In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. – Hebrews 1:1-4
“The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” - which means, “God with us.” – Matthew 1:23
In advent we wait. But wait for what? In short, the answer is easy. We wait for the coming of the Christ child. And in Jesus Christ we wait not for who we wish Him to be but who He is in himself, who He has revealed himself to be. We wait for person Jesus Christ, who in full humanity and personhood is still yet one substance with God the Father and God the Spirit. We wait for the coming of God in the form of a human without substituting either his divinity or humanity. In Jesus Christ we are confronted with true humanity and true divinity. In Jesus Christ we see with the eyes of faith what it means to be human and who God has shown himself to be. In Jesus Christ we find a co-mingling of two natures in one person. As the Nicean councils so forcefully put it: Jesus Christ is of one substance with God. God of God. Light of light. Yet to clarify any potential confusion, a century later the Council of Chalcedon clarified: while never forfeiting his divine nature in becoming truly human, in Jesus Christ the two natures rest perfectly and paradoxically in one person without confusion or division.
The danger then as it is now to bifurcate Jesus Christ into one or the other. Rather than approaching Christ through how he has revealed himself to be, we divide Jesus into a man or a God, one or the other.
Keeping with the spirit of Hellenistic philosophy one early challenge to the Christian faith was to deny the sufferings of Jesus Christ. Inconceivable that he could be fully God and fully human, the docetists argued that Jesus Christ only appeared to be human. And since it is inconceivable and impossible for God to suffer, in life and in death Jesus Christ only appeared to suffer as you and I might. For the docetists, Jesus Christ is very God and yet not very human. The Jesus of which Scripture bears witness only appeared to be fully-functioning biological human. Some said the body was like a ghost that only seemed human. Others suggested his body was “spiritual”. What was certain was that although Jesus seemed human, he was not.
A good proof-texting docetist might sight a passage such as Hebrews and ask “how could Jesus Christ, whom Scriptures designate as ‘the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being’ be human?” Clearly, the Hebrew Scriptures make it clear that God is God and we, to put it mildly, are not. How then could this Jesus, the radiance of God’s glory, be human? To the Greek philosopher this was truly inconceivable.
As someone who has not witnessed many debates about Jesus Christ framed in terms of Hellenistic philosophy, I have not met many, if any, docetist evangelists. However, amongst those who profess faith in Jesus Christ there is an acute temptation to deny the true humanity of Jesus Christ. We exalt the divinity of Jesus Christ at the expense of his humanity. We lose sight of human frailties that characterized the man Jesus. We forget that this Jesus Christ is Emmanuel, God with us. And by “with us”, I mean that in every possible manner of the word. In Jesus Christ, God became one of us by becoming human. This was no sleight of hand. There was a birth, a human birth. And through this birth God entered the world in the person of Jesus Christ. This is what Karl Barth calls the mystery and miracle of Christmas. And in this birth, Jesus Christ confronts us not only with the very nature of God above, but confronts us with true humanity. We know what it means to be a person through the incarnational activity of Jesus Christ.
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