Hebrews 1:1-12, Luke 2:1-20, and the Mystery of Christmas
You are standing at the threshold between Christmas Eve and Christmas morning—that liminal space where anticipation gives way to encounter. The darkness of waiting meets the dawn of presence. And in this threshold, scripture speaks a truth so staggering that we spend lifetimes learning to receive it: the Word through whom God created galaxies has entered creation as a vulnerable infant, and this changes everything about what it means to be human.
The writer of Hebrews opens with cosmic grandeur: Long ago God spoke to our ancestors in many and various ways by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom he also created the worlds. He is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being, and he sustains all things by his powerful word (Hebrews 1:1-3). These words describe Someone infinite, eternal, sustaining every atom in existence by the power of His word. The Son is not a creature but the divine Wisdom through whom all creation came to be. He bears the exact imprint of God’s nature—not a copy, but the living self-expression of the divine.
Then Luke brings this cosmic Word into the most particular, vulnerable, human circumstances imaginable: In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered…Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem…while they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn (Luke 2:1-7). The One who sustains galaxies cannot find a room. The heir of all things is born where animals feed. The reflection of God’s glory is wrapped in strips of cloth like any peasant infant.
What you are being invited to feel here is not abstract theological wonder but the concrete, embodied reality of God’s choice. He did not remain at safe distance, managing creation from heaven’s throne room. He entered completely—not into palaces or power, but into the vulnerability, displacement, and poverty that so many of you know firsthand. If you have ever felt there is no room for you, if you have ever been displaced by someone else’s decree, if you have ever given birth or faced new life in circumstances far from ideal—God has been there. Not observing from above, but participating from within.
Gregory of Nyssa teaches that “what has not been assumed has not been healed.” This means Christ had to enter fully into human reality—including its darkness, its vulnerability, its fear—in order to transform it from within. He did not come to rescue you from humanity but to show you what humanity can become when united to divinity. The manger is not God slumming temporarily in flesh. It is the beginning of matter’s transfiguration, the first moment of creation learning to bear the fullness of divine presence without being consumed.
Notice who receives the announcement first. Not Caesar Augustus in Rome, not the high priest in Jerusalem’s temple, not the scholars studying prophecy. In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified (Luke 2:8-9). Shepherds—ritually unclean according to Second Temple purity codes, unable to enter the temple, considered unreliable witnesses by legal standards. These are the ones who receive the glory of the Lord shining around them in the darkness.
This is the overthrowing of the stoicheia—those separating structures of Second Temple Judaism that divided humanity into clean and unclean, worthy and unworthy, those with access to God and those excluded. Paul will later name these “elements of the world” that held people in bondage like children under guardians. But here, before Paul writes a word, the reality is already breaking through. The glory that was hidden behind the temple veil, accessible only to the high priest once a year, now blazes in a field among shepherds. First Temple access is being restored—not through proper credentials but through divine initiative that ignores human hierarchies entirely.
The angel’s message grounds cosmic truth in immediate encounter: Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger (Luke 2:10-12). The sign is not miraculous spectacle but profound vulnerability. You will recognize the Lord of glory by His complete defenselessness, His utter dependence, His radical availability.
What does this mean for the inner work you are being called to? It means that your own vulnerability is not obstacle to encountering God—it is the very place where encounter happens. The parts of yourself you have rejected as too weak, too needy, too broken—these are not barriers to theosis but doorways. God did not wait until you had your act together. He came to you in your manger, your place of displacement, your moment of having no room.
Maximos the Confessor distinguishes between your natural will and your gnomic will. Your natural will—your human nature’s essential orientation—already knows that God is trustworthy, that love is real, that you are made for communion. This orientation is not damaged by the Fall. It is what you truly are at the deepest level. But your gnomic will—your personal mode of choosing—has gotten out of sync with what your nature knows. Perhaps through childhood wounds, you learned that vulnerability is dangerous. Perhaps through betrayal, you decided that trust leads only to pain. Perhaps through shame, you concluded that parts of yourself are too ugly to be loved.
The Christmas mystery addresses this directly. If the infinite God can unite Himself to vulnerable flesh without destroying it, then your vulnerability is not your enemy. If divine glory can manifest in a feeding trough, then no part of your life is too lowly for transfiguration. The work is not becoming invulnerable but allowing your defended, armored, performing self to descend into your heart where the vulnerable, needy, honest self dwells—and discovering that God meets you there, not in your strength but in your truth.
Athanasius writes in On the Incarnation that “God became human so that humans might become god.” This is not metaphor. The Incarnation means that the union of divine and human natures is now ontologically possible—not just for Jesus, but for you. His humanity is the pattern and power of your transfiguration. When the shepherds find the infant, they are encountering their own destiny: flesh capable of bearing divinity, humanity open to infinite depth.
The shepherds respond with immediacy: When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.” So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger (Luke 2:15-16). They do not deliberate endlessly, do not wait until they are worthy, do not perform elaborate purification rituals. They go. They see. They encounter.
