The Grand Miracle: First Sunday of Advent

The Christian story is precisely the story of one grand miracle, the Christian assertion being that what is beyond all space and time, what is uncreated, eternal, come into nature, into human nature, descended into His own universe, and rose again, bringing nature up with Him. It is precisely one great miracle. If you take that away there is nothing specifically Christian left.
~ C.S. Lewis, "The Grand Miracle," God in the Dock, pg80.

According to Lewis, a miracle is "an interference with Nature by supernatural power." The Incarnation is a miracle - it is God inserting himself directly into our humanity. The grand miracle of God becoming one of us points us towards the reward: that we might become one with Him. Jesus is what God looks like as one of us. Jesus born as an infant, Jesus named Emmanuel: God with us. It's a name pregnant with meaning, a name that we must grow to understand and accept and experience.

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
~ John 1v14 (NIV)

What can compel us to give grace? What can enable us to accept truth? It would take a miracle. And that is what the Incarnation is about - Jesus coming to show us what grace looks like, how to live by the truth. We worship God best when we live out the way of grace and truth as demonstrated by Jesus.

Who needs grace from you? Who needs truth from you? May it be your best gift this Christmas season.