a daily reflection
December 26, 2007
Jesus: God With You
by Shana Schutte
Like millions of other Americans, I attended a candlelight Christmas Eve church service this week. While there, my family and I sang many traditional Christmas songs such as Silent Night, Away in a Manger and Hark! The Herald Angels Sing. And like many other people in churches everywhere, we heard a sermon about Jesus being "Emmanuel"--or God with us.
From the time I've been tall enough to reach my mother's knees, I've heard the word "Emmanuel" at Christmas time, but this year it hit me in a new way and I wondered, Is there a place in my life that Jesus has not become my Emmanuel? A place where I haven't been confident of His presence? Immediately, the Holy Spirit put His finger on a season of my life where I've doubted He was with me.
It's common to be completely convinced of God's care and presence in one area, such as in our professional careers, but doubt that He's with us in our personal lives. We can know beyond a shadow of a doubt that He's present in our finances, but doubt that He's interested in our friendships. We can experience a kind of "schizophrenic faith"--believing on one hand but being unbelieving on the other.
To doubt His love and presence in one area and champion it in another is to live life with a divided heart.
Is there a place in your life, that you're not convinced that God is with you--a place where you doubt that He is your Emmanuel?
If He is Lord, He is the Lord every day of our lives, during every moment, circumstance and season. God is always your Emmanuel--and mine. Because of this, we can rest in His constant, steadfast love.
"And he called the place Massah and Meribah because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the Lord saying, "Is the Lord among us or not?" (Exodus 7:17).
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"The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon me because
he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted."
---JesusCopyright, Shana Schutte, Run to God Ministries, Colorado Springs, CO
