The Impeccability of Christ

Open your Bibles if you will, please, to the book of Hebrews, to chapter number four and verse number thirteen. Holding that place in your Bibles, turn also to I Peter chapter number one and verse eighteen. In Hebrews chapter four and verse thirteen the Scripture says, “Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do. Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.” I Peter 1:18 says, “Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without spot: Who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you,”. I have companion text this morning Hebrews 4:15, “For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.” And then I Peter 1:19,20, “But with the precious blood of Christ,” – talking about our redemption – “as of a lamb without blemish and without spot” – and I want you to consider those two verses and just try to keep them in your mind.
As Bro. Smith spoke last night, and then as Bro. Laurence Justice followed him, I thought this and I even remarked this to these brethren last night in going out: if you took the necessary, logical implications of their messages to the necessary conclusion – I meant what that implies if you follow it to its conclusion – this message would be absolutely unnecessary. No one who followed those truths to their end could doubt the impeccability of Christ. Nonetheless, it is a subject that is well worth our consideration. I am persuaded you do not make Christians by preaching Christianity; you make Christians by preaching Christ. Christians grow, though we ought to teach them the principles of Godly living. You understand that. But the mystery of Godliness is not Godliness on our part, but it is Godliness in the person of Jesus Christ and we grow as Christians by learning more about Jesus, as the theme of this conference says. And all of the other things that we should be taught and are taught have no meaning until beholding the Lamb of God we are changed into His image. And so it is important. These things are not just doctrinal squabbles or fine points at all; they are necessary truths for our growth in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now the English definition of impeccable is to be clean, complete, consummate, faultless, or flawless. You probably know that you really cannot build a doctrine without knowing the meaning of the words in the Scripture. But, you can never rightly build a doctrine only by the definition of the words. The words don’t mean anything – and I don’t care if it’s Greek or Hebrew or English or whatever – the words have no definite meaning outside of the syntax in which they’re placed, that is the construction of the sentences. And so, when we talk about the impeccability of Christ, we’re going beyond just the character in the sense of the question, was He complete? Was He flawless? But we’re talking about, could He have sinned? Now this may sound like it’s something that is academic. But the fact of the matter is that as we look at this, the discussion is the hypothetical ability of Christ. Not many people would say that Christ ever sinned. Now I did have a man one time who said Christ committed His first sin when He was twelve years old when He did not follow His parents away from Jerusalem. Dumber than a box of rocks, obviously. But not very many people will claim that He did in fact sin or that He was even likely to sin, but hypothetically they say He could and so the claim of my subject today is that it was absolutely, unquestionably, impossible for Christ to have sinned. So you know what I’m talking about. We know where we’re coming from.
Now, what are the reasons that are stated by those who claim peccability? The arguments that I have heard have been very human and they say this: there would be no glory in His sinlessness. In other words, they argue His sinlessness, but that’s not what impeccability is. That’s not what the Biblical doctrine of the impeccability of Christ is. It goes beyond that and states that He did not have the ability. And they say, “But if He didn’t have the ability to, there would be no glory in His sinlessness.” That is to say that He struggled against all of the sins that we struggle against and He won the battle. Praise God! We have salvation in Him because He struggled and won. That is basically the argument. They will also say He was tempted in all points like as we are tempted and if they experienced temptation and think about it, they realize that the – now follow me carefully and don’t get ahead of me – the ability to be tempted not only implies, but proves that within us there is flaw. And that’s accurate. It’s not complete, but it’s accurate – to that point. And so they will argue that. Not only that, they will argue that without the ability to sin, on other words if He didn’t have the ability to sin, there would really be no temptation and that He would not be able to sympathize with our infirmities as the Bible indicates that He does. They’ll also say that if He had no ability to sin, that He did not really have a human nature, because with the human nature goes the ability to sin. Bro. Justice very clearly, and also Bro. Smith, both of them, really approached that issue last night of the first Adam and the last Adam. We often say the second Adam; I believe the Bible says the last Adam. But makes no difference. The differentiation, or the line that is drawn there by Paul is that we are not talking about the fallen nature of Adam when we talk about Christ becoming flesh. But they do not see that.
