Eternally Begotten: Acts 13:25-33, especially vs. 33:
"God has fulfilled this [the sending of a Savior] for us their children, in that He has raised up Jesus. As it is also written in the second Psalm: Thou art My Son, Today I have begotten Thee.'"
The third kathisma of the Orthros of this Feast addresses the worthy Forerunner John thus: "Thou of everlasting memory...didst declare the splendor-bearing Sun shining forth, preaching the Creator to the people in the wilderness, the Lamb of God Who taketh away the sins of the world...."Here is a liturgical acclamation which acknowledges what God accomplished at the hand of the Baptizer and explains why the Church addresses John as the great "Prophet of Prophets."
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The Forerunner was the first person to announce the breaking dawn of history's greatest season - the days of the promised One, the Savior of Israel (Acts 13:23). St. John recognized Jesus of Nazareth as the One, "the sandals of Whose feet I am not worthy to loose," and as the "Lamb of God Who takes away the sin of the world" (vs. 25; Jn. 1:29). Further, the Blessed John was the first to witness the initial manifestation of the Trinity (vs. 33; Mt. 3:17; Jn. 1:32-34), a theophany that occurred at the Lord's Baptism and at St. John's hand - for the voice of the Father declared Jesus to be His beloved Son, and the Holy Spirit descended in the form of a dove.
The Lord God carefully prepared the way for the Incarnation of the Word among men. For centuries, He raised up Prophets who offered glimpses of the coming great King. They foretold the coming of One Who would rule all the nations, Who would reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, Who would establish and uphold God's Kingdom in justice and righteousness forever (Is. 9:7), upon Whom the Spirit of the Lord would rest (Is. 11:2).
The revelation concerning the Person of Christ steadily expanded, beginning from the earliest prophets until the days of the Baptizer. Further, the Lord Himself revealed to His disciples and all who would receive His words that "no man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, Which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him" (Jn. 1:18). Further, Jesus declared the essential unity between Himself and God the Father: "I and My Father are One" (Jn. 10:30). In three years of preparation, Jesus' disciples heard, saw, and handled "the Word of life," and then they declared, "we have seen [Him], and bear witness, and shew...that eternal life, which was with the Father...was manifested unto us" (1 Jn. 1:1,2).
After the Crucifixion, Resurrection, and Ascension, the Apostles sought to convey everywhere the Truth Whom they knew personally - God Himself Who had visited His people (Lk. 1:68). To communicate the Truth, they called the Lord Jesus by special names to express His unity with the Father: God's Beloved Son (Lk. 3:22), the only Begotten of the Father (Jn. 1:14), God's own Son (Rom.8: 3,32), or as St. Paul preached when he quoted from the Prophet David, "Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee" (Psalm 2:7 LXX).
Through subsequent centuries, the Fathers of the Church, to defend the Apostolic message one phrase at a time, found precise language to refute all misinterpretations of the term "Begotten." Against certain early Gnostic teachers, who theorized that Jesus was God only in the guise of a man but not a genuine flesh-and-blood person, the Fathers declared that He was "Very God of Very God, Begotten, not made; of one essence with the Father." The Church, with the Apostles, understands that the "Begetting" of God the Word occurs eternally from the Father, and that there never was a time when He was not, since He was "Begotten before all worlds."
From the Fatherly bosom Thou art inseparable, O sweet Jesus, Thou eternally-Begotten Son of God, and Deliverer of the world; Send Thy comforting Spirit to sanctify our souls.