Did He leave heaven?

The Creed first presents to us the oneness of God, lest we fall into polytheism. Our faith is in the one almighty God, the Pantocrator. Then, the Creed presents the Hypostasis of the Father as being the Father of the only-begotten Son before all ages; one in essence with Him, granting us to be His children through divine grace. Now, the Creed proclaims to us the descent of the Son for our sake . The psalm says of Him, “Our God shall come, and shall not keep silent” (Ps. 50:3; Ps. 49:3 LXX).

St. Cyril the Great says, “It is usual in the Holy Scriptures to clarify what is above thought by words suited to us. And therefore he said when conversing with the holy disciples, ‘I came forth from the Father and have come into the world. Again I leave the world and go to the Father’ (John 16:28), and again, ‘You are from below, I am from above’ (John 8:23) … Although being in the highest heights and according to substance above all with his own Father seeing that he is crowned in identity of nature with him ‘he did not consider being

equal to God a thing to be clung to, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave and being made like unto men. And being found in form as a man he humbled himself’ (Phil. 2:6–8). For when the Word being God put on our flesh, even so he remained God … For he was God, as I said, in a form like unto us, and not having taken inanimate flesh, as it seems good to some of the heretics to think, but rather flesh animated with a rational soul … [He] endured birth according to the flesh from a woman, and came forth in our form, for this is being made man … being in the weakness of the flesh the Lord of power, and in the measure of his humanity having as his own that which is above all creation. For, what he was before the flesh, he has, being incapable of losing it, for he was God, true Son, the only begotten, light, life, and power. But what he was not, these he is seen to have taken in addition through the Incarnation … And thus John wisely says, ‘The Word was made flesh’ (John 1:14) And he became flesh not because he turned into the nature of the flesh according to a transition, or a change, or an alteration, nor because he underwent a confusion, or a blending, or the fusion of essences being babbled about by some, for that is impossible since he is by nature unchangeable and is unalterable.”³¹⁵

St. John Chrysostom says, “Therefore also Christ says, ‘I came out from the Father, and am come’ (John 16:28.) But when I say that He left the Father, do not imagine such a thing as happens among men, a change of place; for just in the same way as the word ‘go forth’ is used, not because He literally came forth, but because of His incarnation.”³¹⁶

St. Hilary, the bishop of Poitiers says, “He says ‘ I came forth from God ’ (John 16:27) in order that no one might believe that there is any other nature in Him except that arising from His birth, for what else can it be but God? And He declares: ‘ I came forth from the Father and have come into the world ’ (John 16:28) … the [second] refers to the plan of salvation, the [first] to [His divine] nature.”³¹⁷