Forum Hour with Prof. Randall Zachman
Why Did God Become Human?

At the heart of the Christian faith is the confession that the eternal Son of God became human, and suffered and died on the cross, in order to reconcile the world to God. However, there has never been an authoritative interpretation either of why this happened, or of how the death of Christ reconciles the world to God. This fall, we will explore these questions with the help of representative theological voices from the Christian tradition, both to come to an appreciation of the wide range of answers that have been given to these questions, and also in order to provoke our own responses to the question of why God became human. Click here to join via Zoom.

October 23: Augustine of Hippo

Augustine of Hippo (354-430) claimed that God became human both to reveal to us how much God loves us even in our sin, lest we despair, while also revealing to us what manner of sinners we are, lest we should be proud. Since God sent Christ to become human and die because God loves us, the death of Christ does not reconcile God to us, but rather frees us from captivity to the devil. Since the devil took us captive by tempting us to become equal to God, the Son of God saves us from the devil’s pride by using his equality with God to humble himself, and thereby save us through his humility. Join us this Sunday as we explore Augustine’s exploration of the way “the pride of humanity, which is the chief hindrance against our cleaving to God, can be confuted and healed through such great humility of God.”