The Human Face of God
- davidwperk
- Mar 3
- 8 min read
Devotional Reflection, Monday, March 3, 2025
The week of the last Sunday after the Epiphany
The Rev. David W. Perkins, Th.D.
Key phrases for reflection from today’s Gospel reading:
1:1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. 3All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4in him was life, and the life was the light of all people.
14And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth. . . . .18No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.
You will find the full text of this Gospel reading at the end of this reflection.
Daily Office Lectionary Readings (BCP, 950)
AM Psalm 25; PM Psalm 9, 15
Deut. 6:10-15; Heb 1:1-14; John 1:1-18
Today we celebrate the Feast of . (See below.)
David’s Reflections
At several points in the Great Thanksgiving in The Book of Common Prayer, we use the words “incarnation” and “incarnate” to refer to Jesus’ coming among us. In Prayer B, “. . . in these last days you sent him to be incarnate from the Virgin Mary. . . “ In Prayer D, “Father, you loved the world so much that in the fullness of time you sent your only Son to be our Savior. Incarnate by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, he lived as one of us . . . . “
Prayer A expresses the idea without the word: “Father, . . . you, in your mercy, sent Jesus Christ, your only and eternal Son, to share our human nature, to live and die as one of us. . . . “ Our theological term for this is “incarnation,” based on the Latin word carncaro – flesh plus the preposition in. Literally, it means to “be made flesh.” Jesus was God’s Son made flesh in a human life.
Enriching Our Worship, alternative liturgical materials approved for use in our churches, contains three Eucharistic prayers. Prayer 1 references the incarnation with these words: “in the fullness of time, you sent your eternal Word, made mortal flesh in Jesus. Born into the human family, and dwelling among us, he revealed your glory” Prayer 3 does so as follows: “Of your grace, you gave Jesus to be human, to share our life, to proclaim the coming of your holy reign and give himself for us, a fragrant offering.” The Nicene Creed in that resource changes “became man” to “became truly human.”
Today’s Gospel and today’s epistle (Hebrews 1:1-14, along with passages in Hebrews 2; Philippians 2, and Colossians 1 and 2) provide some of the primary biblical texts on which this understanding rests. John 1:14 reads, “And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.” Verse 18 reads, “No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.” Of course, the first three Gospels also re-enforce Jesus’ real humanity, most especially Mark’s rather candid and graphic portrayal of Jesus’ emotions. The central mystery of Christian faith finds expression in this revelation. The divine second person of the Trinity, the Son, became a flesh and blood person, a real human being in Jesus of Nazareth.
Jesus’ followers and those who witnessed his ministry never regarded him as more than a human being. And, his followers were radical Jewish monotheists. They reflected on his life and teachings after the resurrection and came to the remarkable conviction that his life could not be explained fully within the human categories available to them. Without detracting from the real human nature of his life and their experience of him, they began to worship him and to pray to God through him. That was a dramatic development for these radical monotheists. (For hints about that process of reflection and development, see Matthew 28:16-20; John 8:48-59; 14:15-31.)
Anglican New Testament scholar, John A. T. Robinson caught this idea in the title of his book about Jesus, The Human Face of God (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1973). Jesus brings God into our experience but he also brings our experience as human beings into the divine.
The incarnation means, among other things, that we no longer ever are alone or misunderstood. God went to the ultimate extreme to bring us back in to relationship from our perpetual wanderings. In Christ, God understands us and enters into our experience. Human nature now dwells within the divine Trinity; the second person of that triunity remains human, thus bringing our human experience into the divine life. And that same Jesus lives within each of us, filling our lives with his presence and bringing his oneness with God into our experience. As John put it in verse 16 of today’s reading, “From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.”
Please consider this statement from John Dunne, Catholic priest and theologian:
It is the acknowledgment of ignorance, the openness toward mystery, that authenticates both the passion of man and the passion of God. We can understand what it is to desire to be God through fulfillment of desire or through hardening against pain and deprivation or through renunciation of hope and fear, and so we can understand conversely what it is to aim at being man rather than God. When we make humanity our aim, however, and enter thereby into sympathetic understanding of the passion of Christ, we discover that the fulfilled or hardened or detached being that we had imagined to be divine on the basis of our own desire to be God is not the genuine God, but the genuine God is the one who loses himself as God in order that man may be born.*
* John S. Dunne, A Search for God in Time and Memory (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame UP, 1977), p. 23.
Collect of the Day, The Last Sunday after the Epiphany
This Proper is always used on the Sunday before Ash Wednesday
O God, who before the passion of your only-begotten Son revealed his glory upon the holy mountain: Grant to us that we, beholding by faith the light of his countenance, may be strengthened to bear our cross, and be changed into his likeness from glory to glory; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. (BCP, 217)
Today we celebrate the Feast of John (died 2 Mar 1791 CE) and Charles Wesley (died 29 Mar 1788 CE), renewers of the church.
Collect of the Feast of John and Charles Wesley
Lord God, you inspired your servants John and Charles Wesley with burning zeal for the sanctification of souls and endowed them with eloquence in speech and song: Kindle such fervor in your Church, we entreat you, that those whose faith has cooled may be warmed, and those who have not known Christ may turn to him and be saved; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
A Collect for the Renewal of Life
O God, the King eternal, whose light divides the day from the night and turns the shadow of death into the morning: Drive far from us all wrong desires, incline our hearts to keep your law, and guide our feet into the way of peace; that, having done your will with cheerfulness while it was day, we may, when night comes, rejoice to give you thanks; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (BCP, 99)
Of the Incarnation
O God, who wonderfully created, and yet more wonderfully restored, the dignity of human nature: Grant that we may share the divine life of him who humbled himself to share our humanity, your Son Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Of the Holy Spirit
Almighty and most merciful God, grant that by the indwelling of your Holy Spirit we may be enlightened and strengthened for your service; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. (BCP, 252)
A Collect for Early Evening
Grant us, Lord, the lamp of charity which never fails, that it may burn in us and shed its light on those around us, and that by its brightness we may have a vision of that holy City, where dwells the true and never-failing Light, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (BCP, 110)
A Collect for Mission
O God, you have made of one blood all the peoples of the earth, and sent your blessed Son to preach peace to those who are far off and to those who are near: Grant that people everywhere may seek after you and find you; bring the nations into your fold; pour out your Spirit upon all flesh; and hasten the coming of your kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (BCP, 100, 257)
Daily Office Gospel, John 1:1-18
1:1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. 3All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4in him was life, and the life was the light of all people.
5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. 6There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. 8He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. 9The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. 10He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. 11He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. 12But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. 14And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.
15 (John testified to him and cried out, ‘This was he of whom I said, “He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before me.”’) 16From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.
Daily Offices in The Book of Common Prayer
Morning Prayer, Rite 2, page 75, The Book of Common Prayer
Noonday Prayer, page 103, Book of Common Prayer
Order of Worship for Evening (Vespers), p 109, Book of Common Prayer
Evening Prayer, Rite 2, page 115, Book of Common Prayer
Compline (Night Prayer), page 127, Book of Common Prayer
Daily Devotionals, page 136, Book of Common Prayer
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