But He [the Son of God] did take true flesh, even if the Valentinians go crazy; and the Word was true God by nature, even if the Arians go mad. In this flesh there has come about the beginning of our new creation because he has been created as a human being for our sake and has renewed the way for us, as has been said.

athanasius, orations against the arians, 2:70

In reading the Platonic books I found expressed in different words, and in a variety of ways, that the Son, 'being in the form of the Father did not think it theft to be equal with God,' because by nature he is that very thing. But that 'he took on himself the form of a servant and emptied himself, was made in the likeness of men and found to behave as a man, and humbled himself being made obedient to death, even the death of the cross so that God exalted him' from the dead 'and gave him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should box, of celestial, terrestrial, and infernal beings, and every tongue should confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father' (Phil.2:6-11) -- that these books do not have.

augustine, confessions, vii.14

In particular, it is vital to the whole thrust of John's theology that the logos becomes a human being. Sirach, somewhat loftily, could not envisage a human being ever fully fathoming Wisdom. John sees this Wisdom becoming, fully, a human being. In doing so he is still conscious of writing a new version of Genesis. The climax of the fist chapter of Genesis is the creation of the human being in the image of the creator. The climax of John's prologue is the coming to full humanness of the logos, who, in taking on so many of the characteristics of Wisdom, may be assumed also to be the divine image-bearer. When Pilate declares to the crowds, 'Here is the man,' John intends his readers to hear echoes that have been present since the very beginning. Jesus, as the logos having become flesh, is the truly human being.

bishop n.t. wright, new testament and the people of God, p.416

“Did you mark how naturally – as if he’d been born for it – the earth-born vermin entered the new life? How all his doubts became, in the twinkling of an eye, ridiculous? I know what the creature was saying to itself! ‘Yes. Of course. It always was like this. All horrors have followed the same course, getting worse and worse and forcing you in a kind of bottleneck till, at the very moment when you thought you must be crushed, behold! you were out of the narrows and all was suddenly well. … You die and die and then you are beyond death. How could I ever have doubted it?’

As he saw you, he also saw Them. I know how it was. You reeled back dizzy and blinded, more hurt by them than he had ever been by bombs. The degredation of it! – that this thing of earth and slime could stand upright and converse with spirits before whom you, a spirit, could only cower. Perhaps you had hoped that the awe and strangeness of it would dash his joy But that is the cursed thing; the gods are strange to mortal eyes, and yet they are not strange. He had no faintest conception till that very hour of how they would look, and even doubted their existence. But when he saw them he knew that he had always known them and realized what part each one of them had played at many an hour in his life when he had supposed himself alone, so that now he could say to them, one by one, not ‘Who are you?’ but ‘So it was you all the time.’ All that they were and said at this meeting woke memories … Only you were left outside.

He saw not only Them; he saw Him. This animal, this thing begotten in a bed, could look on Him. What is blinding, suffocating fire to you, is now cool light to him, is clrity itself, and wears the form of a Man. You would like, if you could, to interpret the paitent’s prostration in the Presence, his self-abhorrence and utter knowledge of his sins (yes, Wormwood, a clearer knowledge even than yours) on the analogy of your own choking and paralyzing sensations when you encounted the deadly air that breathes from the heart of Heaven. But it’s all nonsense. Pains he still may have to encounter, but they embrace those pains.

CS Lewis

screwtape letters, no. 31

1 Corinthians 10:16-17: Is not this cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ?

Many Christians over the centuries have thought of the Lord’s Supper as a kind of continuing or second incarnation. First the Son gets embodied in flesh, but now that He’s gone away He gets embodied in another material. Nowadays, He dwells among us not in a human body but in bread.

This kind of analogy between the incarnation and the presence of Christ in the Supper has produced all sorts of bad habits. If this is Jesus here on the table, we should bow down and worship Him. We should keep the bread after we’re done, and maybe even preserve a bit in a golden chest so we can go back and venerate it later.

One way to say this is that we should not think of the Eucharist not so much as Christmas – as if the Son were born again in bread – but instead think about it instead in terms of Advent. This table marks a triple Advent: It celebrates the past coming of the Lord; it is the coming of the Lord; and it looks ahead to the coming of the Lord. We commemorate the life, death and resurrection of Jesus; we feed on Him by the Spirit; we proclaim the Lord’s death until He come.

When we view it as an Advent meal, we see that this Supper is about Jesus’ absence as well as His presence; it’s about the future as well as the present. It is a present feast, a feast we celebrate because the Lord has come. But it is not yet a full banquet, because the Lord is still to come.

Dr. Leithart gave this as a Eucharist meditation this morning. convicting, inspiring, and beautiful.

via leithart.com