm 40:8,

“I delight to do thy will, O my God; yea, thy law is within my heart.”

The incarnation narrative of John is quite different than Matthew and Luke; however, in John 1:10-11, John states, “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not.” Jesus Christ the Creator was not known by His creation and His own received Him not when He came – nonetheless, we know now the heart, mind, and willingness of Jesus Christ to come no matter what way, with the world in darkness, the world pining away in iniquity there stands Jesus Christ – “Lo, I come to do thy will, O God” and He delightfully came in such mean estate and He did the will of God.

Merry Christmas!

Josh Strelecki