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Glory · Jesus Christ
The incarnation is God's love entering our world at the cost of everything. The Father sent His Son not because we deserved it, but because He loved us while we were still sinners. The manger, the cross, and the empty tomb are one continuous act of divine love that we can never exhaust.
https://glorystudy.com/questions/jesus-incarnation-fathers-love · Scripture quoted from the World English Bible
Philippians 2:5-11
As you read: The Son's descent from equality with God to the death of a cross.
5Have this in your mind, which was also in Christ Jesus,
6who, existing in the form of God, didn’t consider equality with God a thing to be grasped,
7but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men.
8And being found in human form, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, yes, the death of the cross.
9Therefore God also highly exalted him, and gave to him the name which is above every name;
10that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, those on earth, and those under the earth,
11and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
John 3:16-17
As you read: The most famous sentence in the Bible: the Father gave His Son because He loved.
16For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
17For God didn’t send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through him.
Romans 5:6-11
As you read: God's love proven while we were still sinners.
6For while we were yet weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.
7For one will hardly die for a righteous man. Yet perhaps for a righteous person someone would even dare to die.
8But God commends his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
9Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we will be saved from God’s wrath through him.
10For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we will be saved by his life.
11Not only so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.
1 John 4:7-12
As you read: The Father's love made visible in sending His Son as the atoning sacrifice.
7Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves has been born of God, and knows God.
8He who doesn’t love doesn’t know God, for God is love.
9By this God’s love was revealed in us, that God has sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.
10In this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins.
11Beloved, if God loved us in this way, we also ought to love one another.
12No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God remains in us, and his love has been perfected in us.
The incarnation was not an accident or a plan B. Paul writes that God sent His Son 'in the likeness of sinful flesh,' and that He 'didn't spare his own Son, but delivered him up for us all.' The Father was not passive at the cross; He gave the Son He loved because He loved the world He made.
“For what the law couldn’t do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God did, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh;”Romans 8:3
“He who didn’t spare his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how would he not also with him freely give us all things?”Romans 8:32
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.”John 3:16
Paul says Christ, being in the form of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. The distance from heaven to the manger, from the throne to the cross, is the measure of the Father's love for you.
“who, existing in the form of God, didn’t consider equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, yes, the death of the cross.”Philippians 2:6-8
Paul makes it plain: 'God commends his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.' We were not searching; He was. We were not worthy; He loved us anyway. The cross is not a reward for the good but a rescue for the lost.
“But God commends his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”Romans 5:8
“In this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins.”1 John 4:10
“For the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost.””Luke 19:10
John says the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen His glory. God did not send a messenger or a system; He came Himself, in person, so that we could see what He is like. Jesus said, 'He who has seen me has seen the Father.' The manger brings God within reach.
“The Word became flesh, and lived among us. We saw his glory, such glory as of the one and only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth.”John 1:14
“Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you such a long time, and do you not know me, Philip? He who has seen me has seen the Father. How do you say, ‘Show us the Father?’”John 14:9
“God, having in the past spoken to the fathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, has at the end of these days spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the worlds. His Son is the radiance of his glory, the very image of his substance, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purified us of our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;”Hebrews 1:1-3
The same Father who sent the Son to be born also raised Him from the dead. The love that entered the world at Christmas accomplishes its work at Easter. Paul writes that Christ was 'who was delivered up for our trespasses, and was raised for our justification.' The full arc of incarnation, death, and resurrection is one act of love.
“who was delivered up for our trespasses, and was raised for our justification.”Romans 4:25
“For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,”1 Corinthians 15:3-4
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.”John 3:16