"[The incarnation] reaffirms that man is truly man when he participates in the life of God; that he is not autonomous, either in relation to God, or in relation to the world; that true human life can never be 'secular.'" (John Meyendorff, Byzantine Theology, p. 152)
After a friend's recent question, I've been wondering what it means to be human in relation to God. A standard take on this question in our time is that of Neo-Calvinism, which suggests (perhaps not intentionally) that human nature, experience, and identity is most fully described in the experience of the sinner justified by God apart from will or choice. It is the experience of passively receiving grace, love, and goodness when we did not yet imagine that such things existed. To be sure, something rings true in this perspective, and there is much scriptural support to it. On the other hand, Neo-Calvinism seems to be lacking in another respect. It suggests that humanity is validated through an imposed external, which conversely emphasizes the difference between humanity and God. God is holy, and I am a wretch, and my own nature is only fully known in that instant of recognition where I see the great divide between myself and God. In this way, we risk making human nature only secular, only separate from God.
This is a proper theological anthropology derived from the cross. Immortal God dies for mortal man, and the monstrous paradox of it all symbolically highlights the difference between humankind and God. God's death in Christ is only noteworthy given the dramatic difference between God and humanity.
What might a theological anthropology of the incarnation look like? Instead of the terrible moment of the mortality of immortality, we see the awe of the union of mortality and immortality as an opportunity. Humanity was only fully realized in the incarnation, where human nature fully participated in the divine nature. This is a symbol of potential, which highlights the Biblical notion of our creation in the image of God. I know myself through the incarnation, where I see that I am fully dependent on God and only fully human in communion or participation with God. This discovery is one of openness, where I am surprised that human nature can be holy where it was not expected. No one looks to their neighbor expecting to encounter Perfection, and yet, in Christ, there the union is. This demonstrates the holy aspects of human nature, identity, and existence.
Perhaps a correct theological understanding of human nature is present in the combination of the two. Human life is never "secular." We know ourselves most fully in our communion with God. However, our communion with God equally exposes to our eyes the reality that we are not God. And yet God's life and death in Christ, the Son of God, consistently challenges both of these poles. Against our insistence on the divide between God and man, the incarnation insistently calls us to participate in a relationship with the Triune God, that we might be fully human. Against our prideful ambitions to become God through this participation, the crucifixion reminds us that our participation is only possible through the dissolution of ourselves in death. We die with Christ that we might live a life of participation with God. In the very instant that we know we have lost everything, we discover that we had something to lose all along, and that it has already been restored to us all along.
This is a discovery that is not alien to Neo-Calvinism. Tim Keller, for example, has taught, "e are more wicked than we ever dared believe, but more loved and accepted in Christ than we ever dared hope — at the very same time." However, it is one that is too often lost in the noise, just as Orthodoxy has, at times, minimized sin too heavily. I wish to explore both extremes, that I might learn to participate in God in every aspect of my life an experience, just as I learn to recognize and repent from the sins I commit in every aspect of life. If I attain this understanding, then I will have true Christian wisdom.
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