Now there are dozens more of these and may I be fair and say that there are some men who are to some extent Bible students who do in fact claim the peccability of Christ. I believe they are absolutely, utterly wrong and it is my opinion that the reason that they have that opinion is that they have read too many books before they read their Bibles; and that what they have done is picked up a book written by somebody influenced by men, such as Bro. Justice mentioned last night, who really doubt the deity of Christ but who are well-educated and have the skill of doing a good job in writing a book; and they absorb that error before they get to what the Bible teaches. From that point forward they read their Bible with a skewed mind. I don’t mean to be unkind, but I believe that’s accurate.
Now let’s look at some problems quickly with the hypothetical idea of their peccability. In other words, they say hypothetically Christ could have sinned. And somebody will say, “Well, what are we doing with hypothetical issues?” Well, in essence, this is a hypothetical issue and examination I think is proper because in almost every case, the argument is not that Christ did sin, but that He hypothetically, or that He could have sinned. So that becomes hypothetical within itself.
Now, let me say this: any sin on the part of Jesus Christ – think about this; this is just logical, but there’s nothing wrong with logic – any sin on the part of the Lord Jesus Christ would have necessarily violated hundreds of prophecies. Therefore the Scriptures would have been broken and the Lord said the Scripture cannot be broken, cannot be broken. Think of the prophecies that would not have been fulfilled if the Lord Jesus Christ had sinned. I’m talking about the problem with the hypothesis that these people put before us. Not only that – this is not double talk, but follow me – if the act were possible, that is any act of sin, if it were possible, then necessarily the event or the eventuality of it would be possible. Now listen: in which case, not only would the work of our salvation not have been finished – and it is not finished until Calvary – but it would have been undetermined; it would have been uncertain. You follow what I’m trying to … Had it been possible for the Lord to have sinned, the certainty of the salvation of all of the elect would have remained in question and in balance until He had indeed become victorious over the temptations that lay before Him. In other words, it would say that salvation was not only unaccomplished until the cross, but salvation was uncertain until the cross. Is that not accurate? The conclusion is inescapable as far as I can see. Not only that, you go through the Old Testament … well, for instance: thousands of spotless lambs were killed. What difference did it make if they were spotless or not? A dead sheep’s a dead sheep! Huh? No, no! The Lord gave definite direction that this had to be a lamb of the first year, a male without spot and without blemish. Why? Was it because that’s the only kind of lamb that could take away the sins of the children of Israel? No lamb took away their sins. It is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins! Why did they have to be that way? Because they were a type, or a figure, of the Lord Jesus Christ. Had there been sin in Him, all of those types, every one of them without question, would have failed. Now that’s hypothetical. I understand. But the discussion is essentially hypothetical.
I think in order to be sure that we cover this issue we need to take a moment to deal with the usages of the word ‘tempted’. Because temptation is a big issue here. He was tempted in all points like as we are tempted (Hebrews 4:15). This great high priest touched with the feeling of our infirmities was tempted in all points like as He was tempted. And I think that there’s a problem here, not in us defining the word rightly, but in us understanding temptation itself. What is temptation? It has been suggested by some that the word here that is translated ‘temptation’ should be translated ‘testing’. It will do no more for you than giving strychnine a new name; call it ‘potato soup’, it’ll still do the same thing. Changing that word won’t do one thing for you, because the fact of the matter is that the word means to test one’s faith or their virtue or their character by enticement to sin. That’s what it’s dealing with.
