The Continuing Incarnation: Christ in You

The absolute essence of this sermon is that the Incarnation is not a finished historical event, but a profound and continuing reality in the life of every believer, most especially in the priesthood. Bishop Fulton J. Sheen challenges the listener to move beyond seeing the birth of Christ as a distant memory and to understand it as an ongoing invitation from God. Just as the angel asked Mary, "Will you give God a man?", God now turns to each of us with the same question: "Will you give me a human nature?" This is the core of our vocation—to offer our minds, wills, and bodies as instruments through which Christ can continue His teaching, governing, and sanctifying mission in the world today.To illustrate how this works, Sheen employs a powerful analogy of a pencil. A pencil is only "good" when it is supple and adaptable in the hand of the writer, perfectly fulfilling its purpose. If the pencil had a will of its own and refused to write what the author intended, it would become useless. In the same way, our effectiveness as ambassadors for Christ is entirely dependent on our pliability and obedience in His hands. Our power, influence, and ability to sanctify come not from our own talents, but from our total surrender, allowing Christ to act through us.This great mystery, Sheen concludes, is the foundation of the priesthood and the call of every Christian life. By offering our humanity to God, we become part of this continuing Incarnation. Our singular purpose, then, is to make Christ lovable to others through our kindness, our patience, our charity, and our gentle courtesy. This, he states, is the very definition of a saint: a person through whom others can see and fall in love with Christ. We are called to be the human nature through which God once again walks the earth.