By J.H. Garrison
JESUS' work did not end with revealing the Father to men, essential and vital as that revelation is. His supreme end and aim was to bring men into filial relationship with God as their heavenly Father. He is not only the revelation of the Father, but the way to the Father. "No man cometh unto the Father but by me." It is one thing to have a glorious ideal, and it is quite another to realize that ideal in our own experience. It was Christ's mission not only to show us the Father, but to show us how to realize the joy and benefits of oneness with Him in the relationship of loving and dutiful children. This he has done, and it is a vital part of the great gospel message.
Perhaps the most difficult thing which Christ had to accomplish in opening up the way of access to the Father was to convince men of the reality and the greatness of His love for mankind. In His own words: "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth on him might not perish, but have everlasting life." But that men might understand the infinite height and depth and breadth of that love, it was necessary that Christ should lay down his life for the sins of the world. This was the highest possible proof of God's love for a sinning world. This story of the Sinless One submitting to the, death of the cross that men might know the heinousness of sin and the strength of God's love, has melted the hearts and revolutionized the lives of millions of human beings in every land where the story has been told. In the light of that love of God in Christ--the Holy and Righteous One--men have seen their own sinfulness and have been brought to "repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ." In offering himself as the sacrifice for sin, the Savior of sinners and the Revealer of God as Father, Jesus becomes himself the object of that faith which carries with it the power to enable sinful men and women to become sons and daughters of the Lord Almighty.
It is the supreme manifestation of divine wisdom that, in the great plan of human redemption, the Infinite God offered to men, in the concrete personality of, Jesus Christ his Son, an object of faith. through whom they could be lifted up, not only to the knowledge of God, but into that communion with God which is the highest privilege that it is possible to confer on mortals. Many a soul has cried out in the midst of life's trials, with Job of old, in his search for God:
"O, that I knew where I might find him!
That I might come even to his seat!
Behold, I go forward, but he is not there;
And backward, but I cannot perceive him;
On the left hand, when he doth work,
but I cannot behold him.
He hideth himself on the right hand,
that I cannot see him."
--Job 23:3, 8, 9.
It was to meet this want of the human heart that God manifested himself in Jesus Christ as the Son of Man and the Son of God, that through him men might find their way to God and realize that communion and fellowship with Him which is life eternal.
It was not enough for Job, nor is it sufficient for us, to see the manifestations of God's power and beneficence in the orderly movements of the heavens, in the infinite processes of Nature, and in the wide sweep of His law throughout the universe. God must identify himself with man in human history by becoming incarnate and dealing with the great spiritual problems which have to do with our higher nature on the plane of our humanity, before we can have such an interpretation of the universe, and of man's nature and destiny, and such a revelation of God, as will satisfy the desires and meet the needs of men. Because this has been accomplished for us in the life and ministry, in the sufferings and death, and in the resurrection from the dead, of Jesus Christ, He is indeed the "way, the truth, and the life." Through Him the great and Infinite Jehovah, the Creator, the God of Nature, the Ruler of the universe, becomes our Father, and we can come to Him with all the sweet confidence and trust of a child to his earthly parent, and commit ourselves and all our interests to Him. In this way we come to the Father through Christ--drawn by his life, won by his love, cleansed by his death, justified by his resurrection, and quickened and helped by his Spirit.
Christ is man's way to the Father. He is also the Father's way to man.