This is the pattern for your own approach to God. Not perfect performance, not having all your shadow integrated, not waiting until you feel holy enough. Come as you are. The glory that shone around shepherds in fields will shine in your life—in ordinary moments, mundane circumstances, the places you least expect divine presence. Your work is not manufacturing holiness but recognizing what is already breaking through.
Now watch how Luke describes the aftermath: When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart (Luke 2:17-19). Two responses: the shepherds immediately proclaim what they have seen; Mary treasures and ponders. Both are necessary. Both are true.
There are moments for proclamation—when you have encountered something real and need to speak it, share it, let it overflow into witness. But there are also moments for pondering—when you need to sit with mystery, let it work in you, allow time for integration. Mary does not explain or analyze. She treasures. She holds these experiences in her heart, letting them transform her over years, not forcing premature understanding.
If you are someone who always needs to process everything verbally, to explain and analyze immediately, Mary’s pondering invites you toward receptivity. Descend from head to heart. Sit with what you do not yet understand. Let mystery be mystery. Not everything needs to be articulated to be real. Some truths take years to unfold.
If you are someone who keeps everything internal, never sharing what you experience, the shepherds’ witness invites you toward proclamation. What you have encountered is not just for you. The glory you have glimpsed is meant to shine through you. You do not need perfect theology. The shepherds did not have systematic doctrine—they had an encounter, and they shared it.
Meanwhile, Hebrews unfolds the cosmic dimensions of what Luke describes in Bethlehem’s stable. The Son who emptied Himself into Mary’s womb is simultaneously the One who sits at God’s right hand, having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs (Hebrews 1:4). This is not contradiction but paradox—both truths held together. The infant in the manger and the Lord enthroned in glory are the same Person. The vulnerability and the cosmic authority are not sequential (first weak, then strong) but simultaneous dimensions of the same reality.
This matters intensely for your own transformation. You do not become holy by rejecting your humanity, by transcending your body, by escaping your circumstances. You become holy by letting divinity transfigure the humanity you already have. The body you inhabit, the circumstances you face, the wounds you carry—these are not obstacles to overcome but the very material of theosis. Just as the Eucharistic bread becomes Body while remaining bread, your flesh is destined to become divine-human while remaining flesh.
John Chrysostom preaches: “I see the manger, and God lies in it; I see swaddling bands, and I perceive God swaddled; I perceive the food-box, and I behold Him who feeds all creation.” This is the key insight: you learn to see divinity precisely in materiality, not by looking away from matter toward some ethereal realm. God is encountered in bread, in flesh, in mangers, in your own embodied life. Heaven is not elsewhere—it is descending into this world, this body, this moment.
The cosmology Hebrews presents grounds this incarnational reality in creation’s very structure. The Son is the One through whom also [God] created the worlds. He is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being, and he sustains all things by his powerful word (Hebrews 1:2-3). Creation does not exist independently of the Word and then have the Word added to it later as emergency rescue. Creation is by, through, and for the Word from the beginning. The Logos-structure of reality is sophianic—ordered by Wisdom, reflecting divine beauty, destined for transfiguration.
This means the Incarnation is not God’s plan B after creation went wrong. It is the goal from the beginning—creation’s telos. Time itself is divine pedagogy, God’s chosen method for teaching finite creatures to bear infinite divinity gradually, “by measure,” without being consumed. The Spirit gives Himself according to capacity, and each increase in capacity is met with increase in gift. Christ’s birth in time is not remedial intervention but the fullness of time, the moment when creation’s capacity has been prepared through Israel’s history to receive what was always intended.
The Temple imagery woven through both passages reveals this pattern. Hebrews quotes Psalm 102: In the beginning, Lord, you founded the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands; they will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like clothing; like a cloak you will roll them up, and like clothing they will be changed. But you are the same, and your years will never end (Hebrews 1:10-12). This is First Temple cosmology—creation as garment that can be changed, rolled up, transformed, while the Lord remains constant. Not destruction but transfiguration. Not escape from matter but matter’s elevation to glory.
The shepherds leaving their flocks at night to worship the infant is priestly act recovering Edenic vocation. Adam was the first priest, meant to extend the garden’s sanctified space throughout creation. He abandoned this calling. The shepherds, despised by Second Temple standards, recover it. They bring creation’s worship to its Creator. They recognize glory in vulnerability. They become witnesses not through proper credentials but through encounter.
And Mary—Mary is created Sophia fully realized. She is what humanity was always meant to become: completely transparent to divine Glory, capable of bearing the infinite Word in finite flesh without being destroyed. When you venerate Mary, you are not worshiping a goddess separate from yourself. You are honoring your own destiny, seeing what you are called to become. She is the first Christian, the pattern of theosis, the proof that human nature can unite with divine nature and survive—more than survive, become radiant.
