God With Us

 “They shall name Him Emmanuel, which means "God is with us." Matthew 1:23

If God is with us, who can stand against us? Sometimes, like many in the Bible, we question God why, why me? why now? We don't understand, if God is good, if God's plans are the best, then why?

God's ways and His thoughts, and His plans for us, are far above what our thoughts and ways and plans are. Sometimes when we look at other people, maybe some rich corrupt politician, or a contractor who stole billions of taxpayer money, and compare them to the poor who can’t even eat a proper meal and who live in shanties by the esteros, we ask ourselves why God isn't punishing the wicked.

In the same chapter of Matthew, there is a long genealogy of Jesus. We can get bored reading it, or skip it altogether, like I have many a time. But in this genealogy, in between the heroic men, there are sinners.  Even big time sinners like King David, "a man after God's own heart" (1 Samuel 13:14) who lied, stole, lusted after Bathsheba and lay with her, then conspired to murder her husband to cover his sin.

I've often asked why David was someone God loved so much when he broke so many of God’s laws. Was it because he loved God so much? David loved the Word of God. He sang, “Oh how I love your law!" (Ps. 119:97) and he loved to pray, “I will call upon him as long as I live!" (Ps. 116). 

And David would praise God and sing and dance with abandon, so much so his wife Michal got so disgusted with Him! In the Bible it says, “Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins." (1 Peter 4:8) 

Love covers a multitude of sins. God saw the love David had for Him, and that pleased Him. It covered all the sins David committed!!!

When David realized he had hurt God by his sin, he acknowledged his sin and turned back to God. He humbled himself before God, and expressed deep remorse. In Psalm 51, David pleads for mercy, that God, according to His unfailing love and great compassion, would blot out all his transgressions. “Create in me a pure heart, O God,” King David cried out. 

What kind of a love do we have for God? Do we recognize when we hurt Him? And do we humble ourselves and repent and change our ways? God’s love is so so incomprehensible that He will in His mercy take back any wayward son or daughter who strays and turns back to Him. Yes, we can depend that He is a God who walks with us through thick and thin.