Coptic Orthodox Diocese of the Southern United States
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What does the Coptic Church say about the pre-existence (sempiternity) of our Lord Jesus Christ?

St. Gregory of Nazianzen (known in our Coptic Church as Gregory the speaker of Divine things) contemplating the Holy Trinity and the eternity of our Lord Jesus Christ wrote, "When did the Father come into being. There never was a time when He was not. And the same thing is true of the Son and the Holy Ghost."

The Son was eternally begotten of the Father. The Father is the Beginning of the Son, timeless, incomprehensible, without beginning. The Son is King eternal and we hear Him saying "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it, and was glad" (Jn 8:56). And when the Jews received these words hardly, He said to them "Before Abraham was, I am" (Jn 8:58). Also He said "Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the foundation of the world" (Jn 17:24). So He clearly declares that the glory, which He has with God, is from eternity. In the Creed we recite:

"We believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Only-Begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all ages by Whom all things were made" and as St. John tells us "All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made" (Jn 1:3).
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