January 19, 2024

Exodus 31.18 (NIV)

When the Lord finished speaking to Moses on Mount Sinai, he gave him the two tablets of the Testimony, the tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God. 

The incarnation reminds us that the personal touch matters.*

If the “tablets of Testimony” were written by God, with his own finger, there could be no question about whether the law was inspired by God; no question about its authenticity. As another writer expresses it: “No other set of laws can claim such an origin – conceived in the heart of God and transcribed by the finger of God.”* Under those circumstances, you would think that the Israelites would have been afraid not to obey!

God is spirit, so in his natural state he probably doesn’t actually have a finger. But the Bible is full of references to God as if he does have body parts because God has gone to a great deal of effort to relate to our humanity and to allow us to feel his touch. So much so that he became an entire human in the form of his Son, Jesus Christ.

In Jesus, we see how God transcends human understanding. God is spirit so he cannot be contained in anything – and yet he dwelled in his Son, and now his Spirit lives in me. Jesus was man and he is God. Jesus is God but he called God “Father.” Jesus was really dead and now he is really alive.

From the resurrection to the Lord’s Supper, Christianity is all about embodiment.*

*Quote sources available upon request.