Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus--Hypostatic Union and more

I wrote previously about reading  Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus: Experiencing the Peace and Promise of Christmas. 

I really do recommend this as a great read during Christmas or anytime.

I just wanted to share a few more quotes from the book about such things as the incarnation and the hypostatic union. Don't let the big words scare you. 

Saint Augustine:
"But how," one will say, " can it be, that the Word of God, by whom the world is governed, by whom all things both were and are created, should contract himself into the womb of a virgin; should leave the angels, and be shut up in one woman's womb?" Thou skillest not to conceive of things divine. The Word of God could surely do all seeing that the Word of God is omnipotent, at once remain with the Father, and come to us; at once in the flesh come forth to us, and lay concealed in him. For he would not the less have been, if he had not been born of flesh. He "was" before his own flesh; he created his own mother. He chose her in whom he should be conceived, he created her of whom he should be created. Why marvellest thou? It is God of whom I am speaking to thee: "the Word was God"

And J. I. Packer:
How are we to think of the incarnation: The New Testament does not encourage us to puzzle our heads over the physical and psychological problems that is raises, but to worship God for the Love that shown in it. For it was a great act of condescension and self-humbling.

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We talk glibly of the "Christmas spirit," rarely meaning more by this than sentimental jollity on a family basis. But what we have said makes it clear that the phrase should in fact carry a tremendous weight of meaning. It ought to mean the reproducing in human lives of the temper of him who for our sakes became poor at the first Christmas. And the Christmas spirit itself ought to be the mark of every Christian all the year round.