Section 4
holiness out of the resurrection of the dead" (v. 4). This is a clear reference to Christ's divin ity. Why is His humanity mentioned first and His divinity last?
Paul mentions Christ's humanity first because he maintains the sequence of Christ's process. First, Christ passed through the process of incar nation to become flesh. Then He passed through the process of death and resurrection. By means of the second step of His process, He became the Son of God out of resurrection. Christ has been processed in two steps: the first step—incarna tion; the second step—death and resurrection. By these two steps Christ became two different things. He became flesh by incarnation, and He became the Son of God through death and resur rection. His first step brought God into human ity. His second step brought man into divinity. Before His incarnation, Christ, as a divine per son, already was the Son of God (John 1:18). He was the Son of God before His incarnation, and even Romans 8:3 says, "God, sending His own Son." Since Christ already was the Son of God before the incarnation, why did He need to be designated the Son of God out of resurrection? This is because by incarnation He had put on an element, the flesh, the human nature, that had