I love Christmas music. I was listening recently to Michael Card’s Christmas cd entitled, The Promise. It is very good. The last song is entitled Immanuel. I have always loved the concept of Immanuel. The word means, “God with us.” There is something completely unique about Christianity among all of the other of the world’s religions.

Every other religion tells us how we can get to God. Tribal religions say that to get to God you must offer sacrifices to appease the god of the sun or the rain or the earth. In Islam, you get to God by doing good, by keeping all of the commandments of the Koran, by praying five times each day as you bow toward Mecca. In Hinduism, you get to God by being good and then by being reincarnated until you reach a state of Karma. In other eastern religions, you must work hard to follow the teachings of a particular master like Buddha or Confucius or even the teachings of your own ancestors.

Christianity, however, is the only religion that tells us of how God came to us. In other religions, the burden is on us to find God, to reach out to him, even to work for him, to try to please him. In Christianity, however, the burden is on God. We don’t reach out to him; he reaches out to us. We don’t search for him; he searches for us. We don’t come to him; he comes to us, and He did so at Christmas as a baby in a manger. This is because Christianity is all about God revealing himself to us in order to save us. Every other world religion is about mankind’s attempt to reach to God, to please God, to prove his worth to God. But Christianity is about God’s efforts to reach us. The gods of other world religions keep their distance, shout commands from their heavenly throne—untouchable, unmoved by our situation.

But not our God. Our God is Immanuel. He is God with us. He is God in us. He is God come near to us. He is God for us. He is God on our side. He has come to be with us. You see, God could not be content to remain distant. He didn’t want to watch us from afar, like the other so-called gods. So He sent Jesus to be with us and to be in us. He sent Jesus to be Immanuel.

You see, you can’t reach God. There’s just no way. It’s not about intellect. You can’t read enough, study enough, know enough, or learn enough. It’s not about effort. You can’t work harder, try harder, get better, or do better. It’s not about religion. You can’t say enough prayers, light enough candles, go to enough studies, or attend enough services. You can’t heap on enough good stuff to take away the guilt of the bad stuff. How many of you have ever needed a shower but didn’t have enough time, so you just put on some extra perfume or cologne? Christianity doesn’t work that way. We can’t cover up the stench of our sin with our efforts at self-produced righteousness. The gospel of God’s grace is all about what God has done to reach us.

Michael Card’s song Immanuel says this. “Immanuel/Our God is with us/And if God is with us/Who could stand against us.” He goes on. “So what will be your answer?/Oh will you hear his call?/Of Him who did not spare his son/But gave him for us all/On earth there is no power/There is no depth or height/That could ever separate us from the love/Of God in Christ.” When I heard those words, I stopped everything. I had the cd playing in the background while I was working, but I couldn’t continue what I was doing. He made a connection I had never thought of before. Immanuel means the love of God, as seen and felt and experienced in Jesus. I had never connected the great promises of Romans 8:31-39 with the advent of Jesus.

But it is true. “He who did not spare his own son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things (v. 32)?” Did you catch that? Paul says that God will graciously give us “all things,” and he will do so because Jesus came—Immanuel. God gave up Jesus for us, certainly at Easter, but also at Christmas, and he did so so that he could give us “all things.” Because of Immanuel, we have everything that we really need. We can look at the manger, and at the cross and at the empty tomb, and see the confirmation of the greatest of all of God’s promises to us—Immanuel, the very presence and power of God. All of the power of God is aimed at us in order to do the very best for us. All of the presence of God is with us at all times—fear and failure, tragedy and triumph, sin and success—to bring comfort and care and compassion. When God sent Jesus, he held nothing back. He sent Himself.

As Michael Card reminds us, Immanuel means that God is with us, and if God is with us, then God is for us. And if God is for us, then nothing can be against us—nothing. There is power in that manger. Because Jesus came at Christmas, as Immanuel, nothing will ever be able to separate us from the love of God—nothing. There is presence, the very presence of God, in that manger. Immanuel means the power and presence of God in every situation and circumstance of life. And if God would send his son for us, then he will certainly give us everything else that we need.