Immanuel

"Therefore the LORD himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel."

Isaiah 7:14 is a verse we hear every year during the Advent season, and it is a verse many may overlook because it is so familiar.  The name Imanu'el in Hebrew means "God with us."  That name is a name that can really make you pause.  God is with us.  And not just that- God came to be with us in the tiny baby Mary gave birth to in the stable in Bethlehem.  God could have come through any means and He chose perhaps the most vulnerable form- a baby born poor in a small town.

WAIT.  Take a moment to let that sink in.  We are talking about GOD here- the God who can shake the earth and carve out mountains and stitch together matter to form anything He wants.  He can come to us in any form, through any series of flashy miracles that would strike awe in the hearts of every man instantly.  Instead, He chose to come on what looked like an ordinary night in an ordinary small town to what looked like a pair of ordinary people as a baby who looked like any ordinary baby.  And perhaps the way He chose is the most awe-inspiring way of all.

C.S. Lewis writes in his book Miracles, that the greatest miracle of Christianity is the Incarnation- God becoming man.  David Platt, in his sermon series on the book of Matthew points out that if the Incarnation is true- that Jesus is fully man and fully God, then all other miracles in the Gospel make complete sense.  It is not that Jesus Christ rose from the dead that should astound us, it is that Jesus Christ, God Himself, could die in the first place.  When speaking about Jesus to a group of Muslims, Platt talks about when he proposed to his wife.  He asks the men if he should have sent a friend to ask her to marry Platt rather than ask her himself.  Of course the men agreed that that "in matters of love, it is better to go yourself."  Platt draws the connection to the Incarnation: God sent His Son- God sent God Himself- to become man to save the lost.  In matters of love, in the greatest matter of the greatest love, God knew He alone could go and save us all.  The Incarnation, the birth of Immanuel, God with us- it is the beginning of the center of God's love story.

Isaiah told of God's promise of Immanuel about seven hundred years before the birth of Christ.  God's people waited.  The birth of Jesus, the Christmas story, is a story of a promise fulfilled.  I sometimes imagine what it would be like to be one of those shepherds that night- doing my job like I did every other night- only moments before the greatest miracle of the world was about to take place.  Ordinary nobodies, startled by an angel and the first Christmas carol, learned that the wait was over... God is faithful and has kept the promise He made.  God chose those shepherds- men whom we do not know their name or story- to be among the first to worship and adore God in the flesh.

Magi later followed to bring gifts fit for a king to a baby in a smelly stable.  My mind flashes to the smelly places in Haiti and the dirty babies in rags- I can't imagine the first Christmas looked much different and the thought of richly dressed Magi of great wealth and education traveling to Haiti to see one of those dirty babies with gold, frankincense, and myrrh seems CRAZY.  I think about how the children in the mountain village of Zoranje  looked with curiosity and amazement at the two American dollars we handed them for 11 avocados and think about how shocking the gifts the Magi brought to a poor baby boy and his working class parents must have seemed.

But this is all a part of the miracle- the miracle that defies all logic and turns the world upside down.  And if God humbled Himself in such a way, how much more are we called to humility.  God did not consider himself too great or too powerful or too wise or too holy to come to us yet he is great beyond all measure, all-powerful, wise beyond all understanding, and the Holy One.  So we learn from Immanuel, God with us, that we must go where He goes and love whom he loves and become the humble servant of all.   In Philippians Chapter 2, we are called to have the same mind as Christ in our relationships with one another, Christ, "who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." (verses 6-8)

This is THE Christmas Gift,  THE Christmas miracle. God becoming man out of His great love for us.   
Oh come let us adore Him.

Describe Your Ideal Day...

I attended a young adult bible study for the first time tonight.  The opening question asked us to describe what our ideal/perfect/best day would be like.  So being the daydreamer that I am, I start imagining and creating a picture in my head.  As I am overwhelmed by the crafting of this imaginary day, people around me begin to share their ideas.  Some talked about warm and mild weather, others talked about not having work, and still others talked about spending time with their family.  Although all of those ideas sounded good to me, I couldn't help but be struck by how average they were.  The days they described were typical to every other Saturday in summertime for many people.  Inside I was screaming- WHAT?  This is your best day EVER???  Part of me appreciated the simplicity of it, but still I cried out for the imaginations that were clearly laying in catatonic stupor inside their brains.  The discussion did not mean much, I know, but it revealed something important to me.  We are content and comfortable with the ordinary.  We are lulled into a comfort with what is normal, mediocre, and familiar.  We aspire to nothing more than a slightly above average life.

So what?  So, desiring a simple life is good, right?  In some ways, yes, but as Christians we believe that there is a God who exists who is anything but ordinary.  A God so creative, that the intricacies of His creation are mind-blowing.  He is the God who crafted the universe down to every little microscopic spec and the God who encounters us personally and knows us intimately.  Peel back the cover of "ordinary" life and there is an entire spiritual world behind everything.  We believe in a God of great miracles and of unspeakable glory, and His desire is that we know Him- that we witness His supernatural presence in our lives everyday and that we ask Him for the desires of our hearts.  AND all we want is a hum drum life of a constant 70 degrees Farenheit and a day off of work? WHAT?  We need to desire the extraordinary- we need to desire to see God and see His glory and work for His kingdom.  We need to desire adventure and the risk of living for Him and seeing the great victories of the King of kings.

