Emmanuel: “God is with Us”
Isaiah 7:10-14; Romans 1:1-7; Matthew 1:18-24
We hear it said at every liturgical celebration, especially at Mass, “The Lord be with you”. This wish/subjunctive and realistic statement precedes every sacerdotal/priestly blessing. The presence of God is the source of every benediction. This Sunday, “Emmanuel Sunday,” when we remind ourselves of the presence of God among us – “God is with us” – it is difficult not to remember Gideon. The first biblical recording of “the Lord is with you” goes back to an angel’s visit to Gideon (Judges 6:12). I am very sure that Gideon’s response to the angel is the response of many of us today: “the angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon and said to him, ‘The Lord is with you, O mighty man of valor.’ And Gideon said to him, ‘Please, my Lord, if the Lord is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are all his wonderful deeds that our fathers recounted to us, saying, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt?’ But now the Lord has forsaken us and given us into the hand of Midian” (Judges 6:12-13).
Your “Midian” could be your economic and financial blockades, your health and family issues, the wars and hatred raging around you, your marriage that is threatened, and the list is endless. You and I wonder what it means, “the Lord is with you,” that our God is Emmanuel – “God is with us,” yet we live with many problems. The good news is that Gideon was made to understand that “the Lord is with you” is empowerment from God to help us change our situation for the better; it is a reminder to us about the power of the faith God has put in each one of us for the transformation of the world. The power we possess from God, Emmanuel, remains dormant as long as we allow cowardice, fear and laziness to invade us. This is the point that the angel made known to Gideon – that complaining without action is useless and fruitless: “And the Lord turned to Gideon and said, ‘Go in this might of yours and save Israel from the hand of Midian; do not I send you?’ And Gideon said to him, ‘Please, Lord, how can I save Israel? Behold, my clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father’s house.’ And the Lord said to him, “But I will be with you, and you shall strike the Midianites as one man” (Judges 6:14-16).
Although “God is among us” and “the Lord is with you,” the absence of an active faith makes us to question the presence of the Lord and give reasons, like Gideon, why nothing good is happening to us – we only see problems NOT solutions! Emmanuel, “God is with us,” is seeing with and acting from the eyes of faith; it is not passivity, but activism; not political activism, based on human philosophies and idiosyncrasies, but the moral power and faith-based example one can muster. The pseudo and false humility of Ahaz, in our first reading, only reveals lack of faith and fear. On the contrary, Joseph’s display of faith and courage, in the gospel reading, is what it means to have realized that “God is with us”. Perhaps, Augustine is right when he says, “the God who created you without you [your help], will not save you without you [your help]” St. Augustine, Sermo 169, 13 (PL 38, 923).
Joseph, a man who had planned his life, made a choice of his spouse and paid her bride-price, on account of which Mary was betrothed to him, came up against an apparently insurmountable problem – the change and overthrow of his plans – without his opinion sought in the process. On the one hand, it was Emmanuel – “God with us” – the Son of God, that was conceived by Mary leading to the disruption of Joseph’s plans; on the other hand, Joseph had to fall back on his faith and trust in God to weather the information, after the fact, that his plans had been changed! This is faith, this is seeing with and acting from faith: “When Joseph awoke, he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took his wife into his home” (Matthew 1:24).
You know what, Joseph already proved himself, the fact that God was with him, because it is said of him, in our gospel reading: “Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous man, yet unwilling to expose her to shame, decided to divorce her quietly” (Matthew 1:19). “Righteousness” is already a sign of God’s presence, the fact that one’s life does not follow the whims and caprices of human emotion, but the promptings of the Holy Spirit. What the intellectuals of today will call the “stupidity” of Joseph – accepting to trust one’s dreams or refusing a scientific analysis of an invisible communication – continues to confound many Christians. For example, how rational and logical is the Christian belief in “turning the other check” or “repaying evil with kindness” or standing up for Christian teachings? Yet, we see that happening daily, even if it is among the minority of Christians!
St. Paul, in our second reading, understands very well the challenge of “God is with us” – Emmanuel – so he argues that Jesus had to undergo the same process of seeing and acting from the standpoint of faith, like Joseph his foster-father: “the gospel about his Son, descended from David according to the flesh, but established as Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness through resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 1:3-4). In fact, the proof that God was with Jesus, his Son, was the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is what Jesus did, even though illogical to most people, that proves the presence of God and the power of God in and with Jesus. The epistle to the Hebrews makes that a model for Christians: “fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. For the joy lying in the future, he endured the cross, despising its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2).
It is true that Jesus, according to the meaning of his name – savior – came to save, but Joseph was his forerunner by saving Mary from being stoned to death, had he denounced her as an adulteress, who conceived from another man. Do we pay attention to who is saved through our righteous acts, no matter how simple and negligible those acts maybe? Can we turn the storyline of our difficulties, incomprehensions and problems to good news of salvation? Is it possible to suspend judgment and condemnation up until we get green-light from God or be civil and humane like Joseph – seeking to spare life, instead of killing it? Indeed, wherever there is life, there is God trying to save it. God invites us to save every life, and never to take or kill any life – human life, that is!
Assignment for the Week :
Offer a life saving gift/advice to someone this Christmas week