Who Am I?

On the Incarnation of the Word 19 – Creation Confessed Him Lord At His Death

Posted: September 11th, 2009 | Author: | Filed under: Incarnation of the Word | Tags: , , , , , , | Comments Off on On the Incarnation of the Word 19 – Creation Confessed Him Lord At His Death

In this section of his treatise, Athanasius begins to focus on the death of Christ on the cross.

For He made even the creation break silence: in that even at His death, marvellous to relate, or rather at His actual trophy over death–the Cross I mean–all creation was confessing that He that was made manifest and suffered in the body was not man merely, but the Son of God and Saviour of all. For the sun hid His face, and the earth quaked and the mountains were rent: all men were awed. Now these things shewed that Christ on the Cross was God, while all creation was His slave, and was witnessing by its fear to its Master’s presence.

I sometimes have the sense that we have narrowed our lens to the point that we talk about little beside the relationship between the individual and Jesus. Yet the Word is the creator and sustainer of all that is. If God relates to all creation, how could creation not respond to the Incarnation?