Unit 1.1 Incarnation

Question 1

What’s the Incarnation?

Answer 1

The Chrisitian belief that God became a human being in Jesus (Jesus was God incarnate)

Question 2

Why’s the virgin birth important to all Christians?

Answer 2

• Jesus was the Son of God (not just a human being chosen and sent by God)
• God was in him and he was in God
• Jesus had two natures- in his human nature he was a human being but in his divine nature he was God (fully human and fully divine)

Question 3

Matthew’s gospel on incarnation

Answer 3

• Joseph told my angel that virgin Mary concieved and child to be called Jesus because hw would save everyone from sin
• Joseph married Mary
  -Jesus born in Bethlehem and visited by three wise men

Question 4

Luke’s gospel on incarnation

Answer 4

• Angel Gabriel appeared to Mary and told her about virgin birth of Jesus
• Jesus born and visted by shepards who had been visted by angels telling them of Jesus

Question 5

John’s gospel on incarnation

Answer 5

• Records Incarnation in a theological form, identifying Jesus as the word of God, the second person of the Trinity

Question 6

Why the Incarnation is important to Catholics

Answer 6

• Shows God cared so much for the world that he came to Earth in Jesus to save people from their sins
• In Jesus, the Incarnate Word of God, humans can see what God is like
• Through the Incarnation God began the process of salvation from sin

Question 7

Incarnation sources of wisdom and authority

Answer 7

• John’s gospel, chapter 1 says that in Jesus, the word became flesh and made his dwelling among us, showing us the glory of God
• John’s gospel, chapter 1 says that though no one has seen God, the Incarnation has made God known
• St Paul says in Colossians that ‘the Son is the image of the invisible God’

Question 8

FOR ‘ Jesus was God incarnate’

Answer 8

• Jesus had a virgin birth and only God could be born of a virgin
• Jesus performed miracles, such as stilling a storm, that only God could do
• Jesus rose from the dead, which only God could do
• It is the teaching of all Christian churches and creeds

Question 9

AGAINST ‘ Jesus was God incarnate’

Answer 9

• The only evidence for the incarnation is the Bible and there is no reason for believing the Bible is the truth
• The accounts in Matthew and Luke contradict eachother
• A human being requires male and female genes, so if Jesus was a human being, where did his male genes come from?
• God is supposed to be an infinite being but Jesus was a finite being, which means Jesus could not have been God