December 25
One of my all time favorite Christmas hymns is “O’ come o’ come Emanuel”.
O come, O come, Emmanuel
And ransom captive Israel
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear
Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel
O come, Thou Rod of Jesse, free
Thine own from Satan’s tyranny
From depths of Hell Thy people save
And give them victory o’er the grave
Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, o Israel
O come, Thou Day-Spring
Come and cheer
Our spirits by Thine advent here
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night
And death’s dark shadows put to flight
Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, o Israel
O come, Thou Key of David, come
And open wide our heavenly home
Make safe the way that leads on high
And close the path to misery
Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, o Israel
This song gives me hope.
Emmanuel, the word means God with us. Having God take on human form, God becoming man, It means life and hope and a future for us, but what did it mean for Jesus?
He gave up heaven.
He left his father.
He left the angels.
He left eternity and entered time.
He left omnipresence and became 3 dimensional.
He spent 9 months inside of his mother.
He spent 33 years traveling through dusty and dirty Judea and Samaria.
Paul says this about Jesus taking on flesh.
“In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death — even death on a cross!”
Philippians 2:5-8
The writer of Hebrews adds this:
“Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil — and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. For surely it is not angels he helps, but Abraham’s descendants. For this reason he had to be made like them, fully human in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.
Hebrews 2:14-18
Jesus gave up heaven for a little while so we could share it with him for eternity. He took on living in the flesh so he could sympathize with us, his fallen creation. He took on living in the flesh so he could live the perfect human life. He lived the perfect human life so he could be the one and only perfect human sacrifice. He became the perfect human sacrifice so he could pay for all my sin, all of our sin. He paid for all of our sin by dying a gruesome and painful death. He died and was buried for 3 days so that though my body will die, I will live forever with him because he rose from the dead, he left the grave and death behind him, conquered forever.
We do not, cannot reach up to God. We can never be good enough. This would be heartbreaking and soul crushing except for this truth. Our God has come down to us. Emanuel. God with us.
