By Pastor Patrick Cho

Matthew 1:18-25 is the account of the angel declaring to Joseph that Mary would give birth to a Son, that He should be called Jesus, and that He would save the people from their sins. It is in this passage that Jesus is referred to as the “Immanuel” of Isaiah 7:14 – He is God with us. As prophesied in the Old Testament, Jesus was born of a virgin and came to be the Savior of the world. “God with us” is a beautiful title for Jesus. By grace, the second Person of the Trinity, the God of all creation, humbled Himself and came into this world taking on human flesh. While Matthew directly speaks of this wonderful truth as the fulfillment of what had been revealed to Isaiah 700 years before Christ, the first chapter of John’s Gospel also describes what it means that God is with us.

John 1:1-3 begins by establishing the deity of Christ. He is everlasting having been with God in the beginning. As the Scriptures testify, “…from everlasting to everlasting, You are God” (Ps. 90:2). There is none like God who was even before all of creation. There is only one God (Deut. 6:4), but He exists in three Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Son, who John refers to as the Word, enjoyed perfect fellowship with the Father in the beginning. He was with God, but John clarifies that He Himself was God. Jesus, the pre-existing One, was from the beginning before He ever came to this earth.

John continues by stating that all of creation came to be because it was created by Jesus. This also is a declaration of the deity of Christ. There is only one Creator. “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1:1). God is the Creator and He is distinguished from everything else He has made. There will forever be a Creator / creature distinction. Whether in this life or in the life to come, He is our Creator God and we are His creatures. John writes that Jesus is not one of God’s creatures, even though He became like us. He is Creator God and nothing else exists that hasn’t been made by Him.

Having concretely established Jesus’ deity, John then explains that “the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). He is Immanuel, God with us. Eternal, infinite, almighty God took on human flesh and “tabernacled” (Gr. skenoō, “to have one’s tent”) among us. Just as God met with His people in the days of Moses at the Tabernacle, so Jesus took on human flesh to dwell among us. This was to show us the glory of God. Moses had asked to see God’s glory (Exod. 33:18), but God did not allow it. John writes that no one has ever seen God (John 1:18), but we are able to gaze upon the glory of God in the face of Jesus (cf. 2 Cor. 4:6). Jesus took on human flesh to show us the Father (John 14:8-9) and to explain Him to us (John 1:18).

Another reason Jesus took on flesh and dwelt among us was because we live in darkness, and He came to shine as the light of the world. At creation, God said, “Let there be light. And there was light” (Gen. 1:3). The light was separate from the darkness. So in John 1:4, the light of Christ shines in the darkness of this world, and the darkness does not grasp or overcome it. Without the light of Christ, we would be left in the dark. God is the one who illumines our hearts to see the truth of Christ (John 1:9). His light overcomes the darkness.

This Christmas season, we will be reminded that Immanuel came when Jesus was born to Joseph and Mary on that first noel. Because the language of Isaiah’s prophecy has become so familiar, perhaps it is easy to lose its significance. Jesus was not like us but He became like us. He is the Creator of all that is, almighty God, and yet He condescended and humbled Himself and took on human flesh. He did this to show us the Father that we might know Him, and to shine the light of the truth in our sin-darkened hearts. This is why John writes that all who would believe in Him could become the children of God (John 1:12).

It is truly remarkable that in God’s love He would be willing to provide salvation in this way to those who rebelled against Him in sinful defiance. We who are deserving of His righteous indignation and eternal judgment find grace and forgiveness in His Son. While we celebrate His coming this Christmas season, let us not forget that He was born that He might die. He took on human flesh that He might be our representative on the cross. He is our Immanuel in that He reconciles us to the Father through His death and resurrection. Christmas is not just a celebration of the birth of Jesus. It truly is a celebration that God made salvation possible because He loves us and came to be with us.