The importance of the Lord's Incarnation cannot be overstated. Without God's plan of salvation including His taking on our flesh and delivering it from the corruption which we chose by rejecting His love, there is no hope for eternal life in the Kingdom of Heaven.
John 1:14 sums up the Incarnation in a very few eloquent words. "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth."
God the Son, the Word, chooses to conform Himself to our flesh. Why? So that in so doing He may establish the path for us to conform ourselves to Him!
St. Gregory Palamas teaches this: “God emptied Himself in an indescribable way, came down from on high to the lowest state of man’s nature, and indissolubly linked it with Himself…He gathered both things into one, mingling humanity with divinity, and by so doing He taught everyone that humility is the road which leads upwards.” ("On the Entry of the Theotokos to the Holy of Holies") How infinitely did God humble Himself, taking on our flesh, to teach us the need to seek the path of humility ourselves, to deny ourselves, taking up the comparitively insignificant cross He has given to each of us so that we may choose to take up that cross and to follow Him!
St. Paul teaches, "For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified." (Rom 8:29-30) Do not misconstrue 'predestined' with having no choice. God always gives us free will to choose to follow Him or to reject Him. 'Predestined' is a word used to indicate His foreknowledge of the choices we will freely make.
In exercising our free will, we are to seek to redefine ourselves into that image of God the Son, the image of the One Who came to love, to heal, to redeem, to comfort, to serve. With the exception of remaining sinless, He has equipped us with all tools required to seek to follow Him in all these things. And through His grace, He blesses us to seek that perfection He shows in Himself. "Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect." (Mat 5:48) The follow-on teaching is equally important. "Just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will." (Eph 1:4-5)
As we together walk the path of these remaining 23 days before the birth of the Savior in the flesh, let us also together seek with every step we take to step toward the Kingdom, not straying from it. The world has always been a dangerous place. Some see it as even more dangerous today than ever. For those who seek to do God's will, danger must not be a concern. When we pray, "Thy will be done," we must pray it and mean it with all our heart. If we pray that His will be done, it has deeper meaning. Jesus teaches, "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven." (Mat 7:21)
I beg all of us, ignore "shopping days until Christmas," and focus rather on "days left to repent before encountering God in the flesh." The Star is already shining in the east. Wise men and women will choose to follow it to find our God laying humbly in a feeding trough present to feed His own dumb animals. For even they share of what they have with God Who comes to save the world. He comes to save you and me. To save those we love. To save those who do not love us. To save those we know and those we don't. In short, He comes to save all mankind, all who will use their God-given free will to choose to follow Him in humility, in faith, and in love.
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