GOD WITH US

Matthew 1:1-25

Key Verse1:23 

"The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"--which means, "God with us." 

One brother I know told me a story about his mother. When he was about 5 years old his parents divorced. He was too young to know what was going on. On the very day when his mother left his house on a permanent basis she said to him, ‘Honey, I will be back.” She left as if she went to the market. But she never came back. Her promise was never kept. The brother could never forget that day. How could he? Years later in college he studied the Bible and he met Jesus who is “God with us”. Then he forgave his mother and he visited her. He even taught the Bible to her. Until that time she had lived a terrible life all by herself. So his mother was very happy to see her son. I could almost imagine her happy face. Here is her own son whom she abandoned and to whom she could not keep her promise. He came back, forgave her, loved her, and even taught the bible to her. Then about one year later she died and went to heaven. Life was hard for her. But God had mercy on her that she was comforted in her last year. She had not believed in God. But she believed in God through her son. She did not need other’s testimony that God is living and merciful. The coming of his own son who forgave all of her weaknesses was more powerful testimony than anything else to prove that God loves her. 

We are all like her because we suffer from all kinds of weaknesses and flaws and we break our promises. So we have many broken relationships. There are many divorces and there are people whom we do not love or we do not want to be with. It is all because of their sins and our sins. In our relationship with God we are even worse. Many times we do not keep even our vows which are our solemn oaths to him and we keep breaking our relationship with him. 

So here we have two huge topics. The first question is: How can we restore our relationship with God and love him despite our multitude of sins? The second question is: How can we restore our relationship with our neighbors and love them despite all their weaknesses and all of our sins? God answers for those questions in today’s passage. Today’s passage shows that Jesus is our Immanuel, “God with us”. And he is the answer for our problems. Let us how he can be the answer for our problems and what it means by “God with us”.

Jesus is the son of David and the son of Abraham. (v.1:1-17)

Matthew starts his gospel with the genealogy of Jesus Christ. Verse 1 reads, “A record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ the son of David, the son of Abraham:” (Matthew 1:1)  By tracing Jesus’ genealogy Matthew proved that Jesus Christ is a descendant of both David and Abraham. My last name is Kwon. I know I am the 34^th generation of the Kwon family which originated from the city of An-dong in South Korea. I saw a book of my family tree and I can trace all the way back to my first ancestor who began to use the last name “Kwon”. According to Matthew the first Jew was Abraham, and all the Jews can trace themselves back to Abraham through their genealogy. Jesus was the son of Abraham. 

Jesus’ genealogy is the genealogy of promises. We can see this clearly in the life of Abraham. He came from the land of Ur of the Chaldeans. While he was there God called him by giving him several promises. 

Genesis 12:1-3: “The Lord had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you. [2] "I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. [3] I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse, and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you."

Among God’s promises to Abraham one promise stands out. It is “All peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” Think about it! What a wonderful promise it is! Imagine that you have been given such a promise. Imagine that all peoples on earth will be blessed through you and give thanks to you! How would you feel? You would feel fantastic. It is no wonder that Abraham was so hooked up with God and he left everything to follow him. 

God’s promises for Abraham shows the reason why God called him. The Lord called him in order to bless him! But even more importantly he wanted to bless all peoples on earth through him. God wanted to start a new human history of blessing through Abraham. Until Abraham all peoples on earth were cursed due to their sin. Except a few men of faith they all suffer from a broken relationship with God and a broken relationship with one another. The Lord wants to bless all men to restore their broken relationship despite their weaknesses.

Many people think that to be blessed means to be materially blessed in this life. But the true blessing given to Abraham was to restore all men’s relationship with God through faith. The blessing God wants us to have, first of all, is the restoration of our relationship with him through faith.

Galatians 3:8-9

    “The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: "All nations will be blessed through you." [9] So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. 

God wants to bless all men through Abraham and it is through faith in Jesus. Nothing in the world will restore our broken relationship with God except faith in Jesus. We may boast of what we have or what we do before men. But it cannot improve anything in our relationship with God. Only faith in Jesus justifies us before God. Faith in Jesus is the answer for our question, “How can we restore our broken relationship with God and love him despite our multitude of sins?” God knows that men cannot come to him on their own and repair their relationship with him. So God opened the way to justify them through faith. 

Now Jesus is also the son of David. What is special about David? Look at verse 6.

Matthew 1:6 

“and Jesse the father of King David. David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah's wife”

The verse teaches us two things about David.

First, David had God’s promise about the true King. In Jesus’ genealogy there are many kings of Judah such as Solomon, Jehoshaphat, Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, Manasseh, Amon, Josiah and so forth. But none of them has the title “king” in front of their names except David. 

 

Why did the author put the title “King” before David’s name alone and none of the other kings? What is difference between all the numerous kings who ever existed on earth and king David? The difference is that King David received God’s promise of the eternal king as his descendant. And he is Jesus. 

