Immanuel Beckons Us
The Gospel of Matthew: Christ Above All • Sermon • Submitted
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After seeing that even in His genealogy, Christ was willing to associate with lowly sinners, Matthew is now going to give us an account of the events surrounding the birth of Jesus.
If you could choose one place in the world for the King of the universe to be born, and choose every detail surrounding that time, and choose His parents, and choose his economic status, and literally every detail was up to you, what would that look like?
He would be...
Born in a clean hospital with trained professionals.
Born to healthy and loving parents with good reputations, education, and ability to care for the child without worry.
Born in a free community, not a dictatorship, and without the threat of death all around.
Seems reasonable for a King, doesn’t it?
But what we actually find in Matthew’s account of Christ is not a neat and tidy story.
This was not a dream come true for Mary...
v1 Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way...When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.
Betrothal was step two in a three step process toward marriage in that time.
Engagement
Betrothal
The wedding and consummation
Marriages were arranged by parents back then, often while the children were quite young. Then the betrothal came along and made the engagement legally binding, even before the wedding ceremony and consummation. Two people could no just separate from a betrothal. A divorce was required.
That’s how we find Mary and Joseph, betrothed and promised to one another, having grown up in the same village and knowing each other very well.
That’s why Matthew calls Joseph her husband even at this place in time.
Now, with that in mind, consider what we just read in v18.
“Before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit...”
But Joseph, nor anyone else knew that yet. So, leave out the Holy Spirit and how does this sound?
Before they came together she was found to be with child.
That’s a scandal.
What was Joseph to think here?
As far as he’s concerned, Mary has been been unfaithful. What other explanation is there?
The devastation, the feelings of broken trust and betrayal. There is an ache in my heart just thinking about it, because that is not God’s design for relationships.
Joseph is perfectly within the boundaries of the law to divorce Mary based on the information that he has.
Notice his character though, and you just come to love Joseph even more.
v19 says he resolved to divorce her quietly.
Can we just consider what’s going on here for a second?
Here we have a man who has every right in the eyes of the society, and the law, to make a mess out of Mary’s life, even to have her stoned in the streets, and yet he chose to deal with it quietly?
There’s some wisdom for us there, isn’t there?
I love Spurgeon’s comment on this passage.
“When we have to do a severe thing, let us choose the tenderest manner. It may be that we shall not have to do it at all.”
Maybe you have some cause to be upset with someone today…could be your spouse, or a friend, or another church member. That anger may be justified, but what you choose to do next is incredibly important. Will you deal with it quietly (Are you dealing with it quietly?), or are you going to make a mess out of it just because you can and because it gratifies your flesh?
Scripture says that Joseph was a just man. He was a seeker of God, and knew the law of God. He would have been constrained on both sides of the issue. God’s law being perfect would demand justice for the crime of adultery and allow him to divorce her, and yet in the same law we find a God who is compassionate and gracious.
Perhaps Psalm 103:8 even passed through His mind...The Lord is compassionate and gracious, Slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness.
He needed help, and God sent.
v20 he considered these things, he pondered them, and then an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream.
Angels are doing some incredible things here in the beginning of Jesus life. Warning, and assuring.
Here, Joseph is fearful. He’s pondering the situation, surely he loves his wife. We don’t know how much Mary already relayed to him of what Luke tells us she heard from an Angel, but this is so crazy and so miraculous, that it’s just not easy to believe.
And of course none of this is possible according to human ability, but Mary had been told in her fear that what is impossible with man, is possible with God, so do not fear.
So, Joseph hears the Angel say,
“Joseph, Son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.”
This is the most important part of all.
Matthew puts this phrase in here twice for us…From the Holy Spirit.
Without the Holy Spirit of God, this is just a scandal.
Without the Holy Spirit of God, none of this makes any sense.
And without the Holy Spirit, there is no incarnation of the eternal Son of God.
Now, in Luke’s account from Mary’s perspective, she asks how can this be? And the Angel tells her that the Holy Spirit will overshadow her...
In Genesis 1 and the creation story we see the Holy Spirit hovering over the darkness of the waters and creating life. Here, the same Spirit is hovering over the womb of Mary, and bringing forth the single most incredible miracle in the history of the universe…, not just the miracle of conception, but a virgin conception.
God put on human flesh.
In the explanation that the Angel gives to Joseph, he is comforted to know that another man did not impregnate his wife, but he’s also given the profound reality that what was currently present in the womb of Mary was from the invisible Spirit of God.
There is so much wonder here…let’s not miss it.
v22, “All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoke by the prophet. “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel (which means God with us). When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus.
Joseph was told by the angel to call his name Jesus, but the prophet said that His name shall be called Immanuel.
This is not a contradiction, but rather a fulfillment of both who Jesus is, and what he would do.
The prophesy of Isaiah 7 had a double fulfillment. One was in the child that is mentioned in Isaiah 8, but the ultimate fulfillment would be in the Messiah, whom Isaiah continues to prophecy about in Chapter 9 (the prince of peace), and other places (Isaiah 53).
Well Matthew is being careful to make this connection for us.
Mary is that virgin
Jesus is that son
He is Immanuel
Oh Immanuel
The meaning is given to us in the text - God with us
His Hebrew name is Yeshua. In the English it’s Joshua. The koina Greek’s translation of that word into the English is the word Jesus and It means, Yahweh is salvation.
