God Became One Of Us

God Became One of Us

I came to give life—life in all its fullness.

John 10:10

For thousands of years, God gave us his voice. Prior to Bethlehem, he gave his messengers, his teachers, his words. But in the manger, God gave us himself.

Many people have trouble with such a teaching. Islam sees God as one who sends others. He sends angels, prophets, books, but God is too holy to come to us himself. For God to touch the earth would be called a “shirk.” People who claim that God has touched the earth shirk God’s holiness; they make him gross. They blaspheme him.

Christianity, by contrast, celebrates God’s great descent. His nature does not trap him in heaven, but leads him to earth. In God’s great gospel, he not only sends, he becomes; he not only looks down, he lives among; he not only talks to us, he lives with us as one of us.

Cure for the Common Life