Names of God: Emmanuel
In 2001 I got sunburned on Christmas Eve. My dad, a navy reserve officer, had been called up to active duty after 9/11 and was stationed at Pearl Harbor. My family and I had been missing him, and were worried that he would be sent off to one of the areas of the world that was breaking into war. We made a special effort to go be with him at Christmas. On Christmas Eve we visited the eastside of Oahu and had a beach day. I tried my hand at surfing the huge Hawaiian December swells. I knew I was in over my head when the locals started diving in off the jetty with helmets strapped onto their heads. We BBQed a turkey on the outside grill under the sun. It was a strange Christmas. But it was wonderful, and memorable, because it was with my dad.
Proximity matters in our relationships. When you love someone, you want to be close to them. This principle comes through with one of the names of God that has been revealed to us in the bible. The name is Emmanuel, translated ‘God with us,’ or ‘God is with us.’ It comes from the book of Isaiah during the time of King Ahaz. Like many Hebrew prophecies, it mysteriously carried both a short-term and long-term fulfillment. The short-term fulfillment included a child that was born during the reign of Ahaz given the name Emmanuel to symbolize God’s deliverance of Judah from the attacks of Israel and Syria. The long-term fulfillment would not come for another 700 years.
God, in his love, has always intended to be close to humanity. He walked with Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. During the time of Moses, he set up a system of sacrifices and a tent of meeting through the tabernacle to create a cleansed space where his holy presence could dwell with his people. Under Solomon, he established his throne, the arc of the covenant, in Jerusalem, as a permanent home at the temple. And every year Israelites were invited several times to come near, to worship and celebrate at his house. God wanted time with humanity, with us. But we faltered. We have neglected our visits like grown children that no longer call their parents.
And for hundreds of years it seemed the lines of communication had gone cold. The prophecies of God coming close collected dust.
But a poor teenage girl kept saying her prayers, and believing that God would keep his old promises. An angel came to her and told her that she would conceive a child by the Holy Spirit, and she would give birth to the Son of God, and his name was to be Jesus. This event would go on to be called the incarnation, God coming to us in a human being, walking with us once again, like He did with Adam and
Eve in the garden of Eden, but not as a spirit, this time as one of us. You can’t get closer between God and humanity than that.
But wasn’t he supposed to be named Emmanuel to fulfill the prophecy? Emmanuel means God with Us. Jesus literally fulfilled the prophecy by being God, and coming to us, as Matthew wrote, “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’ (Matt 1:22-23).
The fact that God came to us through the birth of Christ has wonderful implications for our lives. It means God wants to be reconciled to us, and the ball has been passed to us. All we have to do is believe and follow, and our relationship with God, according to John 3:16, is healed. We have a God that can sympathize with our weaknesses, because he knows how difficult it is to be a human. We have a God that is close, now through the Holy Spirit that is given to those that believe, so we can talk to him, we can listen to his guidance in prayer and bible study, we can praise him, knowing that he hears and receives our love. And we can look forward to the day when we will stand before him face to face, Emmauel, God WITH US.
Together in the Journey,
Father Cam Lemons
(Father Cam Lemons serves at St. Timothy’s Anglican Church. Service is at 9 a.m. on Sunday at 700 Hobson St. in Bishop. He also serves at Trinity Memorial Anglican Church in Lone Pine. The service there is at noon at 220 N. Lakeview Road. For more information, go to StTimothysBishop.com.)