Christmas: Why is it important that God became Flesh?

The Bible says, "The Word Became Flesh".....God became flesh, human. The incarnation.

Why is this important to the average joe? Any opinions, reflections, stories are welcome.

It's like if my brother came to the Judge to offer to take the penalty for my reckless driving conviction. The judge might be impressed with my brother's love, but he'd still have to consider that I was THE ONE WHO had broken the reckless driving law.

Answered by others but here's my answer.

Suppose your fine for Reckless driving was a million dollars or hanging and there was no way in your entire life you could ever pay the million dollars. However, your long-lost brother was an early investor in Microsoft and had a million to give you. He willingly gave it and so you were released. You were still guilty but the price was paid by another who loved you.

That would be called 'grace' - an unwarranted favor, not earned and not deserved. Love personified by Jesus Christ. God in human form, dying for us, his beloved children. Paying the price we could not pay and with His resurrection three days later, defeating death and showing us that death is not the end. We live on, in a different form, for eternity.

If we accept the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, we are promised a home in heaven - with God. If we chose to reject Christ's fee gift, we will spend it outside of heaven, in hell, away from God forever and we will know that we made the choice - not God. That will be part of the punishment; separation from God and the full understanding that we put ourselves in hell, forever, with no appeal or reprieve.

That's the reality that we are free to accept or reject (free will). Hard to believe that hundreds of millions chose to reject the gift but they do, and with wonderfully intellectual reasoning and articulate arguments why God does not exist, the bible is a collection of lies and fantasy and Christ was a figment of someones imagination. Tragic.

They scoff and sneer at the very suggestion that they might need a savior (ala Ted Turner). Science is all, man is supreme and God is dead, a victim of man's superior intellect. Humanism. Arrogant and self-serving but very, very popular in these parts. Be warned.

We lost dominion of the earth to Satan at the fall of man. In old time Israel, each tribe was alotted a certain amount of land. It could be sold to another tribe but during any celebration of Jubilee, every seven years, it could be purchased back.

The deed to the land was rolled into a scroll and wax was affixed to it to hold it closed. If a man could not afford to get his land back, he might go to a more properous kinsman and ask him to buy it back for him. He was called the Kinsman Redeemer, he would pay the price, take the scroll and break the wax seal, only he was allowed to do this. In Revelation, Jesus is breaking the wax on the scroll and reclaiming dominion over the earth and all that it in it, our Kinsman Redeemer.

God the Father, allowed God the Son, to become flesh, no longer are we just created in His image, no longer are we just a creation like a bird or a cow, we are actually related to Him now in the flesh bond. We needed a Kinsman Redeemer to redeem us from death, and now that is accomplished.

The punishment for sin is death, the only attonement blood, God's justice, mercy, wrath, grace, to me is like lightening flashes of pure emotion, man use to receive the full dose of whatever was turned to him, Jesus seems to me the prism that blends them into compassion from experience, and He is the only way to God.

What gave him the right to purchase me? Was it some kind of old law of the universe that God had established? Sort of like, "if you give your life for someone, then they belong to you?"

MAPie, I think you're onto what I'm looking for.

Let's say that I'm hopeless, helpless, and without God in my life. That's bad, right? But let's say it's worse than that. Let's say I'm destructive, that I'm prone to destroying things, causing them to either directly or indirectly die. I'm messing up the whole scene. By all appearances, I'm an active enemy against God's creation. If an analogy would fit, pretend I'm a corn borer in the cornfield. I'm destroying the crop that the farmer worked so hard to plant. The farmer needs to spray to kill me off, 'cause all I'm doing is bringing death to what he's trying to grow.

That'd make me not just lost, but also deserving of extermination; in fact, it'd make my extermination a necessary thing.

So Jesus comes along and dies for a seriously destructive me AND that gives him the right to purchase me and go to God and say, "Look, he belongs to me. He's one of the ones I bought. I'm gonna rehabilitate this one, so none of this "go to hell" stuff with this guy. He's one of mine."

Now, at this point, why doesn't God say, "No dice, Jesus! How in the world did you get the idea that dying for that destructive little twerp would give You the right to purchase him? Where'd you get that idea? He's a blight on creation and everything he touches seems to die, decay, or rot. We gotta get rid of him."

