For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven; was incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and was made man…
Indeed Christ came down. Jesus, not created by but equal with God the Father was “born in the likeness of men” (Phil. 2:6). The fact that God became man distinguishes our faith from that of any other religion. And why did God become man? Why did Jesus humble and degrade himself to the status of humanity? Saint Paul tells us in 1 Timothy that “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Tim. 1:15). Of course we are familiar with the well-referenced verse John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” But how long has it been since we paused to reflect on the magnitude of these words and their implications? Because God loved me, a sinner, he sent himself through his Son to be a human like me. God loved his precious children so much that he died for them. Jesus, the sinless lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, sought to save us in no other way than to be like us.
Hebrews teaches us that he was made like us in every respect in order that he would be “a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people” (Heb. 2:17). Jesus was tempted, tried, and tortured, yet he was able to be without sin, something we cannot do. God saw us in our sin and had pity on us. He mercifully and graciously provided for our insurmountable problem by means of himself. Our sin predicament left us in bondage as slaves to sin and death. Although humanity were not the first beings to descend into sin, since we know some angels too were cast down with Lucifer (Satan), God chose to help us. By the power of the Holy Spirit, God himself became man in Jesus. And when humanly hungry, tired, and tempted in the wilderness by Satan himself, Jesus chose to remain faithful to the Father and his mission to save humanity. He did this although he could have commanded all of the angels of heaven to come and care for him, to tend to him and feed him, yet he maintained his humble stance. This same posture of humility is what led God to come and be born as an infant by a lowly virgin in an animal barn, full of animal smells and dirt. God is a good and loving Father because he is not distant, up in heaven far away from us. Like any good boss who knows both his employees well and their struggles in the workplace, God had his boots on the ground. He got his feet dirty and walked around with those he was responsible for. He entered into our human experience and took on our suffering intentionally.
Although many religions depict a heroic god, our God lived and died for us. This is the one true God who also expresses the truest form of love. Christianity also claims a God who is three in one. Since its beginning, the church has expressed the indivisible oneness and irreducible threeness of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Nicene Creed boldly combatted Arianism’s claim that God the Son is not equal to God the Father. The words from this portion spell out for us the who, what, where, when, why and how of Jesus Christ.
Who: “He” refers to Jesus, God the Son who is of one being and substance with the Father.
Scripture demands Nicene Trinitarian thought, which disallows Arianism. God is uniquely and indivisibly one, and coequal. Yahweh is also irreducibly three as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. To Arius, the Father was greater than the Son, and the Son greater than the Holy Spirit. Arius believed that the Father created the Son, and that there was a time that the Son was not. Yet Jesus says in John 10:30, “I and the Father are one” and Ephesians 2:18 tells us that it is through the Holy Spirit we have access to the Father. Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God (Col. 1:15). When we see Jesus, we see the Father by the Holy Spirit.
What: He came down from heaven and was made man.
The substance of God, or his being, essence, or “ousia” is his unique oneness. The relation of God, or his person, and “hypostasis” is his unique threeness. God as one, Yahweh, is indivisible (Deut. 6:4) and God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is irreducibly three. It is through the Son in the Holy Spirit that the Father is made known (Eph. 2:18). God made himself known by the Holy Spirit through Jesus Christ’s life on earth. The Word who was with God in the beginning “became flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood” (Jn. 1:14) as Eugene Peterson says in the Message translation.
When and Where: At a real traceable point in history over two thousand years ago, Jesus was born on earth, in a real place called Bethlehem of Nazareth. His mother was Mary, pledged but not yet married to a man named Joseph, who became Jesus’ adoptive earthly father, and thus fulfilling prophecies and linking Christ’s lineage to that of King David.
Why: “For us and for our salvation.”
In salvation, God the Father and the Holy Spirit are also at work with God the Son. Isaiah 43:11 says, “I, I am the LORD, and besides me there is no savior.” Romans 10:9 says “If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” St. Paul’s letter to Titus is a rich Trinitarian text that mentions all three persons of the Godhead in salvation. It says, “But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us…by the washing and regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior…” (3:4-7). To bring salvation to mankind, God the Father sent his Son who died for our sins and was resurrected by the Holy Spirit.
How: “incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary.”
We are saved by faith through grace (Eph.2:8). This is faith in Jesus the sinless Son of God and his sacrifice on the cross. Faith comes from believing and is a work not of ourselves but by the Holy Spirit, who opens our hearts to our sin, the law, and the saving power of the gospel. 1 Corinthians 12:3 says, “No one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit” and the Holy Spirit is by the Holy Spirit a virgin conceived and bore the Son of God. By the Holy Spirit through faith we believe Jesus is both fully God and fully man, and grasp at taking hold of other such mysteries of our faith.
The hypostatic union defined at the Council of Nicaea indicates that Jesus assumed human nature in Mary’s womb. Mary is the “Theotokos” (God Bearer, Mother of God), the one who brought forth God into the world by the power of the Holy Spirit.
The One, who through Mary’s womb came into the world, is indeed God from God, Light from Light, very God from very God. Jesus Christ, the Son of God descended from heaven, he suffered and died for you and me for our salvation. Although Jesus’ timeframe on earth as a real human being had a beginning and end, God who is three in one has no beginning, and will have no end. For us and for our salvation he came down, died, and went back up again. This was by the Holy Spirit, the same Spirit who lives in our hearts and cultivates our faith in the Son, thus reuniting us with God the Father.
Photo Credit Unsplash.com
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