(3) "Who was declared to be the Son of God with power." The word rendered "declared" is the word which elsewhere in the New Testament means to "determine," "appoint," "ordain" (Luke 22:22; Acts 2:23; 10:42; 11:29; 17:26, 31; Heb. 4:7). In none of these instances does it mean to "declare." It might be possible to derive the meaning "declare" from its use in the sense of "mark out" or "mark the boundaries". In this way Christ could be said to be marked out as the Son of God.[8] But this process of thought by which to arrive at the meaning "declared" is unnecessary and has little to commend it. There is neither need nor warrant to resort to any other rendering than that provided by the other New Testament instances, namely, that Jesus was "appointed" or "constituted" Son of God with power and points therefore to an investiture which had an historical beginning parallel to the historical beginning mentioned in verse 3. It might appear that this encounters an insuperable objection; Jesus was not appointed Son of God; as we found, he is conceived to be the eternal Son, and this sonship had no historical beginning. But this objection has validity only as we overlook the force of the expression "with power".[9] The apostle does not say that Jesus was appointed "Son of God" but "Son of God in power". This addition makes all the difference . Furthermore, we may not forget that already in verse 3 the Son of God is now viewed not simply as the eternal Son but as the eternal Son Incarnate, the eternal Son subject to the historical conditions introduced by his being born of the seed of David. Hence the action with which verse 4 is concerned is one that has respect to the Son of God incarnate, and it is not only proper but altogether reasonable to regard it as another phase of the historical process which provides the subject matter of the gospel. The apostle is dealing with some particular event in the history of the Son of God incarnate by which he was instated in a position of sovereignty and invested with power, an event which in respect of investiture with power surpassed everything that could previously be ascribed to him in his incarnate state. What this event was and in what the investiture consisted will forthwith appear. And even if we associate the expression "in power" with the verb "appointed" rather than with the title "Son of God", this does not raise an insuperable obstacle to the interpretation in question. The apostle could still say that he was appointed Son of God with express allusion to the new phase of lordship and glory upon which Jesus as the incarnate Son entered by the resurrection without in the least implying that he then began to be the Son of God. The statement would be analogous to that of Peter, that by the resurrection God made Jesus "both Lord and Christ" (Acts 2:26). Peter cannot be understood to mean that then for the first time Jesus became Lord and Christ. He is referring to the new phase of his messianic lordship.
* Footnotes omitted.