At this point, I need Jesus to reply with, "I had the right to purchase him based on X and Y of Code Z "Law of the Universe" subsection 7.111."

MA Pie, your stuff about the year of jubilee and the redeemer getting to take back what was family property gets in the direction of what I'm looking for. But let's say I go to that farmer with the corn-borer problem and say, "Hey, Mr Farmer, I became a corn-borer and died for them, so I want you to stop spraying now. That gave me the right to purchase them, so they're all mine now." The farmer will say, "Says who? What law says you get to own them if you die for them?"

Also, there does need to be a rehab program that Jesus would mention that would convince the Judge that I'm going to somehow be rendered non-destructive. How does just believing in Jesus convince God that I'm going to be a good candidate for the rehab, not just now but for eternity. See what I mean? Otherwise, I might go on some tear in the spiritual world like Satan did, who was a former Angel, and start more destruction in that realm and need to be brought to an end.

I'd appreciate any thoughts on this question that you might have. I hope I'm not wasting your time.

Never a waste of time to bring someone to an understanding of their immortal life. I'm happy to reply with my limited knowledge.

A young man came to Jesus telling him how respectful he was of him. Jesus said, "Follow me", and the young man replied, "First let me go and bury my Father". Jesus said to him "Let the dead, bury the dead". To understand what Jesus meant you must have a grasp on what being a human or any other animal entails. Everything has a soul, your personality as it were, just the fact that your alive means you have a soul, but this does not distinguish you from any other animal, except for the fact that you were made in the image of God. So we all walk around with our souls and our distinct personalities, but the soul we have is "apt to die" to perish.

Jesus stands at the door of your heart and gently knocks, he doesn't barge in, he doesn't demand you follow him, he is offering you eternal life as his companion, a member of the family of God. When you understand that he has created a bridge between you and God that sin had blocked and you accept what he did for you, you are given the "Holy Spirit", a part of God comes to live inside you.

It begins as a little seed, like a mustard seed, it is YOUR will that waters and makes it grow. It is many people's experience that when you first make that decision to accept what Jesus did for you, Satan becomes furious, many people's lives are hit with so much trouble causing so much anger, that is usally directed towards God, it's like, "See what happens when I try to come to God? If this is what my life will be like, forget it". The Bible warns in Matthew 13:19 that Satan will try to snatch that seed from you by blind siding you, it is your will that keeps it. It must be such a pearl of great price to you that you will go through anything to keep it.

Once you have set your will you find one of two things happens, it is different with different people, one set will find that they are suddenly transformed into a new person, but most of us find out slowly, little by little, that we are no longer alone inside ourselves, we begin to recognize there is another voice that speaks to our decision making. That is the Holy Spirit, and you can follow it, or ignore it, your choice. The more you follow it, the more you are transformed into the image of Christ, you are still yourself, but your mind changes about alot of things.

You are no longer only human, your soul is not "apt to die", you have become enternal and on the road to eternal adventures that other's will gnash their teeth in anguish over have missed, much to their sorrow and God's.

I hope this helps your understanding, if you follow the new person inside you, follow his voice, then you no longer are the destructive insect you mentioned, but a blessing to God, and a tool for God to bless others. Merry Christmas xzins, I hope if you have anymore questions you will honor me with a question. God bless and keep you until that day when we meet in His presence full of joy and anticipation.

It's important because the very idea of it is the most transformational concept ever devised.

Great answer, and a good hint that the theory of substitutionary attonement is inadequate to an understanding of how God transforms and redeems time and matter through his intervention therein.

I have recently been thinking about prayer. Now, we all know that prayer is chiefly a means of conforming ourselves to God, but how are we to understand petitionary prayer if we also understand God as unchanging? I don't yet have an answer to this, but I have a hunch: God's receptiveness to prayer is somehow caught up with the Incarnation -- with his own entry into time. Perhaps this is part of what's meant when we see Christ referred to as the high priest through whom all must come to have access to the Father.

This reminds me on another thread you attacked a Christian woman, while others where saying things like "my gospel is to raise the middle finger at you", "I have some fruit between my legs that you need to check", and "that isn't the Holy Spirit, thats a rise in your pants".

