If the moist earth that forms the flesh and marrow does not cause you admiration, neither will the Incarnation.
At this time of Christmas, I have wondered how fully connected Adam and Christ are in the history of redemption, as shown clearly by Romans 5: 12-18 and 1 Corinthians 15:42-49. The Trinitarian God spoke and Adam was born, and He formed it from the dust of the earth (Genesis 2. 7). The Father spoke, the Son manifested himself, the Spirit gave life (cf. Job 33. 4). A son came from the ground.
- In the Incarnation spoke the same Trinitarian God.
- This time in the language of redemption: the Father sent (Gal 4:4; 1 Jn 4:10).
- The Son obeyed (cf.
- Jn 5:19-20) and Mary conceived by the Spirit.
- (Mt 1.
- 18; Lk 1:35).
- The Word came out of a womb (Jn 1:1).
At Christmas, we are always reminded that the Son of God became incarnating and lived among us.
Have we learned that this should fill us with joy, a glorious joy, typical of the proclamation of a celestial army (Lr 2:13-14), and should really do so?However, remembering that Adam is under the shadow of Christ can be used to deepen this joy. Here are some that we think to remind us how the beauty and wonder of the Incarnation rest on the beauty and wonder of creation.
Just as God was not obligated to redeem, God was not obligated to create. “Was creation not something required, or obligatory, or estrangement from God, or by any necessity imposed from outside, or by any defect that infiltrated God’s life? (Fred Sanders). Creation is the result of a voluntary decision. , full of grace and love Is everything we see around us a work of God’s grace, arising out of God’s love? (Michael Reeves).
Adam’s creation, seen from this angle, is neither ordinary nor expected in the sense of being the product of a mechanical law of evolution. Adam just wasn’t supposed to exist. Adam existed only because God chose to speak it, and nothing can thwart the sovereign choice and sacred discourse of an almighty God. Creation was voluntary and not mandatory.
In this sense, Adam’s life can be seen as a gift from the Trinitarian donor. Creation, not Christmas, is at the origin of gift exchange. This can be part of the miracle of humanity’s genesis. Our beginning was packed and labeled by the Trinity: are Adam and his offspring gifts that God has given himself?not by divine greed, but by divine grace.
Now juxtaponga this with the Christmas story of the New Testament, if the wonderful thing about Genesis is that God gave humanity the gift of life, then the joy of Christmas is that God has given us a new life and the packaging of the two gifts. It looks the same. The temporal son took flesh and blood, like the Eternal Son, the man of the earth?(1:47) had no biological father, like the “man of heaven”.
But there are also notable differences: the temporal son has failed where the Eternal Son has won; the man of the earth could not offer salvation, but the man of heaven had salvation in his blood. The first Adam changed God’s words to the words of a creature; the last Adam (1:45) crushed the words of a creature with the words of the Trinitarian God (Mt 4).
Given this historical-redemptive relationship between Adam and Christ, we would do well to remember both at Christmas, with a greater emphasis, of course, on the Incarnation. Adam, as we said at the beginning, is in the shadow of Christ, not the other way around. Still, our appreciation of the complete uniqueness of the Incarnation deepens when we compare it to this ancient incarnation of the lineage in Adam. How wonderful it is that God breathes life into dust and pushes a person! It is only overcome when we reflect on the miracle of God blowing the second person of the Trinity into the flesh. We should be in awe of Adam, but bewildered by Christ. The first brought death for life; the second, life for death.
This Christmas, as you focus on the glory of the Incarnation and the gift of the Son of God, remember that this Son casts a long shadow in which a younger child is born. The world began with a gift; maybe we shouldn’t be surprised, then, to see it restored by someone else?a bigger and more expensive gift. Oh, my God. Such a gift is not only worthy of gratitude. It is worthy of our worship.