Living As If We Believe In the Incarnation

Paul's epistle to the Church at Colossae contains some important advice about what it means to be the Church.  This is particularly found in Colossians 3.12-17, which is the most well known text within the epistle.

Paul indicates that being the Church is all about cultivating the spiritual disciplines of forgiveness and accountability.  The community is called to hold one another accountable to living their lives according to the example of Christ, but to also forgive one another when they fail to do so, keeping such persons in the community rather than removing them.

Paul's advice makes perfect sense when we consider the high bar that has been set for us through the life and teachings of Jesus.  We are called, as Paul reminds us, to live as Christ lived: to clothe ourselves with love, mercy, and compassion, to have peace within ourselves and to promote peace within the Church and the larger community.

The life that we are called to live, on a broader level, was manifest in God's incarnation in Jesus.  By entering into human life to redeem us, God manifested forgiveness, compassion, love, and mercy.  The very act of incarnation that is celebrated during the Christmas season reveals the nature of the God who was revealed in Jesus, that we are called to emulate.

The Nature of Biblical Prophecy

Biblical prophecy in both the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament is often characterized by vivid images of physical events, often containing violence and destruction.  It is the tendency of the contemporary Church to interpret these images in a literal manner.

In Luke's gospel, the writer interprets the arrival of John the Baptist as the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy that God would one day fill up valleys, make rough places smooth, and level mountains and hills.  The perception that John the Baptist fulfilled Isaiah's vision reveals a lot about how we should interpret biblical prophecy.  Most importantly, the physical events that Isaiah described were not fulfilled in a literal manner.  God did not literally fill up valleys and level mountains.  Instead, these physical events were metaphors for what God sought to accomplish through John the Baptist; to prepare people's hearts and minds for the arrival of Jesus.  The valleys and mountains were the impediments in people's souls and minds that needed to be removed through repentance so that God's Word might be revealed.

Let's consider this understanding of biblical prophecy when we interpret biblical texts that we believe speak of the future.  God's agenda remains the same.  God's intention is not to bring about violence and destruction, but to bring about salvation and redemption.  There is already enough violence and destruction in the world.  This is not God's plan or a reflection of God's intention for the world.  God's intention for the world was revealed in Jesus, who arrived to effect reconciliation between God and human beings.