Macchia: The Self-Giving Love of God

“God has determined from all eternity to be the God who gives of Godself and takes the other into the embrace of the divine communion.  This God is the self-giving Father, Son, and Spirit, a circle of love that seeks to indwell creation.  Genesis 1-2 shows that this God creates by reaching into the void in order to bring life into being, life that is graced abundantly by being made to be the dwelling place of the Spirit.  Creation finds fulfillment in new creation and the divine indwelling through Christ as the one who imparts the Spirit.  In Christ as the man of the Spirit, God reaches down into the abyss of God-forsakenness in order to open creation to the gift of the Spirit, the gift of divine pardon and justice in the very image of the Son.  Creation has always lived from God even in its captivity to sin and death.  For God to abandon the creation is to abandon Godself as Creator.  God does not relinquish divine lordship and will uphold the honor of that lordship by overcoming evil and death with self-giving love.”

–Frank D. Macchia, Justified in the Spirit, 183-184.