“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). Mat 1:23 ESV
Throughout the Old Testament, God’s promise to be with his people was a great source of strength. God promised Isaac that he would be with him, to bless him and to establish the oath that he swore to Abraham (Gen 26:3). God promised a troubled Jacob that he would be with him if he left his uncle and returned to the land of his kindred (Gen 31:3). Moses and Joshua both received signs and words from God to encourage them to speak on behalf of God and to wage war (Ex 3:12, Josh 1:5).
But the coming of Jesus Christ into this world expanded the very phrase, “God with us,” beyond what anyone could ever have imagined. For God did not just grace the world with the care of his Presence, but his very Presence came into our world. How remarkable this is! As Charles Wesley wrote, “Our God contracted to a span, incomprehensibly made man.”
The God who crafted the entire universe condescended to enter into our world and added to his divinity the weakness and frailness of human flesh. The infinite God became an infant. The Creator whose breath forms ice (Job 37:10) would feel the chill of the evening wind. The Provider who feeds the beasts of the field would need to be fed at his mother’s breast. The eternal one would age into a man. The all-wise one would need to grow in wisdom. The immortal Lord would suffer death. The giver of joy would become a man of sorrows. The comforter of all would cry at the grave of Lazarus. The quencher of spiritual thirst who gives fountains of living water would himself thirst on the cross. What a paradox he is! Who can understand this great mystery?
He was fully God, yet fully human—and knew what it was to be human. And though he was tempted, he succeeded against sin where no human being had ever triumphed. He knew the maximum weight of human temptation in every aspect of life—more than anyone who has ever lived, yet he did not succumb for a moment and triumphed where Israel had failed!
And there is no path that we believers walk that he has not already walked before us! Are you abandoned and lonely? Then look to the one who had no place to lay his head. Are you crushed under the weight of grief? Look to the man of sorrows. Do you agonize over the crushing weight of your responsibilities? Look to him who bore the weight of Gethsemane. Truly he is a God who is able to sympathize with our weaknesses because he was made like us in every way but without sin (Heb 4:15). Christ has walked your path, and he walks with you now. Not just as the God who sees and ordains all things for your good, but as the God who walked our very world and walks with you now. And surely, he has promised, to be with you—to the very end of the age.
– Pastor Sam Chua
