Jesus was both fully man and fully God
I know it sounds cliché, but this year has flown by. I can’t believe that in just a few weeks, we’ll be celebrating Christmas!
If you’ve been a Christian or Catholic for any amount of time, you’ve undoubtedly heard the Christmas Story: the birth of Jesus Christ, God incarnate, who came to the earth to save us.
But sometimes, it can be helpful to read a very familiar story from a different perspective to gain new insights, for example, by putting yourself in the shoes of one specific character throughout the story. In fancy terms, this is called a character study, but I’m calling it: Christmas from Mary’s POV.
Mary is the mother of Jesus, and her part in the story is quite extraordinary. For starters, she was visited by an angel who foretold her:
You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call Him Jesus. – Luke 1:31 NIV
An angelic visitation is a shocking event in and of itself, especially from Mary’s POV, but his message was even more so. She was a virgin! How could she give birth to a son?
The fact that Mary was a virgin when she conceived Jesus is one of the foundations of our Christian faith. It is included in the Statement of Faith (also known as the Apostles Creed) of every Christian denomination.
Why is it so important? Because it proves that Jesus was both fully man, born of a woman, and fully God, conceived by the Holy Spirit.
Think about this for a moment, we serve a God who became man. Jesus was fully God and fully man when he was born. He was fully God and fully man while he lived, taught, healed and delivered. And He was fully God and fully man while He died for our sins.
Isn’t that amazing?
