UPDATE: THIS IS REFERRING TO GOD THE SON, NOT GOD THE FATHER (GOD THE FATHER IS MASCULINE BUT NOT ANATOMICALLY GENDERED AS FAR AS WE KNOW)
Preface: I was deleting post that I had started and never finished and I ran across a draft of the post below. I have edited it some. This was originally a follow up post to a conversation I had a long time ago with a guy named Brian and his question “Does God have a penis? I was surfing the web and found Eugene Echo’s site and lack of answer while doing some research on biblical masculinity. If Brian came to my church and asked this question this is how I think I would answer him.
1. Yes. God does indeed have a penis. Jesus being fully God took upon the physical traits of human maleness in the incarnation. God indeed is male. He was male before the incarnation as well. God in the OT multiple times has self described himself in masculine overtones (Isaiah 43:10). God is clear in the OT that he did not want to be associated with feminine deities. In fact notice the times God was angry when the Israelites wanted a god who was feminine or were female gods (1 Kings 11:5 & 33, 2 Kings 23:13). God was jealous about his masculinity. He saw himself as the spiritual husband of his people. Read the story of Hosea and the story of Elijah too. It was only natural that in the incarnation he became biologically male.
2. Why do people have problems with God being a male? I can’t speak authoritatively for everyone but here’s my thoughts. We live in a misandrinistic leaning society. Misadry or hating men is okay in our society. Often men are the butts of jokes. Often popularized by the stereotypical cultural man being a jock without a brain, a crude construction/manual labor guy, or the frat boy who never grows up. The alternative is a half feminized man who loves Oprah and is a “nice guy” who shows his emotions by crying when he’s watching a chick flick. The most sinister abuse of masculinity is routinely portrayed in entertainment and the news with stories of male murderers and rapists that are brutes who love nothing more than to terrorize those weaker than them. Men have ruled the world for the last several millennium and for the most part haven’t consistently done the best job of it. We live in a world where war, poverty, rape, and death are common. Our modern culture looking at the failures of men defines masculinity by their failures. At best masculinity is passe and at worst it is oppressive and abusive. Though few would state it as such the problem with the world is in effect men that have yet to evolve to a higher level. People refuse to project masculinity on God because they can’t stand their view of men.
3. To answer the necessity of the maleness of Jesus one must understand the creative order and fall. Adam was created perfect and vested as the head of the earthly family. He failed (Genesis 3). Adam’s failure to obey God’s covenant with him (Gen. 2:16, Hosea 6:7) caused the need for Christ to come and take upon himself humanity in general and in particular to take upon himself maleness. God became biological male specifically so he could redeem Adam’s transgression as the “second Adam.” He alone atoned for all those who came from Adam. Jesus became male to fix the mistakes of the first male. He fulfilled what Adam could not. He alone lived out maleness perfectly from conception to the cross. He showed what a true man could be.
No related posts.