Name Above All Names "Immanuel" | Advent Series Part 5 (Christmas Eve)

Thank you Adriana, that was awesome.

See some of the faces on those kids and heard like some people

have already opened their Christmas presents already like

a little bit of a rippa. Anyway, Merry Christmas to you.

Good morning to you friends. How are we all doing this

morning? Doing alright, Great, we made it

here. Awesome.

It is good to be together. No other season is better than

than Christmas to bring people together.

The song is sung. You know, friends, faithful

friends who are dear to us. Gather near to us once more of

yourself, Mary, We will. Supposed to be joining me there,

friends. Yeah, sure.

But Christmas? I don't know what is it about it

that it's this reprieve that we all get in a very chaotic,

conflict oriented, anxious world.

So much pain. We get this opportunity to just

take a break from that for a moment.

And, you know, not just the stuff that's in the news that we

hear around the world, but also the stuff that's going on in our

own lives. Like, I just just ask, you know,

what difficulties may you be facing this season, this

Christmas season? Maybe it's chronic illness,

maybe troubled children, maybe there's financial hardship or

the loss of a loved one. Maybe it's high anxiety or just

really low depression. All of us are carrying

something. Many of us are carrying weight

and just kind of feels like, it feels like we're just surrounded

with this and, and the weight is very, very heavy in a season

like this. But Christmas, and this is one

of the reasons why we gather on a regular basis.

But Christmas in particular speaks to all of what we're

going through. We're going to take some time.

And this is what the beautiful thing is about, gathering on a

Christmas on a, on a Christmas Eve like this, to just take some

time just to reflect on what it was that inspired so many

heartwarming, peace giving, joy filled songs.

Songs that we sing not only in a church service like this, but

songs that were humming in the aisles of the grocery store and

in the shopping malls. These heavenly songs that speak

of great joy gonna talk about the source.

What was it that inspired those things?

Have you brought your Bible with you this morning?

We're gonna be in Matthews Gospel chapter 1 because the

lights are dimmed a little bit. We don't want anybody straining

their eyes. We're gonna have the Scripture

passage up on the screen as well.

But I just wanted to give you an opportunity if you did bring a

Bible and you want to follow along, and there were in Matthew

Matthew 1 · chapter mention

chapter 1. If you've been following along

with us over the last month, we've been in a series called

Name Above All Names, and we've been looking at the names of

Jesus and particularly the ones that are related to the

Christmas story. So Son of David, for example, or

Prince of Peace, Light of the World, we looked at that.

But there are just so many names associated with Jesus.

King of Kings, Lord of Lords, the Chief cornerstone, the Bread

of Life, the Bright Morning Star, the Lion of Judah, the Elf

and the Omega just goes on and on and on.

Almost 200 names and titles have been spoken of in terms of

Jesus. Names for Jesus.

Now, how special of a person do you have to be in order to have

200 names associated with you? I just think of myself, John

Digiovanni. You know, I get called Johnny

sometimes and my wife calls me Jake every once in a while.

I might get Deja or Deege or Dude, right?

But except for that last one, all of the names that I am, you

know, referred to as are derivatives of my main name.

But with Jesus, when it comes to Jesus, every single name that he

has been given is different, is unique.

Is is, is, is is completely separate from the other, all

talking about referring to who he is, the kind of person that

he is. We're going to look at the last

name today, and this is probably one of the most shocking names

of all. As soon as that association has

been made, Jesus, this now up on the screens, you know what it

is, right? We're gonna be looking at this

name, Emmanuel. But to talk about what it means

in the impact that this name has on our lives, it's good for us

to look at the context in which the Scripture speaks about it.

And so we're gonna take a look at this now.

We're as we're coming back to a very old, old story.

Actually, we're we're returning to the very place we started in

the series of Matthew chapter one.

We have to particularly those of us have been raised in the

church. We're going to make sure we're

not lulling ourselves to sleep. So if anybody, you know, maybe

just pinch the person next to you, wake up, wake up, wake up.

We need to allow these old, old words, ones that are very

familiar to us. We need to allow them to address

us, speak to us, not just on a even on an intellectual one, an

emotional level as well, just to take some time to let them

minister to us, touch us in the deepest places because they're

incredibly profound. So before we read this text,

let's just OfferUp a prayer to God.

Lord, we ask that as we read these, these old, old words, you

would touch us in a fresh, new way.

For the glory of your name we pray.

