His Name Is Jesus

Adam and Eve had just blown it. They’re hiding in the trees, covered in fig leaves, scared of the voice they used to love hearing. And what does God do? He comes looking. “Where art thou?” God knew exactly where Adam was. The question was for Adam. Do you see where you are now? Then, right in the middle of handing out the curses, God slips in a promise. A Seed is coming. Her seed. And He’s going to crush the serpent’s head. That’s the first time the gospel shows up in the Bible, and it shows up on the worst day in human history. So if you’re having a bad week, or a bad year, don’t assume God has stopped talking to you. Some of His best promises come right in the middle of the mess. He’s still the God who comes looking.

When Eve’s first son was born, she said, “I have gotten a man from the LORD.” She thought maybe this was the one. It wasn’t. Generations came and went, and the promise just... waited. Then the prophets started filling in the details. A virgin would have a son. And Micah even named the town: Bethlehem, a place too small to matter. But look at what Micah says about the baby: “whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.” That’s a baby with no beginning, born in a little town. And then Paul says, “when the fulness of the time was come.” Not early and not late. Right on time. Maybe you’ve been waiting on a promise for a long time, and you thought it would happen years ago. Waiting isn’t the same as forgetting. The God who kept Bethlehem on schedule hasn’t lost track of you.

John doesn’t start his Gospel in Bethlehem. He goes further back: “In the beginning.” Before the garden, before the stars, there was the Word. And John won’t let you turn the Word into somebody else. “The Word was God.” Think of your own words. Before you say them, they’re with you: your thought, your mind. They aren’t another person. They’re you. Then verse 14: “the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.” God didn’t send a stand-in. The Word became flesh. That means the baby lying in the hay made the hay. The One who needed Mary to feed Him made every grain of wheat on earth. And it means God isn’t far off. He knows what hungry feels like, and tired, and grief. Jesus wept at His friend’s grave. Whatever you’re carrying today, you’re not bringing it to a God who doesn’t understand.

Mary asked the honest question. “How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?” It wasn’t doubt, it was biology. And the angel gave her an answer: the Holy Ghost will come upon you. Now put Luke next to Matthew. Gabriel tells Mary the Holy Ghost will overshadow her. The angel tells Joseph that what’s conceived in her “is of the Holy Ghost.” So who’s the Father of the Son? The Holy Ghost. And yet Jesus calls God His Father. That’s not two fathers. The Holy Ghost is the Spirit of the Father. One Spirit, one God. Hebrews 1:5 says, “This day have I begotten thee.” The Word is eternal, but the Son was begotten in Mary’s womb, at a point in time. God put on humanity. Mary didn’t understand everything that day. She just said, “be it unto me according to thy word” (Luke 1:38). Sometimes faith is saying yes before you can explain it.

The church at Colossae was being told that Jesus was a good start, but they needed more: angels, rituals, some secret knowledge. Paul shut that down in one sentence. “In him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.” All of it, not a third. Bodily, not in a vision. And then: “ye are complete in him.” You don’t have to look past Jesus to find more of God. There isn’t any more. Now look at Isaiah 43:11. God says, “beside me there is no saviour.” Then Matthew says Jesus “shall save his people.” That isn’t a contradiction. The LORD came Himself, and His name is Jesus. The name even means “Jehovah is salvation.” So stop shopping. You don’t need one more voice, one more experience, or one more thing on top of Jesus. Everything God is, you find in Him.

Read Galatians 4 again and watch the two “sent forths.” Verse 4: God sent forth His Son, made of a woman. Verse 6: God sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts. The first sending was Bethlehem. The second was Pentecost. First God came to us in flesh. Then He comes into us by His Spirit. Emmanuel, “God with us,” becomes God in us. That’s why the Holy Ghost isn’t optional. Jesus said you have to be born of water and of the Spirit (John 3:5). Paul said, “if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his” (Romans 8:9). And Peter told the crowd exactly how: repent, be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and you’ll receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. “The promise is unto you.” The same Jesus who came to save you is ready to live in you. Don’t stop at the manger.

That’s your week. Now you’re walking into the house of God, where that Name is preached, prayed, and sung. Don’t go in just to sit through a service. Go in expecting the same Jesus who kept His promise to keep it again, maybe for you, maybe for the person sitting next to you.