God created the heavens and the earth with man as the head and center. Then man fell. In the eyes of God, man’s fall involved the entire creation. To redeem this fallen creation God came in the Son.
Redemption was not an afterthought. It was pre-ordained by God. First Peter 1:19-20 tells us that the Redeemer, Christ, was foreknown by God before the foundation of the world. In this verse “world” refers to the entire universe. Before the foundation of the universe, God knew that man would fall. Thus, God preordained the Son, Christ, to be the Redeemer. We can see from this that God’s redemption was not accidental.
Furthermore, Revelation 13:8 says that the Lamb, that is, the Redeemer, Christ, was slain “from the foundation of the world.” From the time creation came into existence, in the eyes of God, Christ, as the Lamb ordained by God, was slain. In our eyes Christ was crucified less than two thousand years ago. But in God’s view He was slain from the day creation came into existence because God foreknew that His creation would fall.
These verses show that God’s redemption was not an afterthought, but rather something ordained, planned, and prepared by God in eternity past. How we should treasure this fact about the redemption we enjoy in Christ!
The first step in God’s accomplishment of redemption was the incarnation. It was surely a marvelous thing for God to come into man and to be born of mankind through a virgin. Our God became a man! In creation He was the Creator. But though He created all things, He did not enter into any of the things He created. Even in creating man He only breathed the breath of life into him (Gen. 2:7). He was still outside man. His breath, according to Job 33:4, gave man life; however, He Himself did not come into man. Until the incarnation He was separate from man. But with the incarnation He personally entered into man. He was first conceived and then remained in the virgin’s womb for nine months, after which He was born.
According to John 1:14, He became not only a man; He “became flesh.” The flesh in this verse refers to man after the fall. Man in Genesis 1 and 2 had not fallen, but after Genesis 3 he had. The word flesh, referring to man after the fall, always bears a negative denotation. No flesh can be justified before God by works (Rom. 3:20). Flesh refers to fallen man, and Christ as the Son of God became a man. He became flesh.