Amen. Amen.

Matthew chapter one Start Universe 18.

This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about.

His mother, Mary, was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before

they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the

Holy Spirit. OK, so here we have two people.

They are engaged to be married, married.

They're they, they pledged to be married.

No physical intimacy whatsoever, but Mary's pregnant.

There's a problem, right? Obvious problem.

Three things to note about this. Number one is this slide.

Abstinence is 99.99% effective. Good fan of vaccines.

But this is so. Anyway, the next next point

thing to note is that this is a very unique situation.

This has not happened all the time.

This is what we call a miracle, a divine miracle.

And then the third thing to note about this is the difficulty

that this would have been for Joseph.

Now, I know it's going to be difficult for Mary too, but

we're going to just talk about Joseph for a few minutes this

morning. He's got an incredible decision

to make. Don't just just picture it.

Mary comes to Joseph and says, you know what?

I don't know how I got pregnant. I mean, I mean, there, there was

an Angel and you talk something about the Holy Spirit, but I

can't really explain it. You gotta believe me.

What are you gonna say to that? It's like, I mean, seriously,

how are you gonna respond to that?

Joseph had an incredibly difficult, difficult decision to

be making here. So let's move on.

There's 19 because Joseph, her husband, was faithful to the law

and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace.

He had in mind to divorce her quietly.

So here we have Joseph who loved Mary, just adored Mary, but he

also had a love for God's law. And he knew that adultery was a

very serious sin and that there were consequences, necessary

consequences to someone who committed adultery.

And and so here he is trying to uphold the law.

He knew that he couldn't take her as his wife, but he didn't

want her to go through the consequences, the heavy duty

consequences that would be heard.

He just his, his heart was for her.

And so he wanted to divorce her quietly because the amount of

shame that she would go through publicly would just absolutely

destroy her life. There's no chance that she would

ever find another husband. And once her parents passed

away, she'd have no one to look after her like this would be

absolutely devastating. So he wanted to just keep it

quiet and just move on. But then look what happens.

Verse 20. But after he had considered

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 home

as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the

Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son,

and you were to give him the name Jesus, because he will save

his people from their sins. So here we have an Angel who has

confirmed to Joseph this is actually a work of God.

This is the the it's the Holy Spirit through which Mary is

conceiving a child. In other words, God himself is

the father of this child. And so Mayor Joseph does end up

taking Mary as his wife. But as he takes her as his wife,

he also takes all of the consequences that were gonna be

upon her, upon himself, because now he would be subject to

public shame. Because if he's going to marry

her, that means he's responsible for this predicament.

He's the one who made Mary pregnant outside of wedlock.

And in those days particularly, wow, that was heavy duty stuff.

And so all of the shame would be upon him as the responsible one.

And as a young Carpenter who is trying to make it with a

business, with a with a carpentry business, his whole

market would have been blown up right on the spot because of

word of mouth. And so life would not be easy

for Joseph. But here's the commentary verse

22. All this took place to fulfill

what the Lord had said through the prophet.

The Virgin will conceive and give birth to a son and they

will call him Emmanuel, which means God with us right here.

Matthew the the writer of the gospel is referring back to a

prophecy of the prophet Isaiah chapter Isaiah Chapter 7 verse

Isaiah 7:9

9. And so you can actually go back

and read it. Whatever Isaiah had in his mind

700 years before this happened, Matthew recognizes that he was

ultimately talking about this event, that this was the virgin

who would conceive and give birth to a son and his name

would be Immanuel, a manual. It's just just ponder this word

for a minute. Emmanuel, which means God with

us, right? God with us.

If you were to look at this name and break it into its component

parts, a man you means with us an L means God.

And so literally it is. If you look at the word order,

it is with us God. In other words, God wants us to

know him as the with us God. He is the with us God.

That means that he's personal. He's not just this impersonal

force that created the universe. He's very personal.

He cares about you and he cares about me.

And as well, He wants to be intimate with us.

He wants us to know Him like he knows us.

So what does it mean when we say God is with us?

What exactly does that mean when we say God is with you?

What does that mean? If you're hurting, If you're

going through a rough time and someone says, hey, you know, I'm

with you, bro, What does that mean?

That means I'm thinking about you.

And hey, if you reach out at any point and I'll be there to help,

to support you or maybe maybe a dear one has passed away like

grandma has. Grandma has passed away, and I

know that Grandma has died, but Grandma's still with us.

