By Pastor Steve Nickodemus

God With Us!

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking this SoundCloud link

“The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel (which means ‘God with us’).”
Matthew 1:23 New International Version

Do you feel all alone?  Isolated from everyone else, cut off from anyone who can truly understand you?  Loneliness is the most common and most pervasive problem in the United States.  Many people feel absolutely alone and apart from family, friends, the world around them.

Loneliness has come about in this world because our relationship with God and with others is broken because of sin and separation in all people..  Personal relationships are fractured and wounded because our hearts easily go to offense and negative thoughts, especially when communication has broken down between people.  Shame and blame, the two sides of the same destructive coin, are a common trap that kills relationships and poisons our hearts and minds.

Into this broken, dysfunctional, painful, sinful, dying world of humanity, God in His mercy sent His Son.  Jesus came to be “God with us”, to bear our sins upon the cross, to bind up the wounds of the broken hearted, to pour healing balm into broken hearts.  The Lord Jesus became one of us so that He could die for us and so that he could completely identify with our pain and our tears.  Jesus became “Aloneness” for us on the cross with the cry, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

Do you feel all alone?  Jesus Christ has come into this world and He is your Immanuel, God with you.  You are not alone.  Cry out to Jesus.  He will come to you.  Jesus has come to be your Brother, your dearest Friend, God’s peace and presence in your darkest hour.

Jesus said, “I am with you always, even to the end of the world.” Trust the One who is closer than a brother…. Jesus.

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church Colorado Springs, Colorado