That’s the name he was to be called by His parents, because he would save His people from their sins.
He is to be the Savior of His people, but how would he do it?
Immanuel - God with us.
The God of Heaven came down.
Remember the question at the beginning that was posed?
This is what God chose for His Son - poor parents, a poor community, and a scandal story.
But the Holy Spirit was in the midst of it all, and it was all taking place in perfect fulfillment of prophecy.
Notice the incredible intentionality in that statement.
Name him Jesus, for he will save His people from their sins!
This is not some wishful thought on God’s part, that maybe He would come to earth, and maybe some would be saved, and just maybe he would transform the world with the message of Christ’s Kingdom...
No, this was God’s foreordained plan to send Immanuel, Jesus, to save His people from their sins.
Would God be so precise in everything else, and then when it comes to the saving of sinners just leave it up to the will of man?
Absolutely not!
And Notice what the great need is...
Not salvation from poverty, or tyranny, or war, but from our own sins.
The greatest problem in a person’s life before coming into a relationship with Jesus is the sin that separates them from God.
And even today, having been set free from slavery to sin, so many of the problems that we face in our daily walk is because of the old sin nature, the flesh that remains in us - the old nature that rears its head and must be crucified by faith time and time again - reckoning ourselves dead with Christ, and alive unto God, new creatures in Christ Jesus.
I’m so thankful for Immanuel.
How does Immanuel beckon us this morning?
Immanuel beckons us to look to the Godman.
God in human flesh. Fully God, and yet fully man, so that being holy and separate, we might understand him.
In the name, Immanuel, given to Jesus, we see that Jesus is God…not an Angel in human form as some believe, and not just a prophet, as some believe… none of those are impressive, but God and Creator.
Colossians 2:9 For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form.
It’s a mystery, no doubt, but true nonetheless. All the glory, and majesty, and splendor of Heaven veiled in a human body. Not a demigod, half and half, but fully God.
Jesus Christ is God - Creator, sustainer, Judge, King, Hater of sin, compassionate to the downtrodden, Sovereign and Supreme...
And as God, we cannot be with him in these earthly and sin stained bodies.
But Immanuel changed all of that - And so we look at this next word…With.
God - With.
And so we see that...
2. Immanuel beckons us to believe that God is near to us.
God promised through the prophets that the Messiah would restore sinful man back to a holy God, by God himself coming in the likeness of sinful flesh, and becoming sin for us.
Now, this is not the way life often feels. God doesn’t always FEEL near, does He? Compound this with our fallen world, and sickness, and sadness, and all the brokenness.
But these are not proofs that God is not near.
These serve as proof that there is a serious problem with being far from God, because Scripture teaches that this is where it all went wrong. Mankind rebelled against God, and the final piece of that consequence was that Adam and Eve were cast out of the garden, away from the immediate presence of God, and banished until the time when that relationship would be properly restored again.
Think about how Joseph “felt” about the situation of his time. And where did the Angel point him to resolve the dilemma in his heart?
To the Word of God...
Joseph, this child, He not the result of a scandal. He is the promise of God, the son who would be given to the world, the offspring of Abraham and heir to the throne of David - He will save his people by coming to dwell with His people. He will be near to them. He will do it.
He is most definitely near to many of us this morning, but without a doubt he is far from many too.
And this is because there is no nearness to God apart from a relationship with Jesus Christ, and through faith in His sacrifice.
One can wish to be near to God, or God to him, but until one believes that Jesus Christ is Immanuel (GOD WITH US), there is only separation, and a deep inner turmoil.
We must believe God is near, but only in and through the person and work of Jesus Christ.
3. Immanuel beckons us to believe in our eternal union with God.
It is incredible to me that Matthew begins with this important name ascribed to Jesus - telling us what to expect of the mission and purpose of Jesus, and then all the way at the other end, in Matthew 28, we find these words.
Matthew 28:19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Brothers and sisters, in as much as Jesus Christ, Immanuel, was our way to a restored relationship with the Father, so too is Jesus Christ to be the central theme, the reason, the courage, and the authority for our mission today to evangelize the world and bring the Kingdom to all who will hear.
And there is no others who are called to this mission but those who are united to God through Jesus, and are forever with Him.
God is with US, New City.
It might help to say it with a question mark, as a reminder of the fact that it is only by grace that it is so.
God with US?
Yes, because Jesus Christ is the God-man, and in his human flesh He chose to feel the pains and temptations of humanity, to be our Mediator, so that we might come to him having no doubt that he understands the struggle of each soul in this room, and that His desire was to deal with sin and be with us!
It did not happen without cost, New City. Remember the cost. Jesus Christ, in order to save His people from their sins, also became the very thing that God hates most…becoming the sin and guilt of mankind, and was punished in our place as a human, so that as God, he might enter into heaven and bring with Him all who believe in His name.
“And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” Acts 4:12
You will call him Jesus, and Jesus is Immanuel - Because God is with Christ. And if God is in Christ, and Christ died and rose from the dead for us, then God is surely with us.
And I’ll close with Calvin’s words -
“Whenever we contemplate the one person of Christ as God-man, we ought to hold it for certain that, if we are united to Christ by faith, we possess God.” John Calvin