I cannot even imagine the details of my ideal day because my ideal day would be beyond my imagination because God would totally amaze me with the events that would take place.  I picture that day beginning in Haiti- before sunrise and I wouldn't feel tired in the slightest.  It would still be dark and I would begin it with the lover of my soul- Jesus Christ and the Word of God would be alive in my hand.  God would speak great mysteries and messages to my heart, and I would have little idea that those very promises would be accomplished in that day.  I would cry and laugh with joy at the way in which my God would speak to me, in the way in which He knows me.  The sun would rise over the mountains sending color through every cloud.  And my ideal day would begin.

My day would contain so much laughter that my sides would almost burst by the end.  The kind of laughter that is so full of joy and so uncontrollable- that spreads more easily than an epidemic.
My day would contain all the people I love and they would know in that day how much God loves them- and that love would transform their lives.
During that day, I would witness God's glory in a way I never had before, in a way that we would not be able to contain our shouts and singing and dancing in praise of who He is and what He has done.  His works would bring hope to the poor.  If in that day I must suffer so that God might be more fully revealed, then so be it.  The Holy Spirit would fill us to the brim that we would have no need for food or sleep and would not grow weary of loving and laughing and working for His purpose.
There would be many children, white smiles in dark faces and none of them would be hungry or in pain.
There would be so much dancing and music and a cool breeze from a turquoise blue sea.
The day would end with rolling thunder and an incredible and terrifying lightning storm with lines of lightning etching across the entire black sky.  The clouds would open in a downpour and everyone would dance on the roof and splash in the puddles and marvel at the power and beauty of God in His creation.  And there would be a man- my best friend and the one God had chosen to share in this story God is writing with my life- one who loves me more than his own life who would take hold of me and kiss me in that rain a good long while and laugh and rejoice with me at the wondrous day our God has made.

I can be content with the ordinary, but I hunger for the extraordinary. Why not?  My desire and imagination are gifts from Him after all.  I am made in the image of the Creator who dreams and crafts and plans beyond the wildest imagination.  So, be joyful in all circumstances but thirst for God Himself.  Dream up the greatest day imaginable, and God will show you his dreams are greater and even more marvelous than anything we can think of.


Show us Your glory.

The Body of Christ

Anyone who knows me knows how much I adore my family.  God has truly surrounded me with a loyal and loving family, and they have been such a huge blessing in my life.  God has shown me, especially over this past summer, that my family extends far past my family tree, and He reminded me of this truth this weekend.

In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus is told his mother and brothers are waiting to speak to Him and he replies with a question: "Who is my mother and who are my brothers?" (Matthew 12:48)  He then points to His disciples saying: "For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother." (Matthew 12:50)  This establishes a different kind of family- one perhaps not recognized by the world but clearly recognized by Christ.

This weekend, I had the pleasure of spending time with my Christian brothers and sisters in the Chicago area whom I had met in Haiti and spent a week serving and praying and spending time with.  As I sat at my friend Deedee's kitchen table, I marveled at the fact that I had only known the people around me for a week, but I felt like I was home, and I knew they were my family.  This truth can only lead me to praise Jesus Christ as we are all one in His body and also to worship the Holy Spirit for dwelling within us and bringing us together in unity.  As I realize how much love fills my heart for these people, I know that this is only another small part of God's great love story.

A Thousand Dark Faces

Wednesday night I was afraid to go to sleep.  Afraid that I would wake up and realize it had all been a dream.  A dream of a thousand dark faces with a thousand white smiles.  A dream of small hands slipping into mine- black in white, white in black.  A dream of low, fast drumbeats and melodic voices.  A dream of layers of mountains and turquoise blue water and red flowers sprayed across tree tops.  A dream of blinking in bright sunlight and dancing in downpours.

But I woke up and realized it was not a dream, but that it was more real than anything I have ever known- a place where joy and faith and sorrow and hope exist in raw form, all at once, in tension and communion with one another.  No escape or sedation.  Just pure hunger- for food and for love and for God and for justice.  And I pray that I will never forget.

Last Night of the Best Summer

I have not written anything in awhile because I have been too busy living and loving and praying with the beautiful people of Haiti.  Tonight is my last night in Haiti.  I went to church tonight despite the tropical downpour with hopes of seeing the friends who said they would meet me there.  Some came despite the rain, and Gismene and Kelidha showed up with T-shirts on which they had written in marker "I love Erica for every day."  We couldn't stop laughing and exchanging bits of Kreyol and English and singing songs to the God who brought us together.  This is what life is about- loving, laughing, crying, praising God, and above all, yearning for Jesus to return and make heaven and earth new.  This week, God revealed to me once again how raw and heartbreaking poverty is, and in those moments, I wanted Jesus to come more than I had ever wanted before.  It was a glimpse of what is in the cries and faces of the people praying all around me, and I realized we can never grow close to God if we are content with the world.  When we are not hoping for Christ to transform this earth and end its suffering, then we are not serving in love those people who are suffering.