With Us: An Advent Sermon by Brent J Eelman

With Us

An Advent Sermon by Brent J. Eelman

Isaiah 7: 10-16

Again the Lord spoke to Ahaz, saying, 11 Ask a sign of the Lord your God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven. 12 But Ahaz said, I will not ask, and I will not put the Lord to the test. 13 Then Isaiah said: "Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary mortals, that you weary my God also? 14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look, the young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel. 15 He shall eat curds and honey by the time he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good. 16 For before the child knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land before whose two kings you are in dread will be deserted.

Matthew 1:18-23

Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19 Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. 20 But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." 22 All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: 23 "Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel," which means, "God is with us."

A parent says to her child, “I will be there.”  What do those words mean and how does the child respond to those words?  It depends on the context, does it not?  The words could be a promise and an assurance.  “Don’t worry, I will be there and will help you.”  But the words can also be construed as a warning.  “Listen, you better behave this afternoon, because I will be there.”  

“I will be there.”  It can be a warning or a promise.  The same is true with the name Immanuel.  Whether it is spelled in the Hebrew manner with an I or the Greek with an E. It means, “God with us.”   Depending on its context it can be either a warning or promise.

Today I want to look at three different contexts for Immanuel.  The first is the story of Isaiah. In that story, “God with us”, or Immanuel was a warning.  The second context is the story from Matthew. This is part of the Christmas story, and Emmanuel, “God with us”, was a promise.  The third story is our story: our desire and hope to experience “God with us” in our lives.  Our experience of the presence of God in our lives is both a promise as in gospels and a warning as in the prophet Isaiah. 

I

The name Immanuel originated in an encounter that the Prophet Isaiah had with King Ahaz of Judah. This occurred 700 years before the birth of Jesus. The Hebrew bible was not kind in its judgment of King Ahaz.  It stated that he was not a good king, nor did he walk in the light of the Lord.  Isaiah was sent by God to Ahaz to warn him about his behavior and tell him to change his ways. 

It was a sticky situation.  The nation of Judah was caught in a Middle East power grab, and the future did not look hopeful.  Ahaz, in order to save his kingdom, made a deal with the Assyrians for protection against his enemies.  To sweeten the deal, Ahaz robbed the Temple of some of its wealth and sent it to Assyria.  This was an affront to the prophetic concern for faithfulness and so God sent Isaiah to Ahaz to offer him a sign from God that he needed to change. 

Ahaz refused any type of sign and this angered God. Isaiah then told Ahaz that regardless of what he wanted or thought, God would give him a sign. 

Then Isaiah pointed to his young wife, (who was also a prophetess), and said, “Here is your sign.  The young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.”   Isaiah’s child, Immanuel, was a warning to Ahaz that he made the wrong choices.  The kings in which he placed his hopes would be gone before this child was mature. 

Immanuel was a reminder that God was with Ahaz, whether he wanted him around or not.  God would not ignore the evil that Ahaz would do….a warning.

II

The name Emmanuel in the Gospels contained a promise. When Matthew quoted Isaiah, he used a similar phrase, “Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel.”   We get awfully hung up on whether Matthew translated the Hebrew word for young woman correctly into Greek, but that is not the issue.  The issue is Matthew’s belief that an ancient prophecy would be fulfilled again.  Matthew was familiar with the prophet Isaiah, and when he told the story of the birth of Jesus, he remembered the words of Isaiah.  The light bulb went off and he said, “Yes, the birth of Jesus is a fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy.”  Here is the difference: for Matthew, it was not a warning.  It was a hopeful promise!

 Matthew believed that Jesus, the child born of Mary and Joseph, was a child of hope.  He was an assurance to people that God was, indeed, with them and would not abandon them.  This is the essential message of Christmas: God became a human being and lived among us. This same Christ is present in our lives today.  This is the promise that is the foundation of our faith.   This is the promise that Matthew proclaimed in his Christmas story.  “They shall name him Emmanuel – God with us.” 

III

The prophecy of Immanuel, God with us, is also fulfilled again in our lives. We want God in our lives.  This is the third story; your story and mine.  It is also the story of this season.  We know that this world is messed up, and so we look to the heavens and pray that God will come in some way and restore creation.  During this season of longing and expectation, we sing the ancient carol:  “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel, and ransom captive Israel.” We long for God in our lives. 

Isaiah’s prophecy was fulfilled in the birth of his own child, and the events of subsequent years.  His prophecy was fulfilled again in the birth of Jesus to Mary and Joseph.  I believe it is also fulfilled again and again in our lives.  God enters our lives and is with us.  In the words of the Fanny Crosby hymn, “He walks with me, and he talks with me and he tells me I am his own.” 

Whenever we experience a moment of grace; an act of forgiveness, an expression of love and acceptance, we experience “God with us.”  

When our prayers are answered, our bodies healed, the poor fed, and the lonely visited, we experience “God with us.” 

But is this the only way we experience God?

None of us would argue that we want God in our lives, but which one?  The warning of Isaiah or the promise of Matthew?  

When I was a child, one of our treats was Oreo cookies.  There are a number of ways to eat an Oreo.  I would just take a big bite and eat it.  My brother would split them open, and only eat the filling on the inside.  He only wanted one part of the Oreo. 

Is it the same with God?  We just want the part we like? 

One of the problems with our contemporary culture is how we view God.  We don’t want God to warn us, to challenge us, or tell us to change.    We want God to fix what we’ve messed up and then leave us alone.   We only want one part of God in our lives:

·      a God who is there when we need him; 

·      a God who will fix the things we mess up;

·      a God who will leave us alone and not make any demands upon our life;

·      a God who will not challenge us to change. 

We love this season with all its pageantry. Mary and Joseph, shepherds and magi, angels and stables.  We adore the baby in the manger.  I, too, love this season.  But I also know that this baby Jesus, (the one we call Emmanuel), grew up and became a man. 

·      This baby was the one who later confronted the powers of this world with the truth. 

·      This baby was the one who told the strong and the mighty to turn the other cheek.

·      This baby was the one who came face to face with the Roman authorities, the temple authorities, the legal authorities… the devil himself, and spoke the truth. 

·      This child grew up to trouble and challenge those whom he was with. 

Should we not expect him to challenge us, to trouble us, and to speak the truth to us?   Isn’t this also part of being loved?   The baby in the manger grew up and become the Christ of the cross… and he calls us to take up our cross and follow.  

And so we sing, “O Come, O Come Emmanuel”  longing for God’s presence in our lives.  “God with us” is the God of Isaiah. God challenges us, warns us and calls us to a higher standard of faithfulness. 

“God with us” is the God of the Gospels, who also loves us, assures us, comforts us, heals us, dies for us.   The modern martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote:

So long as there are men and women, Christ walks the earth

as your neighbor,

as the one through home God calls on you, speaks to you,

and makes demands on you.

That is the most serious and

most blessed thing about the Advent message.

Christ lives in the shape of the person in our midst.

This is the good news.  Amen.