Many Christmases ago, I shipped two boxes of Christmas gifts with one of the well-known parcel delivery companies.  One box was for the toddler children of some friends of mine; it contained storybooks for children too young to read.  The other box was for a couple with whom I vacationed on a regular basis; it contained a gag gift associated with our most recent vacation travels. 

Despite the fact that I provided detailed and accurate delivery addresses, the parcel delivery service switched the boxes.  The pre-school storybooks went to my travel companions, and the gag gift went to the toddlers. 

Upon receiving the gag gift intended for my travel companions, the mother of the toddlers called to ask what it was supposed to be.  After some quick logistical maneuvers, I was able to reroute the gifts to the intended recipients.  Everyone enjoyed their Christmas gifts that year, but only because the mother of the toddlers asked about the meaning of the incorrectly addressed gift. 

Sometimes, asking questions is absolutely necessary.  Today’s Gospel reading reports an example of an unlikely but necessary question. 

It seems unusual that John the Baptist would send his disciples to ask Jesus, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we look for another?” (Mt 11:3)  After all, John knew Jesus; according to Luke’s Gospel, they were cousins.  John had even tried to dissuade Jesus from being baptized by saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and yet you are coming to me?” (Mt 3:14)  Why, then, would John express uncertainty about Jesus’ identity?   

Scripture commentators point out that Jesus was not the sort of Messiah that John expected.  Based on the content of his preaching, John the Baptist expected the Messiah to “clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” (Mt 3:12)  That is to say, that the Messiah would bring Divine judgment and punishment on the unfaithful and the unjust. 

Contrary to John’s expectations, Jesus did not act like the sort of Messiah who would judge harshly and condemn.  Jesus said things like, “I say to you, offer no resistance to one who is evil. When someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other one to him as well.” (Mt 5:39)  The cause of John’s confusion is easy enough to perceive.  Consequently, John felt the need to ask if Jesus was the Messiah, “the one who is to come.” 

Jesus responded to the question from John’s disciples by citing the miraculous cures that the Scriptures associated with the coming of the Messiah.  Jesus is, in fact, the Savior; he is the sort of Savior, however, who elicits questions from those who encounter him. 

Among the many questions asked about the Jesus over the centuries, two are of the utmost importance.  These two questions have been asked and answered repeatedly throughout the Christian centuries because they are the sort of questions that need to be asked and answered in each generation. 

Every Sunday, when we recite the Creed, we say that we believe that the co-eternal Word of God became human and died for our sake.  Firstly, we should ask why this happened and, secondly, we should ask how it was possible for the Incarnation to occur. 

“Why did God become human?”  This is the title of an early medieval theological discussion of the Incarnation.  The author of the text postulated that a price had to be paid for sin and, as human sin accumulates throughout history, the price had to be very high.   

In other historical eras, other explanations were proposed to this question.  Some are more satisfying than Anselm’s atonement theory, and others are less satisfying.  The central truth about the Incarnation shared by the various explanations is that God chose to become human for our sake.  Today’s first reading addresses this question by saying, “Here is your God, he comes with vindication; with divine recompense He comes to save you.” (Isa 35:4) 

Acknowledging that Jesus’ saving life and death were accomplished for our salvation rather than our condemnation, the second question arises.  How can we understand the Divine, eternal Word of God becoming human?  It would seem that the eternal and the temporal are so unlike that the Incarnation should be an impossibility.  Again, the Scriptures illuminate this mystery of salvation. 

The defenseless infant born in a cattle barn, whose feast we celebrate soon, was able to be the Incarnation of God’s saving Word for the world because human nature is created to hear and accept God’s Word.  We live in a graced world that is burdened by evil by not defiled to the extent that Divine Grace is no longer possible.  With all our faults and limitations, we are created with the capacity to hear God’s Word and respond in faith.   

Jesus is the one who heard and accepted God’s Word perfectly and who responded with perfect faith.  Our hearing the Word and believing the Word will always be less than perfect, but it will always remain possible. 

No one in this world will ever have the perfect formulation for these two important questions nor the perfect answer for them, but everyone must ask about the “why” and “how” of the Word made flesh because, until we ask, we live with confusion about human existence.