That kind of language. What does that mean?

It means that. It means that her memory is

living on with us. That is not what this means when

we say God is with us. It means so much more than that.

What does it mean when we say God is with you?

First of all, it means that he is extremely close.

God is extremely close to you. You ever wondered where is God?

Maybe if you're a parent, your children might may ask that

question, where is God? Well, in Psalm 139, the psalmist

is kind of grappling with this and thinking about where is God?

Well, this is what he says. Where can I go from your

presence? Or, sorry, where can I go from

your spirit? Where can I flee from your

presence? If I go up to the heavens,

you're there. And if I make my bed and the

depths you were there. In other words, he's everywhere

all at once. There is no place that he is

not. Look at the person next to you

right now. God is in between you right now.

He is that close. He's extremely close.

Even if you were to smooch the person next to you, he's there.

Actually, don't do that. Don't do that.

But he is close. Now we can't see him, right?

We can't see him. But what Christmas does it it

it, it, it makes everything concrete because God suddenly

becomes a person, physically comes to earth, takes on flesh

so that we can see him, to show us just how close he is.

He literally is God with us. He wants to show us how close he

is. And I would imagine Joseph, no

matter how difficult a time that he was having, there was some

assurance He's with me and my family.

He's with me and my family. Now I, I remember the day that I

woke up to this fact about how close, extremely close God is,

because all the way through my life I had sort of thought God

was sort of up there and out there.

But when I received Jesus, when I became a Christian in

university, suddenly God became real for me.

And he was not just a God who was up here, but he was right

here, right here. He was a God that I could turn

to. He's a God that saw me, that

knew me, that loved me, that cared for me.

And I could turn to him at any moment and have a conversation

with him. Remember writing exams knowing

I'm not alone in this exam anymore.

I can talk to the creator of the universe and that's no excuse

not to be studying. But it's amazing what he helps

us to recall in in an exam period.

He is literally with me, with us.

Now, you may not be feeling. It's like, yeah, yeah, yeah,

right. But I don't feel that my my life

is more marked by God's absence than God's presence.

That is a completely natural statement like that is

completely natural. Ever since the fall that's

recorded in Genesis chapter 3. Ever since that time, there has

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

been a barrier between us and God that we haven't been able to

sense His presence. This is what makes Christmas so

incredibly special. And that God himself came to

break that barrier. That's what Jesus did.

Through his life, death and resurrection, the barrier has

been brought down and we have been brought into an intimate

fellowship with God Himself, with the removal of our sins

that are no longer standing against us.

It's a beautiful thing. So now we have full access to

God. Now that's something that we're

not used to because our our natural tendencies to think that

God is very distant from us. But we have now, through our

faith in Jesus Christ, been given full access to God.

And we just gotta get used to that.

One of my favorite books that's ever been written, 17th century

monk, Brother Lawrence wrote the book Practice of the Presence of

God. And it means that we need to, we

get, we need to get used to the fact that God is extremely close

and we need to engage him on that level.

The way that he defines practicing the presence of God

is is that we're to take delight in and become accustomed to his

divine company, speaking humbly, talking lovingly with him at all

times, at every moment without rule or system.

That is what God's desire is for you, for us to know Him on that

intimate level as one who's extremely close.

Second thing that it means that God is God is with you, and that

is that He's highly involved in your life.

He's not just extremely close. He is highly involved in your

life. You know, people might say, you

know, God is with you when you're going through a hard

time, but it's like, you know what?

That doesn't really help me very much.

God could be with me, but if he's just watching kind of as an

innocent bystander, what, how, how does that actually help me

at all? It's like God's on the sidelines

of my life and I'm out here in the field, but the testimony of

Scripture again and again and again is a God who is in the

field. It's not just on the side.

He is always at work in our life, constantly at work.

Now you might think, OK, but my life is hard.

There's an incredible amount of suffering in my life.

So does that mean that God is at work in my life?

Like it's not helping me very much.

Don't assume that because your life is hard that God is not

present. Look at Joseph's life.

God is literally physically with him and he had no easy life.

God with us does not mean things are gonna go easy, but what it

does mean is that we're never going to face anything in this

life alone and that he would. He is with us and he's going to

help us. One of the Scripture passages

that I think has given incredible comfort to many

Christians through the ages and myself, as well as Romans

Romans 8:28

chapter 8, verse 28, where it says that we know and we know

that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him

and were called according to His purpose.

