Dear brothers & sisters in Christ,

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and Jesus Christ the Lord and Savior. Amen.

The word of God falls into three categories: the written word as found in Scripture; the proclaimed word; and the incarnate word in the person of Jesus Christ. God took on human flesh in order to bring comfort and hope to His people.

The Athanasian Creed confesses (in part): “For this is the true faith that we believe and confess:

That our Lord Jesus Christ, God’s Son, is both God and man. He is God, begotten before all worlds from the being of the Father, and he is man, born in the world from the being of his mother—existing fully as God, and fully as man with a rational soul and a human body;” The incarnate God maintains both natures equally. This child whose birth we commemorate each year is both mortal yet immortal, divine and human, eternal yet temporal. The immortal takes on mortality for the sake of human beings.

Paul phrased the resurrection of believers, “For this perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality.” (1 Corinthians 15:53) God, imperishable, put on perishability in the form of Jesus Christ. The imperishable put on perishability in order that we may put on imperishability.

That is at the root the nature of incarnation. God fully enters His created world for the sake of that world. Jesus became flesh and lived among us. God entered this world in a form we could experience with all our senses. The disciples felt his touch, heard his voice, saw his tears, even smelled and tasted meals together. God was no longer abstract for them. God was (and is) real. God was no longer far off. He was right in front of them – walking among them, loving them, leading them, teaching and healing them. God fully entered into their reality.

As we celebrate the birth of the Savior, let us remember the ‘realness’ of this incarnate God. He is real. God sends His son into our reality, here and now – and brings us into his reality now and forever.  The grace and peace of God which surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ² He was in the beginning with God. ¹⁴ And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth. (John 1:1-2, 14)