Immanu-El, Part 2

Last week I wrote about the 'big background story' of humanity and salvation:  Adam and Eve, the Fall, and the nation of Israel as the foundation of what God would reveal in the Messiah.  Now we move to the actuality:  how God came to be among us, "God with us" as Isaiah 7:14 says.  If God is perfect and we most emphatically are not, how can the two come together?

It's simple, yet profound and earth-changing:  The two come together in Jesus, Immanu-el or "God-with-us," the Son of God born into human flesh as the firstborn son of a peasant girl.  Luke 1:26-38 says that Mary's womb became the growing place for a child who would be called the Son of the Most High.  Matthew's gospel records the angel telling her specifically that this child was fulfillment of the Isaiah prophecy, in Mat. 1:18-23.  What a strange event:  God, the Creator, coming into his creation to become a human, just like his other human creations!  For the first time, the Almighty God became limited by being part of his creation.  God, who had sent prophets and leaders to speak for him, this time came to speak for himself (Heb. 1:1-3). 

When God came into human flesh, he joined himself completely with humanity (Heb. 2:14-18)!  Jesus (whose name means "Yahweh saves") was both fully human (he was able to experience all our human life, Heb. 4:15) and he was fully God (Heb. 1:3).  So when he died on the cross, Jesus the man was able to die just like all humans; but when Jesus the Son of God died, he died for your sins and mine, not his own (Heb 2:14-15).  To put it another way, God became one with humans, so that humans could become one with God.

It was God's plan before time began to adopt us, to give us his nature (Eph. 1:3-6) which is a completely free gift (Eph. 2:8-9) and cannot ever be earned.  It was through Jesus, who was the perfect human and is the only human ever to be perfectly accepted by God, "When he had cleansed us from our sins, he sat down in the place of honor at the right hand of the majestic God in heaven" (Heb. 1:3).

Because of Immanu-El -- Jesus -- all of us can come to God completely without fear (Heb 4:16) any time.  We are fully accepted and loved by God (John 17:23) because of his Son.  Even when we've made a mess of our lives, even when we look more like the Three Stooges than anything else, even when we're ashamed of our own behavior, we are still fully loved by God, because of Immanu-El, God with us, Jesus the Christ. 

And that's the meaning of Christmas!