Now the fact is that temptation is necessarily objective and subjective. You follow what I’m talking about. To make this as simple as I know how: the Devil goes forth to tempt men and he holds before them enticements to do evil. But those enticements to do good or evil, whatever they are, have no effect at all without relationship to what is within that man. You follow what I’m talking about? The nature of the man is going to be the thing that will determine whether something is tempting to him or not. For instance, someone will refer to food and they say, “Boy, that is tempting!” But it’s not tempting to everybody. I like spinach; some people don’t like spinach. I love broccoli; my older brother didn’t like broccoli. But I like broccoli; some people are not tempted by broccoli. I like broccoli; I like it better with a lot of cheese on it. You know what I mean? But other people are not tempted by it. In other words, our nature makes a difference. You know, there are people who have been turned over to a reprobate mind. If you don’t like this, it’s free. But there are people who have been turned over to a reprobate mind and they are tempted by issues of homosexuality. On the other hand, I am so revolted, I can become violent and hurt somebody at the mere suggestion of it. When I was a young man, twenty years old, a man sat down in a theatre beside me and started fooling around with me and I knew the guy, had no idea he was a queer. He followed me to this place and sat down and I turned to him and I said, “If you ever put a hand on me again I’ll kill you.” And he got up and left, which was a good idea. See, not everybody feels that way. You see, I have a nature within me that is very repelled by that. Whereas I might be tempted by a woman, I could never be tempted by a man.
Now the issue of temptation is not only objective, but subjective. The Devil goes forth objectively trying to tempt, but he can only attempt, or bring them into subjection to himself, as there is a nature within to submit to that. Do you follow what I’m saying to you?
The Lord Jesus Christ said, “Satan cometh and findeth nothing in me.” Can you say that? I can’t say that. Brother, when Satan comes, I need to pray! Because he can find all kinds of weaknesses and flaws in me. But not in the Lord Jesus Christ. You see, when it says, “He was tempted in all points like we are tempted”, it means that all of these things that Satan holds before us, he held before the Lord Jesus Christ. But! There is that fallen nature within us that was not in the Lord Jesus Christ.
And that brings me to my last and I think the most important point. I might give you back some time, you believe that don’t you. Said, “I don’t believe a word of it.” Then I’ll be through on time. But I think that the great issue here lies in the nature of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, almost anyone who wants to argue for the peccability of Christ will say, “Certainly we do not believe that Christ could have sinned in His divine nature. But it was His human nature that could have sinned.” That is their argument. Incarnation, Brother – and he knows this; I think he even taught us this last night – was not the laying aside of His immutable deity. Now I want to say that again: the incarnation of Jesus Christ was in no sense the laying aside of His immutable deity. We need to be careful in our study – I believe this with all of my heart; if they’re soteriological issues, if they’re prophetic issues, no matter what they are – to be sure that we try to rightly relate them to the person of God.
For instance, the person that goes around saying, “God looked out into the future and saw who was going to be saved.” Please sober up, my friend! God does not look out into the future. He is omnipresent, He is everywhere all the time. Nor does He learn anything by observation – “saw who was going to be” and made a decision? If they would get acquainted with God they will understand. And when we look at the deity of Christ, or when we look at the nature of God, we must understand that one of the great attributes of God is immutability! He not only does not change, He cannot change, for He must either change for the better, which would imply that He was imperfect before the change; or He must change for the worse, which would imply that He was inferior to the former position after the change. He has to be immutable by the very nature of God.
Now, if that be true, then when He was incarnated, it is utterly impossible for us to hypothesize that He might have laid aside any attribute of His deity at all. Only if it is possible for Jehovah to die – and this is not a hyperbole – only if it is possible for Jehovah to die can He change as far as His deity is concerned. Now, someone will say, “But you’ve made no point there, because we’re not talking about His person as God, but we’re talking about His person as a man.” But let’s get to that a little bit.