Second, David experienced God’s forgiveness of his sin with Uriah’s wife. God called David as a man after his own heart. David had such a compassionate and loving and gentle heart. But he called Uriah’s wife, Bathsheba, and committed adultery with her. In order to hide his sin he committed a worse crime murdering his faithful and loyal general Uriah. How could a man of such gentle and humble heart do such a horrible thing? After he sinned he groaned within him, even his bones dried up within him. When he thought about his sin he almost wanted to give up his life. But he knew that even the death of him would not undo his crime. So he came to God. Then he could remember God’s love for him who was a young nobody shepherd, the least in his family and how God had shown him such love and mercy and grace. He could then accept God’s sin forgiving love. David was a great man because he believed what he could not believe, God’s sin forgiving love. According to David true blessing is the blessing of being forgiven by God. He said in Psalm 32:1-5.

Psalm 32:1-5 

“Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. [2] Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord does not count against him and in whose spirit is no deceit. [3] When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. [4] For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer. [5] Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, "I will confess my transgressions to the Lord"-- and you forgave the guilt of my sin.” 

“Forgiveness” is another expression of God’s solution for our broken relationships. God forgives. He not only justifies men through faith in Jesus but also forgives. If God does not offer his forgiveness we would never be able to repair our relationship with him. 

Jesus came as the fulfillment of God’s promises given to Abraham and David. All the peoples in Jesus’ genealogy show one defect after another. They were not faithful to God’s promises. But God kept His promise by faithfully placing Jesus in the genealogy of Abraham and David. The genealogy of Jesus demonstrates God’s faithfulness to his promises. 

Jesus is God with us (v.18-25)

The story of Jesus’ birth reveals his divine nature as our Savior and God with us.

Matthew 1:18-21 

    This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. [19] Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. 

    [20] But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. [21] She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." 

God sent Jesus to save his people from their sins. Why? It is because sin breaks relationship with God and with men. By sinning man keeps breaking his relationship with God and his neighbors. But his agony is that he cannot free himself from his sin. 

There was a man. One day he heard what his friend told him when they talked about addiction. His friend said “According to research people who are addicted to something like drug or pornography or food believe that they can stop it any time.” When he heard it he felt like he was hit by lightening from the sky because that was exactly he was thinking about his hidden addiction. The deception is “You can stop it anytime. So please enjoy it once. What’s wrong with it?” The deception delays man’s decision to stop it until he develops his bad habit to the full addiction. Do you know what is behind the idea that “You can stop it any time?” “Pride”. Satan hides itself behind man’s pride. So people keep sinning, small sin or big sin, believing that they can stop it anytime. When the man tried to stop his addiction after he heard what his friend said he could not do it. He realized that he had been deceived. He was already addicted. He was not a free man but a slave. 

John 8:34 

    Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. 

Now how can we be free from our sins? Since we are slaves to sin we cannot free ourselves. In order to be free from our slave master we need to pay the price for ourselves. But we cannot make money for ourselves because we are bound to our master 24/7. We do not have free time to work for ourselves. So there is only one way for us to set us free. Somebody other than us should come and pay the price for us. Then we can be set free. And the somebody who did for us is Jesus. When Jesus was crucified on the cross he said, “It is finished.” The exact same Greek word was used in taxation document in those days and its meaning is “Paid in full.” Jesus saved his people by paying the full price of their sin. Therefore we do not need to follow the demand of our sinful desires anymore. 

By sending Jesus God provided the way for us to restore our broken relationship with him and our neighbors. By sending Jesus God answers for our question “How can we love God and our neighbor despite our sins?” It is by believing that God who sent Jesus. It is by believing that Jesus paid the full price for our sins. Through God’s revelation the man who had been deceived by Satan learned that Jesus paid the full price of his sin. Then whenever his sinful desires arises in heart and demands him to obey its desires, he shouted to it “Paid in full!” and refused to follow his sinful desires. In this way he was saved from his sins. Indeed Jesus came to save his people from their sins.

Now look at verse 22-23. [22] All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: [23] "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"--which means, "God with us." 

The story of Jesus’ birth took place to fulfill the prophecy. The prophecy of virgin birth and incarnation of God is an incredible story. But if you look at the bible it is full of incredible stories. Jesus’ birth fulfilled the prophecy and therefore Jesus is “God with us.” What does it mean that Jesus is our Immanuel “God with us”? It may mean three things.

First, “God with us” means “Unity”.

