The "With" Comes Before the "For"

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Since there are yet more days of Christmas, we have time to ponder a question.

I think it might be the most important question:

Would God still have come to us in Jesus if there had been no fall?

Would the eternal Son have become incarnate even if we had not sinned?

That is, if there had been no need for his cross, then would we still have gathered at his creche?

Whether we realize it or not, it’s a question we answer in the affirmative every time we name God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

When we call God Trinity, we’re saying that God’s decision to be with us in Jesus Christ— God’s decision not be God without us— is eternal and therefore prior to God’s determination to be God for us on the Cross.

The with comes before the for; therefore, the with takes precedence over the for.

It’s true that Jesus saves us. It’s true that his death and resurrection reconcile God’s creation. It’s true that through him our sins are forgiven, but that’s not why he comes.

The answer is so simple and straightforward it’s hiding from us in plain sight.

God comes to us in Jesus because God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

That is, from before the foundation of the world, God elected not to be God without us.

Jesus comes to be with us at Christmas because he was always going come.

The incarnation only unveils what was true from before the big bang.

What we unwrap at Christmas isn’t simply a rescue package but an even deeper mystery, the mystery that the nativity is an event God set on his calendar before God created time itself.

Even if there had been no need for a cross, there still would have been a creche because God has elected to be no other god than Emmanuel, God-with-us.

In other words—

Jesus is not made for us.

We are made for him.

We are the ones with whom God wants to share his life.

Thus, at Christmas, we are the gifts God gives to himself.

Because before the stars were hung in the sky, before Adam fell or Israel’s love failed, God’s deepest and abiding desire is is friendship.

With us.

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Once you understand that from before creation God elected to be God with us, for the home of God to be with mortals, then you discover that Jesus, as Emmanuel, is not part of some grander plan.

Jesus is the plan.

Emmanuel is not the means by which we gain admittance to the good place. Emmanuel, God-with-us, fully human and fully divine, the incarnate God is heaven on earth.

Jesus is the life of heaven made flesh.

The ancient Christians had a catchphrase they used to think through this.

In Latin, it’s: opus ad extra, opus ad intra. That was their way of saying: Who and what God is towards us in Jesus Christ, God is eternally in himself.

If what Jesus teaches us is really the Word of God, if the Cross is in fact a perfect sacrifice for your sins, if your salvation is indeed assured, if the one born at Christmas is truly Emmanuel- God with us- and nothing less, then who and what God is in Christ on Earth, God is antecedently and eternally in himself. If Jesus is the supreme expression of God, then he must’ve always been so. Before he’s Jesus of Nazareth, in the flesh, he’s the eternal Son, in the Trinity. That’s what Christians mean when we say that Christ is pre-existent. That’s what we profess in the creed when we recite that Christ is the one “by whom all things were made.” That’s what the first Christians sang in the hymn Paul quotes in his letter to the Colossians that Christ is:

“...is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; all things have been created through him and for him...”   

He was before was was.

He’s back behind yesterday.

There is not when he was not, and there can not be when he will not be.

What’s that mean?

It means the incarnation only unveils what was true from before the beginning. God’s primal, primordial, eternal decision not to be God in any other way but God-with-us. Thus, there is literally no limit to God’s love.

There can be no time at which you can exhaust God’s love for you because Jesus Christ is before time.

And so Jesus doesn’t just come to forgive us our sins. He isn’t born just to die. Because when we say that Christ is pre-existent, we say that he would’ve come anyway, that he always going to come, that even if there hadn’t needed to be a Cross there still would’ve been a cradle. Because before he brought forth light and life on Earth, God’s shaped his whole life to be Emmanuel, God-with-us.

Jesus isn’t made simply to forgive or die for our sins. Because if Christ is preexistent, then everything goes in the other direction. Jesus isn’t made for us; we were made for him.

We are the ones with whom God wants to share his life.

Jesus is the reason for the season, but the reason for Jesus is that before the stars were hung in place, before Adam sinned or Israel’s love failed God’s deepest desire is, was and always will be friendship. Fellowship. With us.

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