Day 51 – the incarnation of God
Daily Quotation
Quoted in C. S. Lewis, George MacDonald, 65.
Never could we have known the heart of the Father, never felt it possible to love Him as sons, but for Him who placed Himself into the gulf that yawned between us. –GEORGE MACDONALD
Picture in your mind a group of kindergarten students on their first day of school, eager and ready to learn. Imagine yourself the teacher of this class, willing and able to teach. Suppose you desired, more than anything else that day, that these kids get to know you and relate to you in a positive way. How could you best accomplish this? How could they come to realize your plans to love them, your promise to teach them, your pledge to protect them, and your power to mold them? How could you give them a glimpse of who you are?
Picture in your mind a group of kindergarten students on their first day of school, eager and ready to learn. Imagine yourself the teacher of this class, willing and able to teach. Suppose you desired, more than anything else that day, that these kids get to know you and relate to you in a positive way. How could you best accomplish this? How could they come to realize your plans to love them, your promise to teach them, your pledge to protect them, and your power to mold them? How could you give them a glimpse of who you are?
One way would be to invite them into your world. Bring them to your desk and show them your day-planner and grade book. Ask them to help you hang your diploma on the wall behind you. Let them visit the lounge where you and other teachers relax. Take them outside so they can see your reserved parking space. Show them the card that certifies you as a member of the teachers’ union. Even allow them sixty seconds each to sit in the chair behind your desk and pretend for a minute to be you. By these and other exercises, you will certainly succeed in bringing them into your world, but you will not accomplish your intended goal. They will know that you are a teacher (something they already knew) but not much more.
Or you could try to get them to know you by doing the opposite: forbidding them to enter your world. You could help them realize the vast difference between them as students and you as teacher by keeping them away from your desk, your personal items, and your professional luxuries. But what would that accomplish? They would better appreciate that chasm between you and them (something they are already aware of) but not much more.
Now picture yourself stooping down and sitting on the floor, all the kids around you doing the same. Imagine yourself taking a coloring book and crayons, picking out your favorite picture, and starting to color between the lines. You laugh with the kids, talk in language they can understand, participate fully in their world. In essence, you decide for a few moments to become a child yourself, hoping in this way to let them know who you are. And this time you would succeed! At the end of your coloring, when once again you stand to your feet as teacher, every child would understand clearly your love and concern. As you sit behind your desk, they would be able to grasp your commitment to teach them. Even if they could not find the words to say it, they would sense that you will use your power and position for their good. In short, they would begin to trust you. And it all would happen because you chose to enter their world, to become one of them, to relate to them where they are.
This is a picture of what is meant by the incarnation of God. We, God’s creations, are separated from Him by a chasm that is astronomical in comparison to that between a teacher and her pupils. Of this fact we should already be aware. Although we don’t always show it or like to admit it, we all know that He is God and we are not. If this great God wanted us to get to know Him better, how would He go about it? One way would be for Him to show us His divine credentials, as the teacher did in the first example. Another would be to accentuate the distance between Him and us, as she did in the second. Such reminders of God’s Infinity and our finitude are needed messages today and, if heeded, would surely bring us to our knees. The net effect, however, would be to reinforce what we already should know—that He is God and we are not.
But what if God also chose to relate to us by entering our world and becoming one of us (if only for a short time), interacting with us on our turf and at our level? If this were to happen, we would know Him to an even greater extent. We would, no doubt, see Him in a totally different light. From then on, when again in majesty and power and knowledge we envision Him, we would also see the One who loves us, listens to us, befriends us, protects us, embraces us, even suffers for us. The end result, if God chose to enter our world and become one of us, would be a deepening of our faith. We would begin to trust Him.
Daily Quotation
Quoted in C. S. Lewis, George MacDonald, 65.
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