Throughout Israel’s history in the old testament period God had been with his people because the temple was his dwelling place. But there was a curtain between God and his people. Although God was among them no one was allowed to enter the most holy place where God dwelt. Only one time a year could the high priest enter the most holy place; and he could do so only after the blood of an innocent and flawless animal had been shed. Although God was with his people there was a barrier which they could not remove. Even a high priest could die if he made a mistake in the presence of God; but when Jesus came, the barrier between him and his people was removed. God and man could be reunited, just as in the Garden of Eden. God made his dwelling among us based on his grace; on His desire to be our God and we to be His people. He desires that we would be reunited with Him for eternity. He is with His chosen people and would be for eternity. This was His promise. He said in Mt 28:20b which is the last sentence of Matthew’s gospel.

Matthew 28:20b

And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." 

If you have someone special that person probably wants to be with you to the end. But no one can guarantee ‘to be with us’ to the end. There is only one person who can say, “I will be with you always”. And he is Jesus.  

“To be with someone” requires more than being with him or her physically. Two weeks ago I was driving with my wife Maria and my daughter Martha.  We were going to go to Gardena to buy something for Martha’s field trip the next day. I was at the cross streets of Paramount and Florence. I was going to take Florence and then take the 605 south and then the 105. But Maria wanted to take Paramount and take the 105. She did not want to take the 605 because it involves extra driving. But I wanted to take it because I believed it would save time. So it became an issue between time and distance. When I turned onto Florence she was not happy. Usually I argue with her and say, ‘When you drive you go your way and when I drive I go my way.’ I say to myself, ‘Why should I drive according to what she thinks is right. Don’t I have such little freedom that I can choose which roads to take when I drive?’ But that day I changed my mind and made a U turn and drove as she wanted. The result? There was peace and there was unity inside of my car. “I was with her.” And we were all happy. My wife Maria was happy because I considered her desires. My daughter was happy because she didn’t see her parents disagree or be unhappy with one another. And I was most happy because my family and I could have unity.

“God with us” means unity and the unity comes from “listening”. God answers our prayers and in this way he demonstrates that he hears us and that he listens when we talk.  By answering our prayers he declares that he is with us. “God with us” means “Unity.” 

Second, “God with us” means ‘God bears our weaknesses with pain’

There was one old man and his old wife. During his life with his wife, he argued and complained to her because of many small matters. When his wife finally decided to divorce him he realized his foolishness and he repented his sin of complaining. He realized that his wife was not the source of his problems, but in reality was God’s great blessing to him. She bore him and encouraged and supported him fully. He learned that the great love she had for him was the reason why she stayed with him, even though she had to bear with his many weaknesses and flaws; even though she was pained to do so. When he thought about his wife, he could understand better why Jesus wanted to be with us, even though we are terrible sinners. It is because of God’s unfathomable love for His creation. “God with us” is the concrete love He has for us. 

Romans 8:37-39 

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. [38] For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, [39] neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. 

 

“Jesus loves you!” I say it again, “Jesus loves you!” We are all children of God. So I love the song of “Jesus loves me!”. It teaches me one of the most profound truth of God. “Jesus loves me! This I know, For the Bible tells me so” 

“God with us” means “bearing our weaknesses with pain”. and it describes the love of Christ for us.

Third, “God with us” means “eternal security”

When I prayed to know the meaning of “God with us” God reminded me of one evidence that proves that he is with me. He is not only with me but also working for me while I am sleeping. Some times in the past before I went to bed I would memorize the key verse for the next morning’s daily bread. Missionary Isaac Kim suggested that we should do so, and I did. When I did God did an amazing work. When I memorized the key verse and woke up the next morning already God’s word spoke to me personally without having to meditate on it for a long time in the morning. I was able to write daily bread testimony right away as soon as I woke up based on the key verse. I mean “just key verse”. Basically God’s word was already cooked for me. It was like spiritual morning dew falling from heaven during the night.  

So whenever I experienced it I was always amazed and wondered how this thing happened. What is going on during the night while I am sleeping? Who is preparing spiritual donuts and coffee for me? I still do not know but certainly it is not I who does it but God. 

Psalm 121:1-8 reveals that God does not sleep but watches over his people.

Psalm 121:1-8 

“I lift up my eyes to the hills-- where does my help come from? [2] My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. [3] He will not let your foot slip-- he who watches over you will not slumber; [4] indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. [5] The Lord watches over you-- the Lord is your shade at your right hand; [6] the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. [7] The Lord will keep you from all harm-- he will watch over your life; [8] the Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.”

What an incredible security we have in God! Indeed “God with us” means “eternal security and safety” for us.

So “God with us” means “Jesus’ eternal Union with us”, “His Bearing our weaknesses through pain” and “His becoming our Eternal security for us.”

Now look at verses 24-25

Matthew 1:24-25

 “[24] When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. [25] But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.”  

In conclusion, Jesus is the son of David and the son of Abraham. God sent Jesus as the solution for our broken relationship with him and with our neighbors. He saves us from our sins. He is our Immanuel, “God with us”. 

One word: Jesus is God with us 

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