The Meaning
of Emmanuel
by Rev. John T. Reeve,
D.D.
"Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us."
— Matt 1:23
AS WE REFLECT upon the Incarnation at
this season, it is well for us to ask, "How did it come to
be?" "What is the meaning of it all?" "What is its
purpose?" The human tendency always is to forget origins. And now
that Christmas has grown to be such a great festival, almost universally
observed and of vast commercial significance, there is still greater
danger of our forgetting the real meaning of it and thereby eventually
losing its sweetness and holy purpose.
But in the name Emmanuel, we
have clearly stated, and yet so simply, the vast and stupendous issues
involved in the birth of the little Child in the manger at Bethlehem.
Surely the birth of another child, the birth of a mere ordinary man,
great though he might prove to be, could never have wrought such a
change in the ordinary routine life of this and many other nations, a
change so great that for weeks, millions of people turn their thoughts
away from self and think of others.
What is there in the birth of
this Child that is able to work such mighty changes in the affairs of
men and after the lapse of two thousand years? What is it that takes the
gray days of winter and turns them, with all their burden of sorrows,
into the happiest days that we ever know? What is it that breaks the
ever cumulative monotony of our treadmill existence and makes us
children again and fills every home with laughter and gaiety? What is it
that causes to break forth from every lordly fane and rustic church and
home and school, and to sound out on frosty air from steeple to steeple,
those age-old hymns and spiritual songs that we never tire to sing?
"We hear within the solemn sound, of her unending song."
This No Ordinary Babe
It must be more than the
birth of another little babe, beautiful as that may be. And indeed it
is! It is the birth of God Himself in human form. It is the stooping of
the Divine and the Almighty to make Himself plain and known to our
finiteness. No wonder such an amazing event, such a world-shaking fact,
changes our order of life and brings new hope where hope seemed dead.
And this great fact is made
known to us by the name Emmanuel, which simply means, "God with
us," that God has come and dwelt among men. Still of all the names
of Jesus, this is perhaps the one we use the least. Emmanuel, God with
us—can it be that the loss of this great name from our vocabulary
means the loss of the chief meaning of Christmas? We trust not.
Just think what there is in a
name! And to the ancient Hebrew, there was far more than there is to us
today. They did not give a name lightly. It stood for the character and
the purpose of a man. But this name was a divine gift. It was imposed
upon the Child at His birth and was intended to convey to men the
meaning of His mission here upon earth. Did later events in His earthly
life, in His never-ending sway over the hearts of men, prove that the
name was ill-advised or attained under false pretensions? They did not.
But rather by His mighty works, His wonderful words, the way He died,
the way He rose again and conquered death, the way He rules the
world-all these prove that "He was to the manner born," that
He rightfully bore the name Emmanuel, "which being interpreted is,
God with us." Let us consider its meaning and contemplate its rich
significance.
The Need for a Deliverer
1. The meaning of Emmanuel is an answer to human
need.
How great was that need!
The world had grown old with its burden of sin. This is no mere
theological dogma. Any open minded reader of secular history knows that
if ever a deliverer from human misery were needed, it was at that very
time when Emmanuel came. The nations that had boasted of the culture of
ancient civilization had become corrupt and were rotten from the top
down. The flower of these races and the chief ethical teachers of the
day were the greatest cynics and did not deny their addiction to the
bestial sins of the age.
This is one of the reasons
why the birth of the Christ Child was said to take place "when the
fullness of time had come." Man had reached the low depths of
depravity and helplessness, where it was patent to all that he was
incapable of entering into fellowship with, of even knowing or of being
able to see or understand such a Being as the pure and holy God, a God
without bodily form who is a Spirit and must be worshiped in spirit and
in truth. This was the reason why Jesus later said, "O righteous
Father, the world hath not known Thee: but I have known Thee, and these
have known that Thou hast sent Me" (John 17:25).
And so Emmanuel means that
God took pity on our inability and came and dwelt among us so that we
might feel and know that He was near us and was one of us. All earnest
men have a longing to see God. Moses expressed this longing and was
granted a partial vision. Philip made the same request when he said to
Jesus, "Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us." But
Jesus answered him and said, "Have I been so long with you, and yet
hast thou not known Me, Philip? He that hath seen Me hath seen the
Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father?" (John 14:8,
9)
The Reverence of the Birth
What a reverence indeed it
casts about the historic account when we realize that the far off and
blessed event marked God's condescension to our need and our weakness.
