At the very heart of the Christmas celebration is the Incarnation, or the fact that God became man. When this happened 2,000 years ago, the earth and all mankind was changed forever. The Light of God would now dispel darkness. The second person of the Holy Trinity would now become one of us. The Creator would now come to His Creation. Now, mankind would be capable of living forever.

We commonly hear the initial words of the Bible “In the Beginning…..” which come to us from the book of Genesis and talk about God’s creation; about how all things were created. How Light came in to the earth. How all things came in to being by God’s creative hand. Genesis is the beginning of the Hebrew Scriptures, or the Old Testament. The Christian Gospel writer, Saint John begins his Gospel in the New Testament using the same words, “In the Beginning…..”. This was no coincidence. John wanted us to think about how both the Old Testament and the New Testament are linked and how God created us and brought about His Salvation for us. He wanted us to think about how God’s Light now dispels all darkness. John, in his Gospel, introduced us to the second person of the Holy Trinity namely, THE WORD when he tells us that “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He makes it quite clear that THE WORD was God and was with God and helped Him in creating the Universe. This fits so well with Genesis when it says in the creation account, “Let Us make mankind in Our image”. This explains why the plural pronouns are used. John continues by saying that THE WORD was LIFE and was LIGHT and His LIGHT was the light of mankind.

A few verses down, John talks to us about John the Baptist and how he said that John the Baptist would be the messenger of the LIGHT and testify about the LIGHT and that the LIGHT was coming in to the world to enlighten every person. He also said that even though the LIGHT created the world, the world would mostly reject Him and only those born of God would really receive the LIGHT. Then the Gospel writer talks about the Incarnation by saying, “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us; and we saw His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. John the Baptist testified about Him and called out, saying, “This was He of whom I said, ‘He who is coming after me has proved to be my superior, because He existed before me.’” For of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace.

To summarize all of this, St. John, in his Gospel tells us that THE WORD existed from the very beginning and was both God and with God. In other words, THE WORD was God Himself, but also separate from God. THE WORD was the second person of the Holy Trinity who was also known as the LIGHT and the LIFE. This WORD/LIGHT/LIFE was creator of the Universe. The Gospel writer then goes down to his historical time and talks about St. John the Baptist, and how he was the one to testify to WORD/LIGHT/LIFE and that many would reject his testimony. The Gospel writer then delivers the words, “He came to His own, and His own people did not accept Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of a man, but of God.” It is important to note the the word, WORD comes from the Greek (Logos) and means emanation. Thus, the second person of the Holy Trinity, THE WORD is the emanation of God.

Another part of scripture, from Paul’s letter to the Philippians deals with the incarnation. In Philippians, Chapter 2 it says, “Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, as He already existed in the form of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied Himself taking the form of bond-servant and being born in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death: death on a cross. For this reason also God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

Another familiar scripture showing the incarnation, comes to us from the Old Testament, the Book of the Prophet Isaiah, chapter 9 which says,

For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given;
and the government shall be upon his shoulder,
and his name shall be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Another scripture, from the New Testament, Paul’s First letter to Timothy says, “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost. But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life. To the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.”

Back to the Old Testament, in Isaiah 7 we hear, “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel (which means, “God is with us”).

Also, Our liturgy is a reflection of our faith. In our Liturgy of the Eucharist, when the deacon prepares the cup he pours water in to the wine and says, “By the mystery of this water and wine may we come to share in the divinity of Christ who humbled himself to share in our humanity.”

It is interesting to note that when God (The Word) became man (Jesus) He took on two natures. He was fully God and fully Man, all at the same time. We call this the theological term: Hypostatic Union. Jesus has two complete and distinct natures, all at the same time. Jesus is perfectly Divine and perfectly human. Even more interesting to note, Jesus maintains this Hypostatic Union for ever and ever. When Jesus died and rose from the dead and later ascended in to Heaven, he did so both as Divine Word and risen human. He proved to us that death no longer has a hold on us, but that we will live forever as children of God. The Athanasian Creed recognized this doctrine (Hypostatic Union) and affirmed its importance by stating:

He is God from the essence of the Father, begotten before time; and he is human from the essence of his mother, born in time; completely God, completely human, with a rational soul and human flesh; equal to the Father as regards divinity, less than the Father as regards humanity. Although he is God and human, yet Christ is not two, but one. He is one, however, not by his divinity being turned into flesh, but by God’s taking humanity to himself. He is one, certainly not by the blending of his essence, but by the unity of his person. For just as one human is both rational soul and flesh, so too the one Christ is both God and human.

In conclusion, our God wants us to know Him and to Love Him and to serve Him and He humbled Himself to become one of us so that we could know and love and understand Him better. Christmas is the celebration of God becoming man, When the Blessed Virgin Mary said YES to the angel Gabriel, she allowed God to enter in to our humanity in the form of Jesus. All of our salvation is dependent upon this. Jesus, the GOD/MAN came not only to reveal the LOVE of the Father to us, but also to save us and bring us in to His LIGHT and to have LIFE forever and ever. This Christmas, as we celebrate so many things, let us remember that Christmas is all about the INCARNATION, God became man (Jesus). Also, remember, when we receive the Eucharist, we are receiving the Body, blood, soul and Divinity of Jesus. God is good.

He was made man that we might be made God. (Athanasius of Alexandria)