Another “report card” on Jesus early years. Another “wait-a-minute” moment as I try and noodle again on what it meant for God the Son, the Second Person of the Trinity, God fully God, to take on flesh and become a man. Jesus increased.

And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and with people.

(Luke 2:52 CSB)

Yesterday, I meditated on the fact that, while God has need of nothing, Jesus being fully human needed grace. This morning, I’m chewing on the fact that Jesus increased.

I read these two words this morning and the bible study we did a couple of years ago on the attributes of God came to mind (a Spirit thing, I’m trusting). In particular, the study about how God is unchanging. The theological name for that attribute? God is immutable.

God’s immutability means that God doesn’t grow in some areas or deteriorate in others. To change would mean that God would have a “before” condition and then an “after” condition, implying the passage of time. But God is outside of time. To change would mean that if He became better at something, or possessed more of something, then at some point before then He was less than perfect in that thing. But God is perfect. To change would mean that God would experience something new, but how’s that possible if, in order for God to be God, He must be omniscient, knowing everything? God is immutable. Jesus, being God, is by His very nature unchanging. Yet Jesus increased in wisdom and stature.

Huh?

Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of godliness: He was manifested in the flesh . . .

(1Timothy 3:16a ESV)

I sort of get that Jesus had to increase in stature, that being human meant that His body must mature and grow up (though, that the God who is without limit or constraint would confine Himself to a physical vessel is mind-stretching in and of itself). But that Jesus also increased in wisdom? Hmmm . . .

How does someone increase in something that they have sourced since before the foundation of the world? In the beginning, Jesus created all things (Jn. 1:1-3, Col. 1:15-16). In the beginning, Wisdom created all things (Prov. 8:22-31). Jesus is Wisdom. Wisdom is Jesus. So, how does Jesus increase in something He simply just is?

I don’t really know. All I know is that Jesus emptied Himself (whatever that fully means) when He took on flesh (Php. 2:7). And from that “emptied state”, the One who was fully God and always God lived out, in time and space, what it was to increase. And so, the One who is Wisdom, and was always Wisdom, increased in wisdom. Great indeed is the mystery of godliness!!!

Great indeed is what Jesus allowed Himself to experience in order to be the perfect Redeemer for those in desperate need of a perfect redemption.

Such is God’s incomprehensible grace. To God be the glory!

Amen, again?