Incarnation

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A bee stung you? Where'd it come from?It was in carnation!
Incarnation literally means "in the flesh"

The mystery of the humanity of Christ
is that He sunk himself into our flesh
~ Martin Luther

John 1:1-5, 14, 18

Jesus put on Humanity. He did not lose anything of His deity. He was not a hybrid; not a Prius. He never said "Hmmm, I've exhausted this one part of myself, so I need to tap into this other aspect of myself right now..." God became fully human and experienced everything we do as humans: a mind, emotions, a psyche.

What does the incarnation tell us?

1) It tells us what God is like (John 1:18): Jesus made God known. If we want to know what God is about, we don't have to guess. We can look at Jesus and see what makes Him passionate and angry and compassionate and sad and motivated. We can look at Jesus and see how God would respond to any person.

God demonstrated His love for us in this way:
while we were still sinners Christ died for us.
~ Paul of Tarsus

The incarnation also tells us what God is not like. We make God in our image, which is arrogant and tough and ruthless, like Zeus (it taps into our pride). The incarnation blows all that apart and says: "No, God is humble!". It is not that God was great, and became humble by stooping low. God is humble and stoops low: that is what makes Him great!

2) The incarnation tells us what it is like to be truly, fully, human! "Oh, well, I blew it...I'm only human" No! That is not human-ness. That is fallen-ness! What kind of humans did God design from the beginning? Look at Jesus. That's what God intended in the first place, before the fall. As the band Switchfoot puts it, There's a New Way to be Human

That new way to be human is the redemption of Jesus in our lives. He shows us what it is like to live without addictions, without nasty habits and problems within our depths; free from fear. In Jesus we see what it's like to not be religious, to be free from other's expectations, and free from having to maintain control. Free to tell the truth, Jesus was also free to hang out with those society rejects.

One of the aspects of Divinity is humility. Likewise, one of the aspects of humanity is humility. In John's day (in the height of Roman & Greek culture) no one saw humility as a good thing. Christianity came along and showcased humility as something good and noble. Why aspire to humility? Because God did!

Jesus became human, therefore all humans have dignity. If I take a little seed money and start a company and watch it grow, then that company has some value to me. But if I sell my house and put all my assets into a new start-up business, I would care a lot more about how that business does! Jesus became human. He became one of us. What does that tell us about our value to Him?

And here's something to bend your mind: He is still human. He became human, He died human, and He was resurrected human. He is still fully God and fully human; always will be.

3) The incarnation gives us hope in our lostness. He came and experienced things just like us: Pain. Hurt. Sadness. Sometimes in our pain, all we need is to just have someone be with us, not to say anything or do anything -- just to be with us. To sit with us and cry with us, and just be with us.

In the prophecies of Isaiah, Jesus is called Emmanuel which means: God with us.

As we lose our way, He walks with us. We arrogantly (and ignorantly) tell Him where we're going, and we make all these plans and go all these places with our hearts and lives...and He does not stop us. He lets us go wherever, but He walks with us. He is always with us. When we're tired, and when we're done, we can always grab His hand a little more tightly, and He will hug us, because He will always be with us. He will always have that finger that our tiny hands can reach up and grab.

He will always be there to lead us home.

He knows the way, and He knows how best to lead us there.

Because He became one of us, as a little baby.

Come walk among us.
Come walk among us Jesus.We know that we need You.
We know that we need You Jesus.You see our hearts,
You know that we're but dust.It's You who made us,
Lord in You we choose to trust.Come Lord.
Come Lord.