O Come, O Come, Emmanuel
Scripture Text: Isaiah 7:1-17; Matthew 1:18-25
Quotes for Reflection
Walter Brueggemann, Isaiah
The meaning of faith in the work of Isaiah and, indeed, in the entire Old Testament. Faith (“stand firm in faith”) is not a matter of intellectual content or cognitive belief. It is rather a matter of quite practical reliance upon the assurance of God in a context of risk where one’s own resources are not adequate. It means to entrust one’s security and future to the attentiveness of Yahweh—to count God’s attentiveness as adequate and sure, thereby making panic, anxiety, or foolishness unnecessary and inappropriate. It is to know one’s self safe in risk because of an Attending Other whose resources are mobilized and whose commitments are unfailing. It is to place one’s self into the reliable care of another.
N.T. Wright, Matthew for Everyone
The name ‘Jesus’ was a popular boys’ name at the time, being in Hebrew the same as ‘Joshua’, who brought the Israelites into the promised land after the death of Moses. Matthew sees Jesus as the one who will now complete what the law of Moses pointed to but could not of itself produce. He will rescue his people, not from slavery in Egypt, but from the slavery of sin, the ‘exile’ they have suffered not just in Babylon but in their own hearts and lives. By contrast, the name ‘Emmanuel’, mentioned in Isaiah 7.14 and 8.8, was not given to anyone else, perhaps because it would say more about a child than anyone would normally dare. It means ‘God with us’. Matthew’s whole gospel is framed by this theme: at the very end, Jesus promises that he will be ‘with’ his people to the close of the age (28.20). The two names together express the meaning of the story.
Otto Kaiser, Isaiah
The only way we can have God is by relying on him and using him. For the only way it is possible to accord God’s deity to him is by using him and risking one’s life upon God’s word by trusting his promises and obeying the revelation of his will.
Application Questions
1. What threat is causing you to fear right now? For you personally, how does fear carry you away into exile?
2. How have you seen faith and action work together in your own faith journey?
3. How does the gospel deepen your trust in God as the Attending One?