I never said anything like this, nor did I support those who did say things like this, if in fact they did say these things. In fact, I never even read the posts you are referring to. If I had, I would have reported them as abuse to the moderators.

I will defend Christians when other Christians attack them, however (NOT the people who said anything like what you quote above), which was all that I did on that thread. You mention me "attacking" someone, when in fact that person began the thread and discussion by attacking others. When truth is in question, I will not remain silent, particularly when lies are being perpetuated against other Christians.

I have to wonder why you are bringing this up here, several days after the fact, as if there is a need to revive a controversy that has long since passed, and in a very misleading and unfair way.

-penny

Faithless. God hasn't forgotten. You owe that woman a public apology since you did it publicly. You also owe a public denuciation of the blasphemy posters you sided with against the Lord.

No, I don't expect you to say your sorry. But you did it in public, and I expect better of what is done in public. You are without shame.

I confronted RNMomof7 about something she had said against the President and provided proof that her allegation was false. She thanked me for providing the proof. If that has not settled the disagreement, there is nothing more I can do.

Again, I do NOT take responsibility for the words of others, particularly since I did not, nor will I, read them. I did not publicly support the statements that you allege were made by others, nor in fact did I even see or read them.

I will no longer feed what appears to be an incessant need for dissent and controversy--that does neither you nor me any good whatsoever, and I believe it dishonors God greatly.

Reply to this with more anger and bitterness if you wish, but I will no longer be a part of this...

-penny

I've always thought that the logic of the idea was difficult to sustain ...The logic, from the Creator's perspective, is simple and entirely sustainable, but few Christians are really taught it, therefore they can't explain it. The Bible in the book of Hebrews and especially Romans does explain it--however, don't expect to find it understandable unless you yourself have trusted Christ. God the Son becoming human in the person of Jesus is at the heart of the gospel, which scripture makes plain that without the enlightening of the Holy Spirit, is, " to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness," (the "Jews" representing the theists of the day, the "Greeks" representing all others...)(I Corinthians 1:23) however the sentence continues, "but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God." (I Cor. 1:24).
The logic of it is this: Through one man, everyone's ancestor Adam, sin entered the world, and because of him everyone is born a sinner(this is called "original sin"). Sin has consequences, the chief being separation from God and death. Other consequences are separation from others, and even a separation from yourself... (an inner split). For God to maintain his holiness sin must be punished...and even the seeming smallest sins (such as eating something when told not to...like Adam and Eve did) must (eventually) involve separation from God--which is ultimately death. If we are all eternal beings--like the Bible indicates, that separation in death will be eternal too... rebellious sinful people just cannot abide a relationship with God. This is what Classical Christianity calls "hell."
However immediately after Adam and Eve's sin, God promised a way out... (Gen. 3:15). However, the penalty must be paid by the shedding of blood--symbolized in the Old Testament sacrificial system, otherwise God would be compromising His holy nature--something which is impossible for God to do. To be fair, the payment for sin must be made by a human--but not just any human, as all humans owe God this eternal debt. So it wouldn't do any good for someone to offer to pay it, as they already owe their own debt... Therefore it has to be a human who, while still being human, doesn't owe that debt, a human who is not a sinner. Yet even a sinless human--not being eternal in nature, couldn't pay the debt, without paying it eternally himself. Also, how could a human be sinless anyway--the Bible makes clear "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23)? That human would have to be divine, or else, 1)he'd never be sinless to begin with, 2)he couldn't bear the punishment suffering eternally, and, 3) he couldn't bear the punishment for everyone--only MAYBE for one. So each human would have to have another sinless human to bear their punishment....IMPOSSIBLE!
Therefore in order for the punishment to be paid in anyone's place, it would have to be done by someone human, and someone divine...who is God. That is the essence of the incarnation--that God Himself became a human being....yes, He set the ultimate example of love, yes He was the greatest teacher, and healer, but most important more, much more... He was the only possible sacrifice which was able to pay for His people's sins. The God/Man.

Many find the idea of "original sin" unfair--saying our distant ancestor shouldn't have been able to condemn us all...however this is where the symmetry and beauty of Jesus comes in--just as by one man we all were condemned--so also by one Man, the God/Man, those who believe are saved....

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.