A Devotion from Augustine of Hippo

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

—John 1:1

He came, to whom it is said, “Show signs”; to whom it is said, “Show forth your marvelous mercies”; for dispensing them he ever was; he dispensed them, and no one marveled.  Therefore he came a little one to the little, he came a physician to the sick—he who was able to come when he would, to return when he would, to do whatever he would, to judge as he would.

These things he did, yet he was despised by the many, who did not consider so much what great things he did as how small he was, as though they said to themselves, These are divine things, but he is human. You see then two things: divine works and a human being. If divine works cannot be done except by God, take heed for fear that in this man God lies concealed. Pay attention to what you see; believe what you do not see. He who has called you to believe has not abandoned you; though he enjoins you to believe that which you cannot see, he has given you something to see by which you may be able to believe what you do not see. Is the creation itself a small indication of the Creator? You could not see God; so God became human, that in one being you might have both something to see and something to believe. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1). He who made man and woman comes forth from a woman. He who made man and woman was not made by man and woman. In this very birth there are at once two things, one you may see and another you may not see, so that by what you see you may believe what you do not see. You had begun to despise, because you see him who was born; believe what you do not see—that he was born of a virgin. “How trifling a person,” you say, “is one who is born!” But how great is he who was of a virgin born! And he who was born of a virgin brought you a temporal miracle—he was not born of a father, of any man, yet he was born of the flesh. But let it not seem impossible to you that he, who made a man before father and mother, was born by his mother only.

He brought you then a temporal miracle, that you may seek and admire him who is eternal. He is coeternal with the Father, he it is who “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” He did for you that by which you might be cured, that you might be able to see what you did not see.