Key Verse: 1:23
“The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”).
I love reading bible stories about the birth of Jesus. I read them and I begin to have a feeling of Christmas, even when it's not Christmas. Growing up, Christmas to me was all about family and being with family. When I was a kid most of the time we would spend Christmas with my mom’s family, and my mom has 13 siblings with so many cousins to play with. So imagine Christmas time for us. Lots of fun! Now that I'm a grown up with a family of own God by his grace has revealed to me what Christmas is all about. It's about being with God who came to be with us.
So I would like to share to you a message entitled, “Immanuel” and it's based on the message by pastor Tim Keller from Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City. And he wrote back in 1991.
So the title of the message is Immanuel and today I would like to just focus on this one word "Immanuel." We'll spend our Christmas service here at West Loop Church just on this one word. Some of you may say that it’s a lot of time for just one word and we already heard the same message last week. Well some have spent their entire life on this one word and have not considered it enough time. John Wesley, the great founder of the Methodist church, his last words before he died was, "The best of all is God with us." I hope and pray that like John Wesley, we may have this one word living in our hearts because it last longer than the whole earth.
The message is in three parts and these parts are the meaning of Immanuel, God with us. I) Jesus is God The simple meaning of Christmas is that the Creator, King of the Universe has become a human being. That’s the meaning of Christmas. Everything else is secondary. Now the bible tells us in a hundred ways that Jesus is God. For example in John 1:1-3 says, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning.” Then verse 14 of the same chapter says, "The word became flesh and made his dwelling among us." In the book of Acts 20:28 Peter says that God purchased the church with his own blood. He was talking of Jesus. The bible tells us that Jesus forgives people of their sins: He often says to someone before he heals them, “Your sins are forgiven.” Then religious leaders would say, "Only God can forgive sins." When he says this, he's saying that every sin is against him that’s because he created us, he owns us. Another was when John in the book of Revelations wanted to bow down and worship an angel who revealed the prophecies to him, when John was about to bow down and worship, the angel stopped him saying “I’m no different than you, I am also a creature, a servant like yourself.” But when Thomas saw the after Jesus, Thomas worshipped him and Jesus accepted it. He's saying that he's not a creature, he has no beginning.
Now the issue here is not just that he claims that he's God, the issue is that his followers, his disciples and followers believed this. And this is one of the most important proofs that he really was who he said he was. Back in 1991, in the New York times book review there was a book on historical Jesus and there was a Jewish reviewer who reviewed the book and said something that was really helpful. He said that the real issue is not about Jesus who claims to be God, but the real issue is that why did Jesus' earliest followers believed him. Why did Jesus disciples and followers believed and decided to worship him. The Jewish reviewer knew that it was a big problem because the last people in the entire world who would believe that human beings could be God would be first century Jews.
People generally were pantheists - meaning they believe that God could be anything. Some are polytheists like the Greeks and Romans. They believe that God could be dressed in a human form. For example when Paul and Barnabas in the book of Acts 14, they were preaching and healing and people thought they were Zeus and Hermes, they were Jupiter and Mercury and wanted to worship them. But the Jews were neither. They believed in the God of the Bible, that God is the uncreated Creator. The Jews were the last people to believe that God could become a human being.
Another thing was that the disciples who believed and worshiped Jesus where the ones who lived with him and the ones closes to him. You know, if you want to convince someone that you're god, or you’re perfect, you don't start with those you live with or close to you. You won't be able to. You can not fool the people you live with that you're perfect. Whenever someone comes to me and say nice things to me in front of my kids, they wonder if that person was talking about their dad. Many people worship celebrities because they never lived with them. I bet you that many who worshipped Elvis never lived with him.
Now what could have possibly led them to believe that Jesus was God? The answer is that they must have seen a moral glory that went along with the claims. They must have seen a transcendent personal greatness that matched the claims he was making. They must have seen tenderness and power combined, and truth and love combined. What a wonderful and perfect person Jesus was! All of these they saw and began to realize that they were looking at a very being of God.
And in the four gospels they were saying, "Who is this?" Who is this?" You know what the final answer must have been in their hearts? This must be God with us! And they believed. And these people who were the last people to believe where the ones who were willing to die and they did die. They were martyred for their convictions.
II. Jesus is God With
Now here is the beautiful part of God with us. Almighty, Powerful, Creator God has put himself into a form of “with-ness.” He has entered himself into an intimate relationship with us. There is a difference between having a general experience with God, and being with God. Before Jesus came, people had a general experience of God and whenever God would show up, how has God looked? He looked absolutely terrifying! I have a weak heart and if God appears to me like he showed himself back in the Old Testament, I would probably either pass out or have a heart attack. When God appeared to Job, he appeared as a hurricane. I’ve experienced hurricane in the Philippines and it’s was very scary. When he appeared to Abraham, he appeared as a smoking furnace, an incredible blaze or an incredible heat passing between the pieces of the dead animal that he had cut up. When he appeared to Moses and to the Israelites he was a pillar of fire. When he entered the temple he was what it’s called a shikina glory cloud that was so powerful that when it came down, no one could come near it. Every time God would show himself, he was always absolutely terrifying.
