O Come O Come Emmanuel - The Crosswalk Devotional - December 24

O Come, O Come, Emmanuel
By Gina Smith

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

“Lonely.” “Isolated.” “No support system.” These are some of the words that I have heard moms use to describe what they experience while they are walking through the day-in and day-out of what it means to be a mom. Regardless of how old your children are, each season of motherhood does come with a measure of loneliness, isolation, and a lack of support. Why is that? Because other moms are busy raising their children just like you are. When we prioritize our family and our marriage, there are seasons when there isn’t much time for anything else.

I also know of some who don’t have much in the way of community. My husband and I have gone through times in our lives when God actually withheld community for a season. Yes, community is important, and I encourage you to pray for God to lead you to that particular church body that you can be a part of and live out true, biblical community. It is life-giving and, when intentionally done in a biblical way, will help you grow in your walk with God. But, during those seasons when we haven’t had consistent community, we have sensed that God wanted to do something in us that only He can do. He wanted to have our full attention. He wanted us to experience a loneliness that can only be filled by drawing near to Him and crying out in desperation and need.

We are never alone. Ultimately, He is the only One who can meet us in our deepest longing and loneliness. He wants us to experience this in a new way. When you take time to look at the lyrics of today’s hymn and are able to see what these lyrics are saying, I believe that the truths found there can lift you out of any sense of loneliness or isolation and give you a birds-eye view of the life you have been gifted.

Emmanuel - God with us.
This Christmas Hymn explains what we can experience because Jesus came. We see prophecy being fulfilled when He was born - His first coming. And we see in the same hymn the promise of His return - His second coming.

Jesus is with you.
He was born, lived His life, walked in obedience as He submitted to His Father and accomplished what He was sent to earth to accomplish. He was crucified, died, rose again, and then went back to His Father when His plans were accomplished.

The fact that He rose again means that He is with you. It means that He is alive and walking you through every single minute of your day. Every trial, He experiences with you and enables you to persevere. Every victory, He has enabled you to accomplish and rejoices with you in it.

Intersecting Faith and Life:
You can have joy, knowing He came and is with you. You can have joy knowing that there is so much more to this life than what we are experiencing right now. He is coming again and we will spend eternity with Him. All of His promises will be fulfilled.

We can worship Him this Christmas as we celebrate His birth, and we can also worship Him as we look forward to His return. We can thank him for coming and thank Him for the promises that we find our hope in, for the future.

And then we can add the following words to describe what we experience while we are walking through the day-in and day-out of life – at times feeling like we are completely alone: “Thankful.” “Rejoicing.” “Anticipating.” “Hopeful.”

Let’s pray:
Father, thank you for coming to earth as a baby and thank you for the promise that You will come again one day in the future. Thank you that these truths and promises give me joy and hope amidst daily life and loneliness. Thank you for being with me. I need You. Thank you for giving me true joy when I focus on You, praising and worshiping You for being Emmanuel - God with us.

O Come, O Come, Emmanuel

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 thee, O Israel.

O come, Thou Wisdom from on high,
Who orders all things mightily;
To us the path of knowledge show,
And teach us in its ways to go.

O come, Thou Branch of Jesse’s stem,
Unto Thine own and rescue them!
From depths of hell Thy people save,
And give them vict’ry o’er the grave.

O come, Thou Key of David, come
And open wide our heav’nly home;
Make safe for us the heav’nward road,
And bar the way to death’s abode.

O come, Thou Bright and Morning Star,
And bring us comfort from afar!
Dispel the shadows of the night
And turn our darkness into light.

O come, Desire of nations, bind
In one the hearts of all mankind;
Bid all our sad divisions cease,
And be Thyself our King of Peace.

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Gina Smith is a writer and author. She has been married for 35 years to Brian, a college professor and athletic trainer. For 25+ years, she and her husband served on a Christian college campus as the on-campus parents, where Brian was a professor and dean of students. They reside right outside of Washington, DC, and are the parents of two grown children, one daughter-in-law, one son-in-law, and one granddaughter. She recently authored her first traditionally published book, Everyday Prayers for Joy, which is available everywhere books are sold. You can find Gina at the following: Website: ginalsmith.com, Instagram, and at Million Praying Moms, where she is a writer.