Immanuel - God with Us.

Isaiah 7:1-25
Isaiah looked ahead to the coming of ‘Immanuel’- ‘God with us’(14; Matthew 1:23). We look forward to the Second Coming of Immanuel: ‘Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them and be their God’(Revelation 21:3). The Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ presents us with a challenge: ‘When the Son of man comes, will He find faith on earth?’(Luke 18:8). He calls us to ‘stand firm in our faith’. We must not ‘shrink back ‘from Him. We must ‘believe and be saved’(9; Hebrews 10:37-39). Jesus says, ‘I am coming soon’. Let us pray, ‘Come, Lord Jesus’. Let us pray that our ‘love’ for Him will not ‘grow cold’. Let us pray for strength to ‘stand firm to the end and be saved’(Revelation 22:7,12,20; Matthew 24:12-13).

Isaiah 8:1-22
'Immanuel... God is with us’(8,10). Jesus Christ has come to be with us so that we might go to be with Him. He has come from heaven to earth so that we might go from earth to heaven. He died for us that we might live with Him. He does not return to heaven alone. He ‘brings many sons to glory’: ‘Here am I, and the children the Lord has given me’(18; Hebrews 2:9-10,13). Jesus speaks to us of the glory of the Father’s House’. He shares this glory with us: ‘I go to prepare a place for you... I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also’. He invites us to enter this heavenly glory. He is ‘the Way, the Truth and the Life’. Without Him, we cannot enter heaven: ‘No one comes to the Father except through Me’. Through faith in Him, we receive ‘eternal life’(John 14:1-3,6; 6:40).