And yet us look upon this...as a kind of journey or voyage to our native land

...And let us look upon this purification as a kind of journey or voyage to our native land. For it is not by change of place that we come nearer to Him who is in every place, but by the cultivation of pure desires and virtuous habits...

But of this we would have been wholly incapable, had not Wisdom condescended to adapt Himself to our weakness, and to show a pattern of holy life in the form of our own humanity. Yet, since we when we come to Him do wisely, He when he came to us was considered by proud men to have done very foolishly. And since we when we come to him become strong, He when he came to us became weak. But "the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men" (1 Cor. 1.25). And thus, though Wisdom was himself our home, He made Himself also the way by which we should reach our home...

And though He is everywhere present to the inner eye when it is sound and clear, He considered to make Himself manifest to the outward eye of those whose inward sight is weak and dim. "For after that, in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe" (1 Cor. 1.21). Not then in the sense of traversing space, but because he appeared to mortal men in the form of mortal flesh, He is said to have come to us. For he came to a place where He had always been, seeing that "He was in the world, and the world was made by Him." But, because men, who in their eagerness to enjoy the creature instead of the Creator had grown into the likeness of this world, and therefore most appropriately named "the world" did not recognise Him, therefore the evangelist says, "and the world knew Him not" (John 1.1o). Thus, in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not God. Why then did he come, seeing that he was already here, except that it pleased God through the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe?

...In what way did He come but this, "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us" (John 1.14)? Just as when we speak, in order that what we have in our minds may enter through the ear into the mind of the hearer, the word which we have in our hearts becomes an outward sound and is called speech; and yet our thought does not lose itself in the sound, but remains complete in itself, and takes the form of speech without being modified in its own nature by change: so the Divine Word, through suffering no change of nature, yet became flesh that he might dwell among us."

Augustine, On Christian Doctine, Book I, Ch.10-13