We had become totally benumbed by the chill atmosphere of a world of sin
and blind to all that was good by the long years of separation. As soon
as Emmanuel came and God was with us, near at hand, a new warmth entered
the world bringing kindness and tenderness and love; and a new light
dawned-"the light that never was on land or sea." What a
wonderful way to help us, when we could not help ourselves, for God to
come down to this sin-stricken and sorrowing world and become one of us.
The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. As the hymn puts it,
"Thou didst leave Thy throne, and Thy kingly crown!" This is
one of the meanings of the Christ Child's name, Emmanuel; it is the
divine answer to human need.
2. Emmanuel also contains the explanation of the divine mystery
whereby this human need was met.
Emmanuel—God with us.
Here we have the linking of God and man in one being, Jesus Christ. How
was this human need, of which we have just been speaking, going to be
met? Ah, that was the great mystery that no one could understand. But
God found a way in the sending of His Son. But how was He to be known
and seen and touched by men? How was He to meet the need that was so
clamant? Only as He had more power than we. Only as He could be bone of
our bone and flesh of our flesh. Only as the being who should come could
be both God and man.
And how could such a being
come except He be born of both God and man? If He was to be the Son of
God, God must be His Father. And so He was. And if the Child was to be
the Son of man, then His mother must be a woman, a virgin. And so she
was. He was conceived of the Holy Ghost and born of the virgin Mary. And
here we have all this expressed in the name Emmanuel. God is at one end
of the word and we, that is humanity, at the other. How else could this
great plan to meet our human need have been brought about? Apparently
there was no other way, and so the Scripture says, "A virgin shall
be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call His name
Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us." How wonderful
it all is. And so it appeared to the apostle Paul when he wrote to
Timothy, "And without controversy great is the mystery of
godliness: God was manifest in the flesh" (1 Tim. 3:16). The
outstanding fact in the whole mystery of God's redemptive plan was that,
first of all, God had appeared here upon earth in the flesh, that is, in
human form.
Not to Be Associated With Mythology
Who would ever have
believed that such a thing could have been possible? Do not let the
grandeur and wonder of this fact and this mystery be lessened by the
false assertions that the coarse and sensual relations of pagan gods
with women upon earth, as related in ancient mythologies, antedated and
foreshadowed the blessed accounts of the virgin birth in Isaiah, Matthew
and Luke. For one thing, these stories are not true. There is no
authentic evidence to credit them; future events did not substantiate
them. And for another thing, if they were hypothetically true, they are
not to be mentioned in the same breath with this pure and holy event as
related in the Word of God. Jesus was the real and only Emmanuel, the
real and only person who ever lived and walked this earth as a man among
men and of whom it could be truthfully said of His presence, "God
is with us."
Is it any wonder then that
Christmas is the most joyful of all occasions, the time when we
recognize this great event that took place, this union of God and man,
this coming of God to our earth to live and walk among us?
3. Emmanuel still further expresses the end that was accomplished.
Emmanuel-God with us. Yes,
but what did God come here to do? Why was Jesus born, and why did He
grow up and live here upon earth? Just to glorify childhood? Just to
create a beautiful sentiment that annually should enthrall a rough and
cruel world? Did He come here just to explore this portion of His
universe or even to set us a good example of how heavenly beings ought
to live? Or did He, as some would say, come to teach us and hence became
the world's greatest Prophet?
His Purpose Was to Die
His own Word tells us why
He came and what the great end of His earthly mission was: "But
when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a
woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that
we might receive the adoption of sons" (Gal. 4:4). In another place
He says, "Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto,
but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many" (Matt.
20:28). In other words, Jesus came into this world to die. That was the
great end of His mission. What would it have profited for a mere
ordinary man to die? Only a being of infinite worth could die and by His
death "destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil;
and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime
subject to bondage" (Heb. 2:14,15). Only a God-man could accomplish
such an end. And this end we know by experience Jesus did accomplish,
hence His name, Emmanuel. It is indeed, God with us; for no one but a
divine Redeemer could have wrought such results as the Christian Gospel
has wrought wherever it has been proclaimed and received. Truly indeed,
God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.
No wonder the angels sang on
that holy night, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace,
good will toward men" (Luke 2:14). The angels knew what a sad and
hopeless world this was. They also foresaw the glorious consequences of
this event when Christ was born and the star stood over the stable in
Bethlehem. No wonder the heavens rang!
And so will our hearts
respond in glad acclaim as we, too, realize the mighty portent of the
Savior's birth. Nothing will so enlarge our vision of this vast plan of
God for the redemption of men and the restitution of this depleted
earth, as the contemplation of this great name, Emmanuel, God with us.
—This article was written in 1936 by Dr. John Reeve, a pastor and
defender of the faith from Utica, New York.
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