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The Willing Servant.
A.--Apart from minor differences that are the result of translation, there is one that does
call for explanation. In Psa. 40: 6 the words "mine ears hast Thou opened" are replaced
in Heb. 10: 5 by the words, "A body hast Thou prepared me".
B.--In the margin of the Psalm you have a note to the effect that "opened" is really the
word "digged". The typical principle of interpretation which we have discussed upon
previous occasions comes to our aid here. In Exod. 21: 1-6 we have the law pertaining
to a Hebrew servant, which limited his servitude to six years, except under the following
exceptional conditions:--
"If the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will
not go out free: then his master shall bring him unto the judges, he shall also bring him to
the door, or unto the door post; and his master shall bore his ear through with an aul;
and he shall serve him for the age."
The "digged ear" was the symbol of loving willing servitude, entered for the love of
those who would otherwise have been left behind in bondage. The Lord of glory, the
Creator of things seen and unseen, when He entered out of love His period of willing
servitude, took the form of a servant, and entered the body "prepared" for Him, which
body was the symbol of lowliness, and pierced for our sakes upon the cross.
Shall we abuse the very condescension of the Lord and make of it an argument against
His very Deity?
A.--I never saw the shameful ingratitude of the doctrine I held that used the language of
the Saviour's period of servitude to deny His Godhead.
B..--When people begin arguing that the "Son" must necessarily be less than the
"Father" they are wasting time, for Scripture teaches the same thing. The Son and the
Father speak of that relationship which commenced when the fullness of time came for
Christ to be born of a woman. He can expressly to do the will of Him that sent Him, and
took the "form" of a servant and the "fashion" as a man in order to accomplish that
purpose. This voluntarily assumed subordination cannot be used as an argument when
dealing with His essential Deity.
A.--Do you not believe that Christ was "The Son" from eternity?
B.--You are asking a question which the human mind cannot answer unaided, and upon
which Scripture never speaks. As I have said, I am no philosopher, all I know is already
written in the Word. What I find there is that Christ
"Originally was in the form of God."
"In the beginning He was the Word."