If it is true that Christ is the Son of Man, consubstantial with us, then it follows that everything that He accomplished in His earthly life must likewise be possible for the rest of the sons of man. I truly believe that this thought is essential to our true understanding of the Incarnation and is the basis for our thoughts about salvation.

One Father states, if we confess His   (i.e., Christ) full and perfect theosis, it behooves us also to hope for the same degree of theosis for the saints in the age to come. The Greek Fathers felt that it was absolutely essential for a correct understanding of salvation that they find ways to express that Jesus was truly man as well as truly God. While there is only one Person in Jesus, we believe He has two   distinct natures – divine and human – and that His divine nature did not control His human nature. Of course the problem is that we cannot conceive how this is really possible. It is a mystery! But a very important belief if we are to believe that He is our model for how to live this human life. The simple fact is that we cannot live with Christ if we are not like Him in all respects. As the great Apostle John the Theologian and Evangelist proclaims: We know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And every man that has this hope in him purifies himself even as he is pure. So if we wish to be eternally with Christ, we must become like Him; and this process of becoming Christlike, this purification, invariably involves repentance – which is a fundamental change in our whole way of life, in our very mode of being. Metanoia, which is the original Greek word used in the Scriptures and in English represented by the word repentance, means changing the way that we think (our attitudes) and the way that we behave.

St. Symeon the New Theologian reiterates this point in the following way:

The Master is in no way envious of mortal men that they should appear equal to Him by divine grace, neither does He deem His servants unworthy to be like unto Him, but rather does He delight and rejoice to see us who were made men such as to become by grace what He is by nature. And He is so beneficent that He wills us to become even as He is. For if we be not as He is, exactly like unto Him in every way, how could we be united to Him? How could we dwell in Him, as He said, without being like unto Him, and how could He dwell in is, if we be not as He is?

It is my hope that my readers are beginning to see the real difference between Eastern and Western theology!