Matthew 1:23 - God Is With Us

“Behold, the virgin shall become pregnant and give birth to a Son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel-which, when translated, means God with us.” Matthew 1:23

It is important to establish that Jesus Christ is the Son of man, that He was born of a woman and walked upon the earth as a man. Researching Him as “the Son of man”, this fact was found in Scripture to be stated almost twice as much as He being referenced as the “Son of God.”

So, why is it so important for us to recognize Jesus as being born in the flesh, we might ask. Well, when God first created the first man, Adam, he was flesh and spirit and given free will. But because of his disobedience to our heavenly Father’s instruction ‘not to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil’ that the spirit of God within him “died”, so to speak. Thus, the only way mankind could be redeemed was to have One come in the same state, flesh and spirit, and out of free will, choose to redeem mankind from eternal damnation brought by sin as we clearly see in Matthew 18:11, “for the Son of man came to save [from the penalty of eternal death] that which was lost.”

Just think about that. He, the Word, Who dwelt with our heavenly Father forever, before the beginning of time as we know it, consented to come upon the earth in human form in order to redeem us back to God. He who lived in the beauty of splendor of the heavenly kingdom where sin had no prominence or dominion came upon the earth to take sins of mankind upon Himself. He offered Himself as the Lamb of God, being slain so that we could be free of sin. He Who knew no sin became sin for our sakes. That truth is mind boggling!

And it was as the Son of man that Jesus endured temptation and overcame it! It was as the Son of man that He was taunted, ridiculed and treated unjustly yet He did not respond He in kind. Jesus was and is our example to follow. Had He come only as the Son of God, first He could not redeem that which the first Adam lost, the spirit of God within him. Secondly, mankind would think only the Son of God could live a righteous life but Jesus came to show us that even in the human form, when you have the spirit of God within you, you can live a righteous life. Adam was given free will and Jesus, too, walked in free will. The difference is, Adam decided to honor his flesh and walked in disobedience when he partook of that tree. Jesus decided to honor His Father Who is Spirit when He took sin and nailed them to that tree (cross). Today we have that same choice, whether we honor the flesh or honor the Spirit of God.

When we are born again we are born again of God’s Spirit, He lives and abides within us. Yes, the flesh is weak but the Spirit of God is strong! Until we can see this truth and recognize that we can and are overcomers through Christ Jesus then we will consider the weakness of the flesh to have predominance over the spirit of God within us and that is simple a lie the enemy wants us to believe. That which is written says “greater is He that is in you than he who is in the world” (1 John 4:4). He Who became flesh showed us that this is true. As the Son of man Jesus knew what it was like to be feel the pains of this world and in the flesh He could have chosen to give in to sorrow and temptation. But Jesus’ love for the Father was greater than the things in this world. While living as the Son of man Jesus chose to live as the Son of God. And when we become born again we have the same opportunity to either live as sons/daughters of man or to live as sons/daughters of the most high God.

It comes down to choice, not availability. Thus it is essential that we recognize Jesus as the Son of man, walking with a flesh nature but choosing to be obedient to the Father as the Son of God. Let us ask the Holy Spirit to search our hearts and reveal to us if we have been living like this world or have we chosen to present our heavenly Father’s nature, Spirit, to the world through our lives. As the Son of man Jesus did. We can too. Hallelujah!

Jesus, who was spirit became flesh so that we could be redeemed. Now we must understand that we are not only flesh, but spirit as well, just as Jesus! Too often we get so focused on our flesh and our sins that we lose site of what just did for us, washed away our sins and through accepting Him as our Lord and Savior we have become a "new creature" where the holy Spirit of God abides in us. That's why Jesus said, "these things that I do, greater shall you do" because He knew that as new creatures in Him all things were possible and that the anointing was available to us if we positioned ourselves and prepared ourselves to walk in it.

Let us look to Him to be all that we can be for His honor and glory. Amen? Amen!