Now here is the point. There is one thing to experience God and another thing to be with him, to meet him personally. As an illustration, when you go to a concert or a show and see your favorite music group, or favorite performer, you get to experience the presence of the performer. But then to actually meet the person or group face to face you get scared. I love music and I love to sing and there is this famous Filipino singer that I admired, idolized, and imitated. I studied how he sings and sang many of his songs. I’ve been to a couple of his concerts and always wanted to him. Actually there was a time when I could have met him face to face to talk to him because his wife is a distant relative of one of my best friends in high school. I wanted to say to him that I’m his number one fan and I also sing. But you know I was afraid that if I say that, he’d be like, “Ok let me hear your sing.” And that made me not want to meet him. I was so afraid.
There is one thing to experience God and another to meet him face to face. Before Jesus, to get into the presence of God was totally terrifying: A hurricane, a smoking furnace, a pillar of fire. There was one person who was brave enough to ask to meet God. It was Moses. And when Moses asked to meet God, what was God’s answer? He said no but I’ll show you my hind parts. If I let you see my face it would kill you, but I’ll show my hind parts (I don’t know exactly what that is) and what was the result? Moses face when he came down the mountain was so bright that he had to put a veil over his face for several days until the glory went away. The people of God could not look at Moses because of the radiance on his face when Moses saw just God's hind parts. Now just imagine if Moses was here with us and began to hear the message of Christmas. John 1: The word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. Or if he hears Paul's message on 2 Corinthians 3 where Paul says that Moses had to put a veil over his face, but Christ has removed the veil because God who made the light has shown us into our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. If Moses hears this he would say, "Do you realize what this means? This was the very thing I was denied!" This means that through Jesus, you can meet God and have personal relationship with him. And Moses would say, "Why aren't you praising God? Why aren't you jumping up and down and celebrating? Why aren't you worshiping God for this beautiful thing God has done?" And would we say? Through Jesus, God is with us because Jesus took away the terror, the fear, the barrier of guilt between us, and God took away the sin. God is with us because when he appeared to us in Jesus, he was not a hurricane, a pillar of fire, or burning furnace, but he came to us as a baby. WOW! We see a baby and go, "Awww, so cute!" And what do we do when we see a baby? We try to get them to smile or laugh. Suddenly we do all these silly things, we become like a clown to get the baby to smile and laugh because we know that when we get them to laugh or get them to smile for even a little, it would just melt your heart. It's like looking at a beautiful angel. Why did God come to us in a form of a baby? God wants to be with us in a most beautiful way. Christmas is when God became a baby in a manger so humble but yet so beautiful!
God came not just to be us, but to rescue us from our sins and it's not a rescue mission that we see in the movies and tv with all the great battles and great number of soldiers to fight for us. But he came to give his life, to die for us, and to take our place for the punishment of sins we are deserve. God with us!
Before Jesus, I had so many questions about God, about, and about hell. Many people I've known have died including close relatives and I asked myself why? Why is this happening? Is this what life is all about? But by God's grace, God led me to know him through his son Jesus. Through Jesus I met God and I got to know God personally. God is Almighty, Powerful, and Sovereign. And through Jesus, God answered all my questions and made me believe that God is real and heaven is real. God with us!
III. Jesus is God with us - Now the word "us" is a limited term. It's not for everybody. It doesn't say God with all. Then who is the “us”? Are they the exclusive ones, moral group of people, the ones who deserve it? Are they ones who say "God I did this and I did that, so you owe me God, here I am, accept me!" When Jesus came, who did he hang out with? Not the righteous ones, but sinners. They are the ones who have realized that they would never be good no matter how they try and they need a savior to save them. Those who come to God with nothing: no reference, no evidence, no proof of their innocence. You know one time I received this parking ticket and it says on the ticket that I didn’t have a zone permit but I did have one. I was so upset so I sent a mail back with all the proofs. I took pictures of the parking sticker that was on my van and made sure the sticker was on my van crystal clear. Close up picture, picture that showed bought the sticker and the license plate, and I included the receipt of the sticker that I kept. I showed them all the proofs and they waived the parking ticket. But you know if I come to God that way, I would not make it. God wants to come to him with nothing.
In this world there many religions and all of them say that morality and goodness is enough to get to God. If you live a good life then you get God. But Christianity says no. Only Christianity uniquely says that morality and goodness would never be enough. Your situation is too dire. You need a Savoir, you need someone to save you from for your situation. When we examine our selves, how much we try to be good, the efforts we make to be good. Will we ever be good? There was one pastor in our ministry who one time found his testimony that he wrote many years ago and after he read that testimony, he realized that nothing much has changed in his life and he became depressed. Perhaps we rely so much on good works thinking that it is the way to be accepted by God. But there is only one way to be accepted by God and it's never by our good works. It’s when we simply put our trust in Jesus. When we simply come to God with nothing and just humbly accept what Jesus has done, not what we did, and ask Jesus to come into our lives and allow him to change us.
Conclusion: short practical applications -
1. What God did to be with us was something BIG that our response should be true worship. Even Moses was denied of this. What God did to be with us is something that was not possible. I mean you cannot park a nice gorgeous red Ferrari between two junk cars, or you can't have our president Barack O Bama live with the homeless people on Lower Wacker drive. But the bible says that what is impossible with men is possible with God. And that was exactly what God did. God made it possible to be with us.
2) If he is God with us, we need take off the limitations, habits, needs, difficulties in our life. Get rid of the things that hinders from what God can do through us, through this church, etc. The bible says if the God is us then could be against us?
3) Christmas is about being with God, with his love, being close to him. Let's remember what God did to be with us. You know there are so many things in this world that will make us think that it’s more real than Immanuel. Let’s pray that we may spend our time more on being with God.
