Rector's Blog: God is With Us
This Sunday at church, we’ll hear St. Matthew quote Isaiah when talking about Jesus. “Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” Matthew writes, and then, just to make sure we’re all on the same page, he translates Emmanuel saying, “which means, “God is with us."
God is with us.
If we never learned anything else about Jesus, if we never learned anything else about Christmas, if we never learned anything else about God – “God is with us” would be sustenance enough.
God is with us. This means that God is present. It also means that God is with us rather than against us. And in Jesus Christ it means that God is willing to be one with us, to be in solidarity and communion with us as we are right this moment.
What’s more, God’s presence means that you matter to God; that you matter at all. Think about this for a moment. What does it mean when someone shows up for you? When they are present for you and with you? It means you matter to them. And what does it mean when you show up for someone? It means they matter to you. It means their life and fate are significant to you.
I recently saw A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood – the film where Tom Hanks plays Mr. Rogers. I won’t digress into a movie review here. But one of things I was reminded of was Mr. Rogers’ transformative ability to make everyone feel like they mattered. The movie reminded me that he did this by being utterly present with the person right in front of him. He insisted on being present, and people of every age understood what this meant. They translated it as, “I matter to him."
I think about who will be around the table for my Christmas dinner, and what their presence on that day means to me. And I think about the ones I wish could be there, and what that yearning means to me. Presence matters.
Presence is a sign that you matter. Presence is a sign that someone matters to you.
Being with people means they matter to you.
Them showing up or inviting you means you matter to them.
I think we forget this sometimes. I know our relationships are often not what we’d like them to be. God knows it. I know that showing up can be painful or tense. I know sometimes after showing up, we need to take a breath or a few minutes, or even a few days to recover. I believe we are God’s gift to each other. We are not easy gifts. The work of learning how to love each other just isn’t simple arithmetic, and it doesn’t come with a manual (no – the bible is NOT a manual). But our presence in each other’s lives is a powerful symbol that we matter to each other.
Jesus is God’s relationship with us. Jesus is God’s presence. In Jesus Christ, God shows up, and we find out how utterly we matter to the God of all creation.
We hear again and again throughout Advent John the Baptist’s words, “Repent, for the Kingdom of God is near!” Remember, John’s not trying to shame us, or get us to look busy so we don’t get in trouble when Jesus shows up. He’s reminding us to open our eyes and look around to see the fact that God is present and active in this world and in our lives. God is with us. God is with you.
