What Heaven Told You

When the doctor who’d examined the tremor in my hand said, “You’re fine. You’re in good health,” I did what you might expect – I began to weep. “How much time do I have left?” The doctor cocked his head, puzzled. Wait a second! you’re thinking. Didn’t you hear what the doctor told you? And I’m wondering, didn’t you hear what heaven told you?

That response to the doctor? I made it up. I was elated. And now when I see my thumb shake, I chalk it up to an aging body and I just place my trust in the doctor’s words. Do the same won’t you? For just as my thumb will occasionally tremble, you will occasionally sin. And when you do, remember sin may touch you, but it cannot claim you. Christ is in you! Trust his work for you. Trust his work in you. Your heart is his home, and he is your master.

Devotion by Max Lucado | The Almighty Jehovah | https://thealmightyJehovah.com

What Gabriel Never Expected

Prior to Bethlehem God gave us his messengers, his teachers, his words. But in the manger God gave us himself. Extraordinary, don’t you think? I imagine even Gabriel scratched his head at the idea of “God with us.” Gabriel surely was not one to question his God-given missions. When God sent, Gabriel went.

And when word got out that God was to become a human, Gabriel was no doubt enthused. He could envision the moment: The Messiah in a blazing chariot. The King descending on a fiery cloud. An explosion of light from which the Messiah would emerge. What he never expected, however, was a slip of paper with a Nazarene address. “God will become a baby,” it read. “Tell the mother to name the child Jesus. And tell her not to be afraid.”

Gods With Us Promise

Jesus understands you. He’s faced hunger, sorrow, and death and wants to face them with you. The Bible says Jesus “understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin” (Hebrews 4:15).

If Jesus understands our weaknesses, then so does God. Jesus was God in human form. He was God with us. That’s why Jesus is called Immanuel. Immanu means “with us.” El refers to Elohim, or God. So Immanuel is not an “above-us God” or a “somewhere-in-the-neighborhood God.” He came as the “with-us God.” All of us.

“I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). Search for restrictions on the promise, and you’ll find none. There’s no withholding tax on God’s “with us” promise. God is with us. What great news!

What Heaven Told You