God With Us

As we celebrate the Incarnation this year, I’m aware of the radical vulnerability so many of us are feeling, possibly like never before. In addition to the vulnerabilities we experience at various phases of our lives – marriage, changes in employment, health, and, ultimately, nearing the end of life – there is a renewed experience of vulnerability in the wake of recent terrorist attacks and other acts of violence in our country. Most Americans have never experienced this sense of vulnerability, the awareness that, at any moment, someone bent on destruction may appear, and our lives simply end.

As Christians, we believe that in the Incarnation, the God who created heaven and earth, the God who gives us life, became a human being. As with any human life, God Incarnate developed in his mother’s womb, and was born, paradoxically, radically vulnerable, completely dependent on others for sustaining his life.

In the Epistle to the Hebrews, we read, “ we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses.” In other words, other than the experience of sin and guilt, Jesus experienced everything that we, as humans, experience, including our vulnerability.

While Jesus’ life begins with the vulnerability of the manger, his life ends on the cross, defenseless and exposed to every assault of the soldiers and passersby. In the Incarnation, God became a human being, God became vulnerable – in birth, in life, and, ultimately, in death.

Gregory of Nazianzus, a Christian theologian of the 4th century, wrote of the Incarnation, “That which He has not assumed He has not healed.” In other words, the Incarnation gives us hope in the midst of our vulnerability because, in Jesus, God “assumed” vulnerability, thus he has also healed vulnerability.

The healing of vulnerability, however, does not mean that we will not be susceptible to violence – physical, emotional, or spiritual – but rather that through the cross and resurrection, God is ultimately stronger than sin, evil, and death. So, we can face vulnerability with the confidence that God, who became radically vulnerable in the manger and embraced ultimate vulnerability on the cross, knows our vulnerabilities, and promises to be with us in and through them, ultimately leading us to real and abundant life.

In the end, the Incarnation is about love. Why else would God embrace such profound constraints, such immense suffering, and such a shameful death? The God who became vulnerable in the Incarnation wants to bring his love to us in the midst of our own vulnerability. One of the strong temptations in the midst of vulnerability is fear, and many of our worst decisions emerge out of fear. In 1 John 4:18 we read, “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.”

Let us, then, acknowledge our vulnerability before God. As we do that, let us allow the God who became Incarnate, the high priest who is able to sympathize with our weakness, to come alongside of us, let him be Immanuel, God with us. Let his perfect love drive out all fear, assuring us of his victory over the sin and evil that breed violence and death.

In the midst of vulnerability, then, the God who in his great love became vulnerable is with us, meeting us and loving us, leading and guiding us to the place where we can say, with the Psalmist, “though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, because you are with me.” That is what we celebrate this and every Christmas – the presence of our loving and powerful God, demonstrated in the Incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection and Jesus. He is, indeed, Immanuel.

Peace,

Chris