It's not saying that in some things God's at work doing good.

No, in all things, absolutely everything that happens, God is

at work bringing about good, no matter whether it might feel

difficult or not. In other words, don't give up.

Never give up believing that God is extremely close and that He

is highly involved putting your trust in Him.

You know one foot in front of the other.

Life might look a little messy, but God truly is with us.

Reminds me of a story by the concert pianist, a Polish

concert pianist. What is his name?

Ignacy Petruski and he was putting on a concert.

This is how the story goes. Put on a concert and before the

concert began, a little boy got up under the platform and

started playing chopsticks on his piano.

And the audience, of course, is 1 Reno kind of confused.

Like, what's going on here, right?

Well, Petrosky comes on to like comes out of the curtain toward

the toward the young boy behind him.

But we can see him and he whispers over his shoulder,

don't stop while the boys playing chopsticks.

And while he's playing chopsticks, Paderewski starts

playing the bass. Right next to him, base keys,

and then with the other hand, the melody.

And he's just weaving into this very rudimentary chopsticks

piece, this absolutely gorgeous melody.

Now there's a lot of versions of that story, but the one

principle remains true is that there is a master musician who

is taking our feeble attempts at living and He's making something

beautiful out of our lives. Do not give up trusting and

believing in the goodness of God.

He is going to use you powerfully for His glory and for

your good. So God is with you.

What does that mean? He's extremely close.

He's highly involved in the last thing is that he is on your

side. God is on your side.

That doesn't mean that He is on your side of every argument that

you make, because sometimes we're just dead wrong, right?

But even when we are wrong, we can know.

We can be assured that He has always for us.

He loves you, He cares about you, He is for you, He created

you, He's given his life for you and He wants you on his team.

Now you may not feel worthy to be on his team.

You look at your life, you think, man, the things that I'm

doing, they just don't measure up to the way they should be.

I don't love God the way that I should.

I don't love my neighbors myself, but this is where

Christmas becomes so sweet. Because at Christmas, when God

came down, made us dwelling among us, He took the initiative

to reconcile us to Himself. This is what the name of Jesus

in verse 21 means. You would save his people from

their sins. That's what Jesus has done.

You know, the same Jesus that was born and placed in the

wooden crush is the same Jesus who took the nails on that

wooden cross and died taking the weight of our sin upon Himself.

All of the consequences of our sin were placed on Him so that

we could be forgiven, washed clean, that we could get that

full access to God and that we could know His presence every

moment of every day. That's why, Paul, you possibly

just think about the implications of that.

If if God does that for us when we're at our worst, think about

what he think about his approach to us as we're trying to live

for him. That's why the postal police

said if God is for us, who can be against us?

Like seriously, what can we not face if the living God of the

universe is truly for us? And so Joshua 19 I love this

charge, one that Joseph would have known well.

Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid, do not be

discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever

you go, wherever you go. Do you believe it?

You know the beginning and the end of Matthew's Gospel.

We hear a promise at the beginning.

We read it that when Jesus came, it was God with us.

And then at the very end of the gospel, when Jesus is now going

to ascend and leave, the last words that he spoke to his

disciples is surely I am with you always to the very end of

the age. It's all about His presence with

us. How would your life be different

if at the beginning and in the end of your day you would be?

You would have that conviction that God is with you, that he is

extremely close, that He's highly involved, and that He is

on your side. How would your life be

different? How would your relationships be

different just the way you conduct yourself in life?

You and I, we can be an unambitious presence in the

midst of a very anxious world simply because we know deep in

our heart that God truly is with us.

Whatever difficulties that you're facing during this season

of your life, I want you to take a moment.

We can do that even now. And I don't want you to picture

yourself being surrounded by your difficulties.

I want you to envision being surrounded by the presence of

the living God who loves you and cares for you.

You're growing awareness of that and you're growing delight in

that is what your life is all about.

That is the reason why we're here on this planet is to enjoy

and engage the presence of the living God.

That's my prayer for you. That is my prayer.

And maybe you have never opened up your life to Jesus Christ, to

the presence of God. You can do that.

It is not a complicated process. In fact, there are three words

that we use that we learned in kindergarten that we can use for

a prayer like that. God keeps it very, very simple.

As complex as he is, He keeps it very simple.

Sorry, thanks and please. Those are the three words.

Those are three words and invites us to pray them.

And that's a prayer that we can all pray.