In the last decade I’ve been busily de-constructing. Regular readers of my blog will know that as each year passes another core doctrine I held onto tightly is examined, turned over, and often discarded.
We’ve discussed atonement, salvation, hell, repentance: what it all means really, I no longer believe in a literal hell, or that you have to be a Christian to be saved, I’m not even sure we need to be saved.
As each year passes I find myself asking the question “Do I still believe enough of the core doctrines of Christianity to be able to call myself Christian?”
For now I believe I do. I believe in and follow the teachings of Jesus. As I read through the Nicene creed I think I believe everything in it.
I think I do, though I’m not really as sure about what I believe as I once was.
I think, on balance, I still believe in the literal physical resurrection.
I’m not so sure about the virgin birth, I believe God could make a virgin pregnant, I’m just not sure it matters, I don’t think virginity matters as much as we think it does.
And then there’s the incarnation.
I wonder if in a few years time I will still believe in the resurrection, the virgin birth, the deity of Jesus, but for now, I do.
Or at least I want to.
I want to believe in the incarnation.
I need the incarnation.
Whilst I don’t really care whether Mary was a virgin or not, I don’t think it matters, the incarnation does. It is important. I need it.
There is something beautiful, wonderful and necessary about a God who loves us so much that they would give up the power and the glory of heaven and come down to earth in the mud and the blood and the sweat of human birth, as the most vulnerable and powerless creature on the planet: a human infant.
A God who cares so much about human suffering that they choose to endure it not only alongside us, but as us. This isn’t a God who just talks the talk but one who walks the walk. A God who is no longer separate from creation but becomes creation. A God who is not content to be a mystery, so chooses to become knowable.
This is a God who “gets it.”
This is a lion who lies down with the lamb.
A God who turns all our notions of power and kingship on their head by giving up all authority and stooping to the manger so that we can be lifted up to heaven.
A God who declares “blessed are the humble in spirit,” who casts down the mighty, lifts the lowly, feeds the hungry and sends the rich away empty handed.
A God who looks women in the eye, fills them with power and sends them out in joy.
A God who heals the sick and washes feet and takes a whip to con artists.
A God who drinks wine, and goes fishing. Who enjoys a good wedding, and rides donkeys and weeps at the death of his friend.
A God who rejects violence and conflict and instead allows himself to be beaten, brutalised and murdered, all for the sake of love.
I need that God.
