It’s interesting how our patterns of thought often converge when we’re paying attention. I posted a couple of days ago about a line from the Woven Hand song “Chest of Drawers” in which David Eugene Edwards alludes to Philippians 2:5-11 by saying: “The world will bow. Knees will be broken for those who don’t know how.” This set me to meditating on the “forceful” side of Christ, that indeed, He will return and all will see Him for who He truly is, though some will resent it.

All the while, I’ve been reading N.T. Wright’s Paul In Fresh Perspective (I know, as a good little Reformed boy, I’m not supposed to speak positively of Wright, but I think it’s important to let him speak for himself, so I’m actually reading what he has to say, much of which is actually quite good, but that’s for another day because this parenthetical section is already way too long) and it was with great interest that I approached his section dealing with Philippians 2.

This section occurs in a larger section in which Wright examines the way in which Paul “redefined” Judaism’s strict monotheism around the person of Jesus Christ. What I found in this section was one of those “aha” moments wrapped in the thought, “I never saw that before, even though I have looked at the individual elements, I never saw how they fit together!”

Specifically, Paul says that it is because of his death “even on a cross,” that God has highly exalted Christ and given Him “the name that is above every name” (Philippians 2:9),

so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (Philippians 2:10-11).

While we read this as a nice passage about Christ being glorified, what we miss, because we’re not familiar with our Old Testament, is that Paul is clearly saying that Christ and YHWH, the One God of Israel are, in fact, one and the same. Think about what Paul has just said: at Jesus’ name, every knee would bow, acknowledging Him as Supreme. Yet, God has made it quite clear that He will not share His glory with another (Isaiah 42:8, etc.) and here is Jesus, as Wright says: “sharing the glory that the one God will not share with another, because he has done what only the one God can do” (italics original).

Add to this the fact that Paul likely would have read from the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament. In many places, the Septuagint translates Old Testament references to God as YHWH, the holy name as “Lord,” which Paul now says, is a title rightly belonging to Jesus Christ. But wait, there’s more! All of this is a direct allusion to Isaiah 45:23:

By myself I have sworn;
from my mouth has gone out in righteousness
a word that shall not return:
‘To me every knee shall bow,
every tongue shall swear allegiance.

God says that every knee shall bow and every tongue shall swear allegiance to Him and to Him alone! Paul says that every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord! Paul is clearly, unequivocally saying that Jesus Christ is God Himself clothed in flesh, ascended in glory.

Wright examines a similar occurrence centered around Deuteronomy 6:4-5, known as the Shema:

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.

This was well-known to all Jews and was, in fact, prayed daily. It is one of the most forceful arguments of monotheism and yet, Paul, as Wright says: “puts Jesus into the middle of it.” Consider 1 Corinthians 8:6:

for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.

In the midst of discussing how Christians should live in the midst of a pagan world, particularly addressing the matter of food offered up to idols, Paul makes a startling declaration. He is not merely saying, as some suggest that Christ is the agent by which God created everything, Paul is saying that Christ is God Himself. Remember again, the Septuagint’s formula for translating YHWH as “Lord,” which Paul again applies to Christ, but there is more. As Wright notes, Paul “has quoted the Septuagint’s formula,” and he has inserted Christ right in the middle of it. Wright says:

Looking outside the immediate impact of this, we observe that he has thereby done with Jesus what was sometimes done with the figure (personified or personal?) of Wisdom, the one through whom the creator made the world, the true content of God’s self-revelation in Torah.

Such references to the divinity of Christ are found throughout the pages of Scripture. But I wonder if at least part of the reason I have missed the force of such allusions for so long is because I didn’t recognize them as allusions in the first place? I have certainly not been trained sufficiently to understand the many Jewish complexities of the New Testament and you could fill volumes with what I don’t know about the Old Testament. Yet far from being a discouragement, such “aha” moments are exhilarating, one more level to the glory of Christ!

Regardless of your overall thoughts on N.T. Wright, it must at least be said that he takes the Old Testament seriously in New Testament interpretation and for that he must be thanked. The Old Testament, far from being antiquated, is the foundation of the New Testament and the more we strive to understand the Old Testament, the more we will see the glory of Jesus Christ, God incarnate, our Salvation and only hope. May such revelations continue, both in this life and the next.

• Read Paul, In Fresh Perspective by N.T. Wright
• Read The Incomparable Christ by John Stott