Great is the Mystery of Godliness (1 Timothy 3:16)

How many times a day do you use the word ‘great’? Someone asks, How are you feeling? ‘Great,’ you reply. How was your holiday? Great. How was the meal? Great. How are things going? Great.

The Bible uses the word often. Think of some of the examples:

•         Hebrews: How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation?
•         The Psalmist: Great peace have they who love your law.
•         Acts: There was great joy in the city.
•         Peter: Great and precious promises. His great mercy.
•         Paul: The appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ
•         Gabriel: He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.

It has been pointed out that Paul may be alluding to an incident a few years previously in Ephesus where Timothy now was. The earlier incident included a crowd shouting ‘Great is Artemis of the Ephesians.’ In contrast, Paul highlights the greatness of Jesus.

A confession

Paul here quotes a confessional statement used by the early church. Perhaps he had written it earlier because his description shows that he and Timothy already knew its statements about Jesus.

I wonder why Paul  introduced it here in his letter. We can see from the context that he is dealing with church life. What is the main motive for doing anything in a church? Surely, it is to do it for Jesus. We can think of the response of Zinzendorf when he saw a painting of the cross, and Jesus asking, ‘ All this I did for thee, what hast thou done for me?’

The early Christians would have used this short statement in their services. What would be the benefit of doing so? One benefit is that Christ would be mentioned. I have sat in services and in conferences when no mention has been made about Jesus. But here six things are said about him. We have to think about Jesus in a Christian service.

Paul expects all Christians to use it as a form of memory statement. It has been the practice of the church to have memory statements about doctrines. 

A mystery

We all love a mystery, trying to work out who did what. We may often say, ‘Well, it’s a mystery!’ And we may conclude that when the word is used in the Bible it means something puzzling, something unknown. In fact, it means the opposite. The word describes truths that God has revealed or described.

1 Corinthians 15:51-52: ‘Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed.’

Ephesians 1:9-10: making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth in him.

Here we have another mystery, but a revealed truth, but a person to speak about to one another and to God.

A person

Paul mentions six truths about Jesus. Scholars debate why they are in the order they are, but no one seems to have the answer. It is the case that in the Greek text the first word of each line rhymes with the other first words. Some try to make couplets out of them. I did notice that the first describes a heavenly origin and the last a heavenly destination.  Maybe we could just call them Six Important Truths About Jesus. If someone were to ask you to select six important truths about him, what six would you choose? Maybe you can do that this afternoon when you go home.

I don’t intend to deal with the six truths, but my aim is to only use the first, that he was manifested in the flesh.

Who is he? The answer to the question is that he is the eternal God, the Creator of all things, the One who spoke and the universe appeared, the One who has been upholding all things since they were created. Or we could say that he is the second person of the Holy Trinity who has been worshipped by angels and by believers down the centuries. And we could say that he is the prophesied deliverer mentioned in the Garden of Eden who would yet come to the rescue of his people.

Where was he? He was on earth. Let’s think about some incidents from his life. We can go to Bethlehem and what do we hear? We hear singing in the sky as angels celebrate. Who is their audience? Some local shepherds, and we could call them local rascals because that is how shepherds were regarded in Israel. We see the shepherds making their way to the village, but they don’t enter a house. Instead they go to the manger, outside, and there they find a newborn infant. Who is he in yonder stall, at whose feet the shepherds fall? God made observable.

Let us go to another incident in his life. We see him coming to a well, tired and weary, near a village called Sychar. His disciples head off to the village to get some food. Jesus stays behind. Then we see a lonely woman coming to him and we wonder what they will find in common to talk about. But he has no problem speaking to her, and we overhear that he is taking to her about satisfying water of life and that his Father in heaven wants her to join in his worship. She senses she is speaking to someone different, and she is because she is having a conversation with the Son of God. God become observable and approachable.

We can go to another location, this time to a garden which Jesus and his disciples visited often. They had to stay within the bounds of the city on the evening of Passover, but the disciples noted that he was becoming disturbed and distracted, and revealed that he wanted to pray. Indeed he urged them to pray as well. They fell asleep, but when they were woken up, they saw him rolling on the ground in agony. He was in distress because of a great burden he was carrying and an awful prospect that was imminent. In the garden in Jerusalem he was carrying our sin on his way to pay its penalty. And the prospect frightened him and he asked his Father if it was possible for it all to be taken away. Who is this we are watching? God made observable and in his human nature appalled at the sight of sin.

We can go to one more location, and as we stand on the roadside we see Jesus being marched to the place of crucifixion. On the way, he falls down and a man in the crowd is commandeered to carry the cross with Jesus. We watch as he reaches the destination and almost immediately the soldiers begin to nail him to the cross. What is that sound from his lips? He is praying that his Father would forgive the soldiers. Who is this we are watching? God made observable and having a conversation with another divine person about pardoning sinners.

We wait around after the crosses have been put in their standing positions. Two others have been crucified with him and they have joined in the general derision being made about Jesus. Then one of them changes his speech and begins to speak about the perfection of Jesus, that he has done nothing wrong. He then asks Jesus if he will remember him when he reaches Paradise. Jesus responds by telling the criminal that he will be with Jesus in Paradise that day. Who is this we are watching? God made observable and able to decide who will be allowed into glory.

We have asked two questions – who is he and where was he? Now as we close, we can ask a third question, how was he? We often say to someone when we meet them, ‘How are you?’ and the last thing we want to hear from them is a detailed account of how they are. But how was Jesus? We are told in Hebrews 13:8 that he is the same yesterday today and forever. Can we say that he was the same in the incidents we have been thinking about?

We can because in each of them he was humble, holy and heroic. He was humble at his birth, born with no reputation. He was humble at the well, because the woman had not a clue who he was until he told her. He was humble in the garden as he revealed his terror at the prospect ahead of him, and he was humble at the cross as he prayer for indifferent soldiers and welcomed a former criminal into heaven. Great is the mystery of godliness as revealed in the constant humility of the Son of God.

He was holy at his birth, the only infant that ever was holy at such a time. There was no original sin in him when the shepherds saw him. He was holy at the well as he spoke with an unholy woman and was kind to her. He was holy in the garden; as he expressed his terror, there was no rebellion in his heart. And he was holy on the cross even when he was bearing the sin of his people. Those sins were offensive and he paid the penalty for them, but they did not defile him in any way. Great is the mystery of godliness as revealed in the constant holiness of the Son of God.

He was heroic throughout his earthly journey from birth to the death. He had come on a mission, to fulfil a task, and he was the only one who had the resources whereby his mission would succeed. What bravery he showed in paying the penalty for the shepherds who came to look, for the woman who lived in isolation. What courage in Gethsemane as the depth of the task loomed before his eyes! What valour as he took on the powers of darkness on the cross and made them nothing! What determination as he persisted in paying the penalty for sin on the cross! Great is the mystery of godliness as revealed in the constant heroism of the Son of God.

It is true, is it not, that it is good for us to say good things about Jesus, good things that we gladly confess with all his people, Great is the mystery of godliness, God became visible in the flesh, became a man without ceasing to be divine, became a man with a God-given mission, and fulfilled all that was required of him in his great task.