Ethan Seifried - December 18, 2022
Immanuel
Matthew 1:22-23 It’s hard to hold out hope when it feels like God’s not there. Sometimes it feels like it got too hard for him and he's just vanished, or that our sin has finally made him abandon us. Our prayers seem to go unanswered, like he’s not hearing us. And our hopes and expectations pass by unmet. It’s hard to hold out hope when it feels like God’s not there. The good news this season is that Jesus’ advent is God’s guarantee that he will always be with us. Jesus was fully God and fully man so he could be fully present with us. And it is at Jesus’ advent that all of history is forever changed. The incarnation is a turning point in the grand history of God’s redemption of humanity and the world. It’s the climax of the story that God’s been telling since the beginning of time.