Now I certainly am not an expert by any means on dealing with the hypostatic union of Christ and sometimes we joke about it as if it were something since it’s beyond us to reason it out we just won’t talk about it, but it is a fact. It is a Bible truth. In this man that we call Jesus Christ – “God with us”, “Jehovah with us”; that’s what His name really means. In this “Jehovah with us”, there was a union in the nature of Jesus Christ as a man and the nature of Jesus Christ as God; there was a union that we cannot see, that we cannot handle, that we cannot touch, that we cannot analyze, that we cannot define; but it is necessarily there. But it is inconceivable and it is unbiblical that the human nature could in any sense violate the divine nature. It could not in any sense conceivably alter the divine nature because divinity is immutable. Can’t be; it’s not possible. So as we look at this, we look for instance at I Timothy 3:16 and I think this has already been read a couple of times: “And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness.” How are we going to learn about God? “God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, …”. Who is this talking about? It’s not just talking about some kind of a conception or a manifestation of God! It’s talking about a Person! Jesus Christ. And I don’t have time to get into all of the steps that would go through there. “Received up into glory” – I get to preach on that later on – that’s a wonderful subject and it’s more than just the miracle of Him going up into the air I’ll tell you for sure. Much more than that.
But the fact of the matter is that as we look at this we understand that it goes beyond our ability to analyze, to fully define, to fully understand and yet we know that there was a union there. The Apostle Paul said, “I with my mind serve the law of God but with the flesh I serve the law of sin.” In some sense, Paul was saying, “I have a split personality.” I don’t use those terms too frequently – hear people talking about that today and the psychologists try to make all kinds of foolishness out of that. But you often hear honest people say, “part of me wants to do this, part of me wants to do this.” Have you ever felt like that? You know why? ‘Cause you are the offspring of Adam. But not so with Christ. He was not. And He was not a split personality. I don’t have time to prove all of this, but there was never one moment in the life of Christ when part of Him wanted to do one thing and part of Him another. Ever. Though he was man, though He was God, there was no conflict within Him. You will find one thing in Scripture – look for it, find it, show it to me; and I’ll apologize to you. But you won’t find one thing in Scripture that ever finds Him in consternation saying, “I don’t know what to do. I’d like to do this, but I’d like to do …”. You don’t find that in Him. There is a unity. It is the hypostatical union that goes beyond my understanding. He was God manifest in the flesh.”
But now listen and get this as a basic principle: true deity cannot be compromised. Now I’m not saying that if it is compromised it ceases to be true deity. There’s a difference. I’m saying if it is true deity it cannot be compromised. It is infallible. It is immutable. It understands all eventualities. It controls every thing. You see, I make decisions that re mistakes and sometimes I have decisions that I’m not sure about; and I have decisions where I want to do something, but sometimes I’m afraid to do it. You know why? ‘Cause there’s so many things out there I can’t control. But that’s not true with God. There’s so many things out there I don’t know, but that’s not true with God. There are so many things within me that I am uncertain of, but that’s not true with God. You ever do anything you have to apologize for? God never does. You see, the very nature of God forbids this whole idea that they bring forth of the possibility of Christ having sinned. He was not the offspring of Adam. Bro. Justice did a good job on this last night, dealing with the way that He was conceived in the womb of Mary. And I’m not a scientist. I’ve heard a lot of this stuff and I’m amazed sometimes at some of the things that people buy into, you know. M.R.D. Honral wrote this article about the chemistry of the blood and people across the country bought into that and bought into…And I was always embarrassed when I heard some of my good friends get up and promote that idea. And I want to tell you something: it’s so far beyond our understanding; and the statements that he made there, they were not even made from a medical standpoint, can’t be proven from a medical standpoint. But the fact of the matter is that this is beyond us. He was not the offspring of Adam; He was the last Adam. Look at I Corinthians 15:45: “And so it is written: the first Adam was made a living soul” – He was made a living soul – “the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.” Now there’s a difference in “living” and “quickening”. For instance, I am a living soul. But I am not a quickening anything because “quickening” means that they have the ability or involved in the giving of life. Not a “quickened” spirit – see that would be like a living soul – not a “quickened” spirit, but a “quickening” spirit. A totally different species. He is the last Adam, He is God, He is made in the likeness of God even in His humanity. Time will not allow me to get into that and I shouldn’t; it’s another subject. But let me go on to something else. Adam – now listen carefully – being a creature was absolutely dependent upon the grace of God to maintain His holiness. I’m always embarrassed when I hear a Baptist preacher get up and say, “Adam was created innocent.” Obviously he was and so were all of the trees in the garden and all of the dogs and kitty-cats and the birds and every thing like that. What does the fact that Adam was created innocent have to do with anything? They say Adam sinned because God created him with the ability to make a choice. That’s like saying cats climb trees because they have four legs. Mules have four legs, too, but they don’t climb trees. It’s a stupid argument. It’s unreasonable logic. Adam was created positively holy. How could Adam lose that holiness? Help me out a little bit: did he fall by sinning? Or sin by falling because he fell? Now, I know the answer to that because the Bible gives me the answer, but without the Bible I couldn’t give you an answer. The Bible says he by transgression fell. But how in the world did an unfallen man transgress? Of if you turn it around the other way, how could he have fallen without sinning? In other words, you cannot describe the origin of sin. Unless you say this: that God created Adam for the purpose of bringing forth an elect people who would be saved by the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. I understand that that goes into the area of lapsirianism and I understand that that would probably put me in the school of a supralapsirian and I don’t give a flip one way or the other – I think we’re thinking all the way outside of our ability to reason when we even talk about it – so if I’m wrong about that it doesn’t even make me nervous.
But I believe that God withheld grace from Adam in order to glorify Himself through the redemption that is in Jesus Christ. And I think the Bible will bear that out if I had time to develop it; the Bible will bear that out. The fact of the matter is that, as we look at this, Adam had a fall that was decreed by God – doesn’t mean Adam was not in violation; no justification in that for him – but the fall was decreed by God. Now if you don’t believe that, well you don’t really understand what God is about. Because the decree of God includes every eventuality that ever comes to pass. Adam fell because it was decreed; why would God decree the fall? Because God in so doing shows us that we are totally dependent upon the grace of God for our livelihood, for everything. I mean, you’d fall from grace after you got to Heaven if it were not for the grace of God. If there were not the nature of grace there would be no such thing as eternal security.
Now listen: Adam became a sinner by sinning; you do not become a sinner by sinning. Adam did, you do not. You sin because you’re a sinner. Now if you take that principle – that you sin because you’re a sinner; you do what you do because you are what you are – how could Christ have sinned unless He’s a sinner? You follow what I’m saying to you. In other words, the very nature of Christ not being a sinner shows us that He could not have sinned. Jesus Christ could not have sinned because He was not the offspring of Adam; He was the offspring of the Godhead. Hear His words to His mother in Cana: “What have I to do with thee, woman?” You ever wondered what that means? Well I don’t know; just let you figure it out and tell me; so you fellas help me out. But I think it has to do with this. Now I don’t have time to say anything else about that and besides, it doesn’t need to be said.
Grasp in your mind – I’m coming to a close – grasp in your mind the nature of Christ: Who He was, what He was, what God is; and you will necessarily reject the idea of any hypothetical peccability of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was the Lamb without spot and blemish. He was that holy thing conceived in the womb of Mary outside of any effect and influence of Adam in his fallen state. The idea Bro. Justice mentioned last night, the foolish idea that Mary was born without sin or came to the time of the delivery without sin, garbage. She was a sinner; He was her Savior. And only sinners need Saviours. So the idea is utterly foolish. But the fact of the matter is that as you look at this you’ll understand that Who Christ was absolutely, unquestionably necessitates the conclusion of absolute impeccability. Thank you for your time.
Transcribed 10/2006 Joy Ellaina Gardner
Autor: Pastor Forrest Keener