TRANSFIGURATON - SON OF MAN

  To understand the transfiguration of Jesus, it is imperative to understand the substance, or person, of Jesus. Transfiguration is to metamorph (metamorphoo: Greek), or to change from one form to another, or from one substance to another.  Metamorphosis occurs in animals when there is an abrupt and profound change in the structure at birth into another structure subsequent to that. It is simply a change in forms of the animal; thus transformation. Transfiguration comes into the English translation because Jesus went from one type of Figure to another.
  God transfigured Himself when He changes “states,” or transitions Himself from one phase to another. The Old Testament is the initial phase, his physical life is God’s second phase, and His Glorification, the final phase. Homeostasis — when equilibrium is reached — would occur only in the final state, at Glorification as a consequence of the Resurrection. Homeostasis (balance) was achieved when Jesus died, was resurrected, and came into the Presence of God.
  After the Resurrection, “Jesus saith unto her, ‘Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father’…” (John 20:17). Some think that Thomas touched Jesus. He did not; Jesus merely challenged him to do that to remove any doubt. “Glorification” is the last step in the order of salvation (ordo salutis; Latin). It refers to the stasis of the Christian after death and judgment. It is when God “knows” the Christian in contrast to those he did not know:

Many will say to me in that day, “Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?” And then will I profess unto them, “I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.” (Mat 7:22-23)

  It seems Christians metamorph as well; from iniquitous persons, born again, to spiritual persons by the indwelling of God’s Holy Ghost. From the “old creature” to the “new creature.” (2 Cor 5:17). Birth generates the old creature, and rebirth the new creature. The old creature is like Adam, and the new creature like Jesus. The old person exists as the “son of man” and the new person as the “son of God.”
  In the Old Testament, before the days of Noah, “The sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose” (Gen 6:2). The “sons of God” were ben ‘Elohymn, and the “daughters of men” were bath ‘adam in the Hebrew. Therefore, the reference to Jesus as the “Son of man” (Huios Anthropos; Greek) would refer to the “Son of Adam” or the Flesh from Adam. “Anthropos” refers to a man with both body and soul. That applies to Adam since God breathed life unto him and he became a living soul (Gen 2:7). Hence, Jesus was the “Last Adam” or the “Ultimate Adam” in that Adam will someday be like Jesus.  Adam represents death, and Jesus life because Adam sinned and Jesus did not (Rom 5:12-21).
 Adam morphed (Gen 3) just as the Serpent did. He went from the Old Creature to the New Creature when God removed his apron of fig leaves and replaced it with a coat of skin (Gen 3). Of course, the Serpent morphed from a walking creature to a slithering one, (from that same chapter).
  Adam was transformed from an endangered naked creature to a safe covered creature. How was he “covered” in safety? By the blood that God shed on his behalf. In Genesis chapter three, Adam was transfigured from an iniquitous beastly creature (like the Serpent) to a justified righteous creature (like God.)
  During “phase one” Jesus was not “the son of man” as is written, “God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent…” (Num 23:19). God was “the Word” in phase one (John 1:1-2). In phase two, God like Adam before him, put on skin (John 1:14). He was “the Second Adam” in phase two, or the “Son of Adam” (aka, “the Son of man”).
  The psalmist sang of that metamorphosis when he wrote, “Let thy hand be upon the man of thy right hand, upon the son of man whom thou madest strong for thyself” (Psalm 80:17). That was written as prophecy forecasting that the Word of God would be transformed into the Flesh of God — phase I to phase II, and the process of Jesus’s Glorification was well on the way to homeostasis.
  The Old Testament was not to trust in Jesus who had yet to die, but the trust in Jesus who would die for them: “Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help” (Psalm 146:3). The Jews were expecting a “prince” (what kings were often called), but they were not to put their trust in the Son of man. Who then? The Son of God. Something would happen to Jesus which transformed Him from the Son of man to the Son of God.
  Metamorphosis is changing from what once was to a new figure with no ability to change back. Jesus changed as he moved between one reality to the next — from the natural to the supra-natural. Jesus traveled freely from in earth to in heaven. Not from the place Earth to the place Heaven but from one existence to another. His “substance” seemed to be what it needed to be in whatever realm He was in.
  Jesus arose and disappeared in the clouds. I believe that He transformed from the physical to the Spiritual. Likewise, when Jesus descended as the Holy Ghost, He transformed Himself into the Holy Spirit for His new residence, which is inside the souls of Christians, as God breathes life (Jesus) back into them.
  And when God comes to get His children, He will be seen in the clouds as “the Son of man,” according to this verse, “I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. (Dan 7:13).  In other words, Jesus’s countenance as a human being is as the Son of man, and His countenance as the Holy Ghost is as the Son of God. That surely refers to Jesus because Matthew wrote, “For the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day” (Mat 12:8).
  Jesus made a distinction between His physical nature and His Spiritual or supra-nature:

And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come. (Mat 12:32)

  Therein, it is clear that God has another nature, and now there are three: The Son of God, the Son of man, and the Holy Ghost. That should be recognized as the Holy Trinity.
  Jesus was in the tomb three days as was the son of man, Jonas. Jonas was physically in the whale’s or fish’s belly, and Jesus was physically in the tomb for three days. (“For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth;” Mat 12:40)
  While Jesus was “asleep” in the tomb, all the sins of mankind were being delivered into Hell. As Jesus died, His Holy Ghost was given up (Mark 15:37). Jesus Flesh died but His Spirit lived on as the “Ghost” of Jesus. Jesus was alive in a different form; hence, he was merely sleeping. God suffered death but He did not die. He was in a different form.
  God adjusts His form, perhaps, for mankind. The Holy Ghost resides in the souls of men, of course unseen, but when God comes to reward those in whom He resides, He will again appear as “the Son of man,” as is written: “For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works” (Mat 16:27).
  Today, I have tried to explain the implication of Jesus as “the Son of man.” Tomorrow we shall examine Jesus as “the Son of God.”

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