Emmanuel-Christ With Us
by: Sharon Hughes
A little over four years ago, the day before the U.S. presidential election, I felt my world turn upside down. I wish I could have blamed the sharp pain in my chest on the contentious political race, but I couldn’t. Instead, I was robotically making my way up the elevator to the ICU, worn out from a morning of distress, talking with a surgeon and--along with my mom and husband--numbly praying with my pastor.
As I cautiously walked down the hall, past hurried nurses and beeping machines, I felt the baby inside of me kicking, a reminder that life and breath were still a reality. I hesitantly entered the sterile ICU room and stared at what looked like a lifeless mummy. I slowly and reluctantly inched closer and made eye contact with my father. He had miraculously survived a suicide attempt, leaving years of recovery in front of him.
The days that followed were a blur. I had moments of calm and strength and others filled with stinging tears. I was 3 1/2 weeks away from delivering my second son and I was frantically grasping for the mental strength needed to turn in my last paper in order to graduate from my program. I felt haunted daily, not only by the details of what happened but also by the looming threat of bitterness. My father’s darkest hour had come, and by proximity mine had too.
As I poured out my heart to the Lord in prayer with deliberate desperate strokes of my pen in my journal, Psalm 107: 2-3 were the words the Holy Spirit brought to my attention as I opened the Bible:
“Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever! Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, whom he has redeemed from trouble and gathered in from the lands, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south.”
The question I began to ask myself was did I believe in God’s goodness, and why was He reminding me of His goodness in the midst of tragedy?
In early December, our second son entered the world. His eyes immediately reminded me of my dad’s. As we snuggled our bundle of joy in the hospital room, my eyes glanced towards the window and I wondered how my dad was doing in his room. I was simultaneously carrying deep joy over our new baby and acute grief as my dad fought to recover.
In the weeks leading up to Christmas I listened to a song (on repeat!) by our friend Jon Guerra called “For the Songless Hearts”. As I listened to Jon’s words, I knew deep down that neither my dad, or myself, were alone in our pain:
“When he was laid in the tomb
He laid right next to you
No one could hear your hopeless sorrow
But there he could hear you
When he was sad and wept alone
Child, he wept for you
When you were dead in a song-less slumber
He sang and died for you.”
The lyrics poignantly reminded me that the goodness of Jesus was demonstrated in the tomb by his willingness to identify with our sin and suffering. While the dark impact of mental health felt all-consuming, it did not overtake the reality that Jesus was near and present and while we wept, we were not weeping alone.
God continued to demonstrate His goodness in my dad’s life by bringing physical, mental, and spiritual healing. I can’t help but stop and smile when I see my now four year old giggling with delight as my dad wrestles and tickles his grandson. But even if healing never came about, God’s goodness was a reality in our lives on that somber first day in the hospital four years ago because we follow Jesus who himself experienced pain and willingly holds us in our darkest hour.
2020 for many of us has embodied “next level” pain and suffering. Covid, joblessness, division, racial inequities (the list goes on) seem to fog our understanding of God’s goodness. “God is good” can feel like an empty cliche, but God is always good. He’s good not because our circumstances change but because we serve a King, who came as a baby in a manger, lived among us, and died on our behalf. He weeps with us, forgives us, and extends new life when we choose to embrace His loving invitation to follow Him.
As we straddle the joys and pains of life we must remember He is Emmanuel, Christ with us. He didn’t look down on us with pity but pierced the darkness by entering into our dark tombs. Christ’s willingness to enter human form is an embodiment of His goodness that we can hold tightly to in whatever season we find ourselves in. Whatever joy or pain hangs in the balance this season, we can surely be confident of His goodness in this very moment and echo the psalmist:
“Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!”
