In seeking us, Christ came all the way to where we are, taking upon Himself "the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh." Thus He is a Savior "nigh at hand, not afar off." He "is the Savior of all men," even "the chief of sinners." But sinners have the freedom to refuse Him and reject Him.

What the Bible Says

E.J. Waggoner

E.G. White

Gospel Truth Index

        "In these days of the general acceptance of Catholicism on the part of 'Protestants,' we should know for ourselves the doctrine of Christ and the consequences in those who accept the dogma [of the Immaculate Conception].
        "We have the following statements of Catholic fathers and saints: 'Because [Mary] being very different from the rest of mankind, human nature, but not sin, communicated itself to her.' 'She was created in a condition more sublime and glorious than that of all natures.' This puts the nature of Mary infinitely beyond any real likeness or relationship to mankind. In the words of Cardinal Gibbons: 'We affirm that the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, was begotten of the virgin, thus taking to Himself from her maternal womb, a human nature of the same substance as hers.'
        "It follows, as two and two make four, that in His human nature the Lord Jesus is 'very different' from mankind, infinitely beyond any real likeness or relationship to us as we are in this world. The truth is that the Lord Jesus in His human nature took our flesh and blood just as it is, with all its infirmities. It will be well to know how near He really is.
        "Jesus, that He might bring man back to the glory of God, in His love followed him down even here, partakes of his nature as it is, suffers with him and even dies with him as well as for him in his sinful human nature. For 'He was numbered with the transgressors.' This is love. He comes to us where we are, that He may lift us up from ourselves unto God. 'Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise took part of the same' (Hebrews 2:14).
        "All the words that could be used to make this plain and positive are here put together in a single sentence. Instead of its being true that Jesus in His human nature is so far away that He has no real likeness nor relationship to us, it is true that He is in very deed our kin in flesh and blood relation. This great truth of the blood-relationship between our Redeemer and ourselves is clearly taught in the gospel in Leviticus. When any one had lost his inheritance, the right of redemption fell to his nearest of kin in blood-relationship. It fell not merely to one who was near of kin, but to the one who was nearest (Leviticus 25:24-28; Ruth 2:20; 3:12, 13; 4:1-12). Therefore Christ took our very flesh and blood, and so became our nearest of kin. He is the nearest to us of all persons in the universe.
        "This is Christianity. To deny that Jesus Christ came not simply in flesh, but in the flesh, the only flesh that there is in this world, sinful flesh,—to deny this is to deny Christ. For 'every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is not of God.' Confess to Him your sins: He will never take advantage of you. Tell Him your griefs. He has felt the same and can relieve you. Pour out to Him your sorrows: 'He hath carried our sorrows,' He was 'a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief,' He will comfort you with the comfort of God" (The Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, 1894, condensed).
        "If He were not of the same flesh as are those whom He came to redeem, then there is no sort of use of His being made flesh at all. More than this: Since the only flesh that there is in this world which He came to redeem, is just the poor, sinful, lost, human flesh that all mankind have; if this is not the flesh that He was made, then He never really came to the world which needs to be redeemed. For if He came in a human nature different from that which human nature in this world actually is, then, even though He were in the world, yet for any practical purpose in reaching man and helping him, He was as far from him as if He had never come. . . .
        "The faith of Rome springs from that idea of the natural mind that God is too pure and too holy to dwell with us and in us in our sinful human nature; that sinful as we are, we are too far off for Him in His purity and holiness to come to us just as we are.
        "The true faith—the faith of Jesus, is that He has come to us where we are; that, infinitely pure and holy as He is, and sinful, degraded and lost as we are, by His Holy Spirit [He] will willingly dwell with us and in us, to save us, to purify us, and to make us holy.
        "The faith of Rome is that we must be pure and holy in order that God shall dwell with us.
        "The faith of Jesus is that God must dwell with us, and in us, in order that we shall be holy or pure at all" (The Consecrated Way, pp. 35, 39, condensed). (Ellen White was not Only Supportive, but Enthusiastic)