Word of The Father – Day 9
We have all done it. Spoken in clichés, or in words designed to hide more than to reveal…to disguise rather than unveil. Every relationship has the opportunity to remain on the surface of who you are or to go deep and reveal your heart. Communication is the vehicle through which that can happen. Relationships exist so this has a place to happen.
While some communication exists to transfer information, the process of communication is fundamentally about self-revelation or self-disclosure. The most meaningful levels of communication are those in which we learn, not data, but who the person is we are communicating with. Communication is about removing the mask of superficiality, of going below the surface of a relationship into the depths with another.
Adam and Eve began life in the Garden at a place of absolute transparency. (see Genesis 2:25) They were “not afraid” to let the other person see them as they were. But when sin invaded, they hid from God and from each other. We do the same. Our communication becomes unclear, clouded with fear, half-truths, and superficiality. To truly communicate strips all these things away… we can show the other person who we are without fear. “There is no fear in love but perfect love casts out fear.” (1 John 4:18)
Christmas was the ultimate step of God making the effort to self-reveal to us. In the incarnation of Jesus, we see the Deity…the fullness of God indwelling Jesus bodily. God is not hidden from us anymore… nor does He ever want to be. We don’t have to wonder Who God is; He came as a baby at Bethlehem. “He who has seen Me has seen the Father,” Jesus later would say. In Jesus, God is self-revealed! “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1) God perfectly revealed Himself in the vulnerability and weakness and sweetness of a human baby.
And with Christmas, we can celebrate the God Who came to show us Who He was!
Veiled in flesh the Godhead see,
Hail the incarnate Deity;
Born as man, with men to dwell,
Jesus, our Emmanuel!
“For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.” (Colossians 1:19)
FOR REFLECTION: How has God revealed Himself personally in your life?