Throughout our extended Advent, Pastor Amy reminds us that we have reflected on the various names for Messiah: King of nations, Key of David, Dayspring, Branch of Jesse, Wisdom, and today, Emanuel. (We had to skip Lord of might because we didn’t have enough weeks to fit them all in this year!) Each name rooted in the prophecies of Hebrew scripture. Each one a name or title used by our ancestors to describe some attribute of God’s longed for Messiah. Each name, revealing some facet of how God’s anointed one comes to the world and reminding us that the God for who whom we are still waiting came once as a child, but also comes in many and various ways.

Names matter, so we pay attention when Matthew tells us that when an angel visits Joseph, the angel gives Mary’s child the name that God intends for him. “You are to name him Jesus” which Matthew helpfully reminds us means – he will save his people from their sins. And then of all the names and titles for Messiah which our ancestors knew, the angel claims Emmanuel for the child – God is with us.

What is Messiah’s name? Jesus Emmanuel – which means the God who saves is with us.

We celebrate our Messiah born into this world on Christmas Eve. Share in worship at 5:30 or 7:30. Sing Silent Night and hear the story of Christ’s birth around the Christmas tree outdoors at 6:45. Invite your friends and neighbors! “Like” Bethlehem’s Facebook page and share our posts so that the whole world might hear the Good News that the God who saves is with us.

O come, O come, Emmanuel,
and ransom captive Israel,
that mourns in lonely exile here
until the Son of God appear.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to you, O people of God at Bethlehem.