When a baby enters your life, everything changes. All bets are off. A new day has dawned. It all really starts before the baby enters the world. Before the birth of a baby, especially the first child, your calendar fills up quickly with regular doctor visits, setting up the child’s room with the right furniture, colors and theme, the showering of gifts from loved ones and friends, and my personal favorite the childbirth preparation classes. We learned breathing and relaxation techniques, the stages of labor, and so much more. It was truly an experience.
A baby also changes how you travel. Can’t just jump in the car and go anymore. You must place the baby in a 5 point harness car carrier or else you don’t get to leave the hospital. The stereo system you love and enjoy gets moved and replaced by a pack-n-play. Your favorite chair is replaced by a mechanical swing. The crib, changing table, a dresser, child proofing everything, having storage for toys and books, and an eventual high chair in the kitchen: your home is transformed into a “baby cave”; your own Babies-R-Us store. I am amazed at how much additional gear is needed to travel with one little person.
There’s the lack of regular, sound, deep sleep. There’s the constant attention needed to attend to a baby’s needs: changing diapers, getting them dressed, doing laundry, feeding the baby, getting the baby dressed again, getting yourself dressed again, doing more laundry. You get the idea.
And in the end, we do what we have to do when a baby enters our lives. Why? Because we love them more than we imagined we could love anyone. A baby is a sign of God’s creative love and irresistible grace. A baby serves as a sign of God’s love for the world and all creation and at the same time we, the parents, experience the love of God in a whole new way and our lives are changed forever. A baby is a sign of hope in a world of despair; a sign of peace in a world of violence; a sign of joy in a world of unhappiness; a sign of love in a world of hate.
We find ourselves this morning with King Ahaz, the king of Judah, in the middle of a foreign policy crisis, fearful of his two close neighbors to the north, Syria and Israel (vs. 4–6). The prophet has just warned King Ahaz that only faith will rescue the king from this apparent threat (vs. 7–9).
God invites King Ahaz, the king of Judah, to ask for a sign, but he refuses. God wanted him to ask for any kind of a sign because God wanted to prove to Ahaz that He would protect him from the kings of Syria and Ephraim. But Ahaz refused to ask for a sign because he really wanted to ask help from Assyria and continue practicing idolatry. The point of the sign is to underscore God’s intention to do as he promised.
We're always looking for signs, but we don’t always see them or we refuse to see them. We look for them in the mall, when driving in unfamiliar neighborhoods, when looking for a bathroom in a restaurant or when checking into a hotel (where's the fitness room, the swimming pool, the business center?). We look for signs when deplaning and wandering through the airport terminal ("Where do I catch my connecting flight? Where's baggage claim? What carousel number?"), but in the hustle and bustle of a busy airport it’s easy to miss a sign and go in the wrong direction. Or when hiking on a trail in the mountains, following the trail signs when you notice they are worn out, simply missing and difficult to discern. When life isn’t going our way, we look for signs of improvement and growth from God. Noah looked for a sign and God gave him a rainbow in the sky. The Hebrews looked for signs and received manna from heaven in the morning, quails in their camps in the evening, and water from the rock. The shepherds living in the fields keeping watch over their flocks by night received a sign that in the city of David they would find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger who is the savior of the world.
The king’s refusal is wrapped up in some form of personal piety. The clever but stubborn refusal of the king evokes from the prophet a hard, devastating oracle (vs. 13–17). The prophet Isaiah puts the royal Ahaz administration on notice. The prophet now refers to Yahweh as “my God.” By implication, this odd pronoun suggests that Yahweh is no longer “your God.” Yahweh has withdrawn from the dynasty. The dynasty wanted autonomy, and now it has it, for the Davidic house no longer is claimed by God. “Therefore” (v. 14), because of the king’s resistance, the prophet announces a “sign”, even though the king has not asked for one. The sign is that a young woman will have a child (v. 14). All the focus in the oracle is on the anticipated baby whose name is Immanuel, “God is with us” (v. 14). The birth and growth of the baby present a time line to the nations: “Before the child knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good” is commonly calculated in terms of childhood development as two years. Before two years, the threat of Syria and Israel will dissolve (v. 16). That’s the good news. The bad news is that with the disappearance of these small kings whom Ahaz so much fears, Yahweh will “bring on you” bad, bad days.
Is it any wonder that we should be looking for signs to guide us on our spiritual journey? That's the way we're wired. And especially at Advent!
What signs are you looking for? Is it a sign to confirm a sense of new calling in your life? Perhaps it’s a sign that comes from a doctor visit or a trusted loved one saying it’s time to change your unhealthy habits or you will die. Or is it simply a word of hope? A feeling of peace? An experience of joy? The power of love? A bright star shining in the east? The Christ child lying in an animal feeding trough?
The sign of the Christ child, the sign of Emmanuel, changes everything. Everything changes when “God is with us”.
The power of the Immanuel sign calls us to live faithfully in God’s promise to always be with us. The Emmanuel sign calls us to have the courage of faith to test that promise when we are challenged by the enemy.
The challenge of the Immanuel sign is stated by the prophet to King Ahaz in v. 9: “If you do not stand firm in faith, you shall not stand at all”. Stand firm in your faith as we cry out to God, “O Come, O Come Emmanuel and ransom captive Israel, that mourns in lonely exile here, until the son of God appear…come and cheer our spirits by Thine advent here; disperse the gloomy clouds of night, and death’s dark shadows put to flight…bind all peoples in one heart and mind; bid envy, strife and discord cease; fill the whole world with heaven’s peace. Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel, God is with us, shall come to thee.”[1]
Get ready! Everything changes when “God is with us”! Amen.
[1] O
Come, O Come, Emmanuel, The Presbyterian Hymnal #9. Latin c. 12th
century, adaptation by Thomas Helmore, 1854.
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