Gregory Nazianzen teaches that “the Son of God became Son of Man so that I might become son of God.” Notice the exchange: He takes what is yours (humanity, vulnerability, mortality) so that you can receive what is His (divinity, glory, eternal life). This is not legal transaction but ontological transformation. Not debt paid but nature transfigured. The cross will complete what the manger begins—Christ assuming fallen humanity all the way to death, then raising it all the way to glory. Both termini preserved: fully human, fully divine.
But here in Christmas mystery, you are invited to feel the beginning of this process. The Word becomes flesh. Heaven descends. Divinity unites with humanity without destroying it. And this happens not in spectacular display but in utter hiddenness—in a minor provincial town, in a feeding trough, announced to shepherds, treasured by a peasant girl. God’s power works through vulnerability, not force. Beauty persuades through evident efficacy, not compulsion. The long-suffering patience you see here—God waiting for the fullness of time, working through ordinary human history, entering through ordinary human birth—this grounds ultimate hope.
What is being asked of you right now, in this threshold between Christmas Eve and Christmas morning? Not grand gestures. Not spectacular holiness. Not having everything figured out. What is asked is what Mary offered: receptivity. Let it be with me according to your word (Luke 1:38). What is asked is what the shepherds offered: immediacy. Let us go now and see. What is asked is what creation itself offers: availability—matter capable of bearing divinity, flesh open to transfiguration.
Your circumstances—whatever they are—are not obstacles to this. The manger teaches that divine presence manifests precisely in displacement, vulnerability, poverty. If you feel there is no room for you, God knows that experience intimately. If you are watching in darkness like the shepherds, that is exactly where glory breaks through. If you are pondering mysteries you do not yet understand like Mary, that treasuring in your heart is itself the work.
The practical discipline is learning to recognize God’s presence in ordinary materiality. Not waiting for spectacular mystical experiences, not seeking escape from embodied existence, but finding heaven descending into your actual life. The bread you eat, the water you drink, the faces you see, the beauty that stops you in your tracks—these are not inferior copies of spiritual reality elsewhere. They are matter learning to become transparent to glory, creation practicing for its transfiguration.
When you venerate icons tonight, you are kissing matter that has become transparent to the prototype. When you sing the liturgy, your voice participates in angelic worship. When you receive Eucharist, your body is being united to Christ’s Body just as His divine nature united to human flesh in Mary’s womb. All of this is participation in the same mystery: God becoming human so that humans can become god. Not metaphor. Not someday in distant heaven. Now. Here. In your flesh.
The completion is not yet—Hebrews makes clear that Christ’s exaltation to God’s right hand is also part of the pattern. The vulnerability of the manger leads through the darkness of the cross to the glory of resurrection and ascension. The anagogical horizon is “God all in all,” creation fully transfigured, every atom learning to pray. But this end is not evacuation—it is fulfillment. New Jerusalem descends. Heaven and earth unite. Bodies are raised. The material world does not get left behind but brought into glory.
And this completion has already begun. Right now, in your body, in this moment. The kingdom is not distant future—it is present reality breaking through. Your work is removing what obscures it, not creating what is absent. Descend into your heart where God dwells. Face what you have been avoiding—the wounds, the shadow, the parts you have rejected. Bring compassion to the vulnerable child within you. Then, from that place of honesty, let love emerge. Not manufactured, not performed, but real—chosen from wholeness, not suppression.
Basil the Great writes: “The Spirit restores paradise, leads us back to the kingdom of heaven, and grants us adoption as children. He gives us confidence to call God our Father, to share in the grace of Christ, to be called children of light, and to have a share in eternal glory.” This restoration is happening now. Not someday when you are holy enough. Now, in your poverty, in your need, in your vulnerability. The Spirit gives Himself by measure to your capacity, and each moment you choose receptivity over defense, each moment you choose honesty over performance, your capacity grows. And divine life flows in to meet it.
So tonight, in the threshold between vigil and feast, let yourself feel what is actually happening. Not just commemorating ancient event. Participating in eternal reality. The Word becoming flesh in you. Heaven descending into your life. Divine glory manifesting in your ordinary circumstances. This is not wishful thinking—it is ontological truth. The image of God in you is real. Your capacity for theosis is built into your nature. The sophianic foundation remains intact even when obscured by shadow.
Go like the shepherds—with haste, with immediacy, with willingness to see. Ponder like Mary—treasuring in your heart what you do not yet understand, letting mystery be mystery. And receive like creation itself receives—available, material, capable of bearing divinity without being destroyed. The Word became flesh. And He dwells among us, full of grace and truth. And we beheld His glory. And we are being transformed into the same image, from glory to glory. This is not future promise. This is present reality. Heaven is here. God is Emmanuel. And you are being made divine.
Keywords: Incarnation, theosis, vulnerability, Sophia, kenosis, shepherds, transfiguration, Mary Theotokos, divine-humanity, participatory ontology
The Greater Horizon 