God Is With Us

Alicia Johnson

Scriptures: Isaiah 7:10-16, Matthew 1:18-25

As many of you know, this is my first Christmas since my daughter, Julia, was born in February. Even though she is too young to understand what Christmas is, it is such a delight to watch the holiday through her eyes. We went to the Grotto’s festival of lights a couple weeks ago, and she was silently entranced by the lights, the singers, and the other kids the whole time. Then, as soon as we got in the car, she started babbling and spent the whole ride home telling us all about it. It was so precious and super fun.

This is the first Advent in a long time that I feel joyful. In August of 2020, my first baby, Olivia, was born about halfway through my pregnancy. She had a fatal genetic abnormality and was not alive when she was born. Between then and early 2023, my husband Scott and I went through 5 early pregnancy losses. We then took a year to decide what to do. Did we want to do fertility treatments, and if so, which ones? Or did we want to make the decision to remain childfree and keep building our life without children? We ended up deciding on IVF, but it took many conversations and a lot of prayer. During those years, Advent was really hard. An entire season devoted to excitedly awaiting the birth of a baby that would save the world? Ouch. Last year at this time, I was pregnant with Julia, and while part of me was hopeful and excited, another part of me was really, really scared. So even then, the joyful anticipation of Jesus’ birth felt like too much. Hope felt risky. Even though everything was going well, part of me couldn’t believe that – after all that time and pain – we could end up with a healthy baby. After she was born and they put her on my chest, I still couldn’t quite believe it. She’s ok? I’m ok? Everything is good? It took a few minutes, and then the joy flooded in, but my first reaction really was shock.

When you struggle with infertility, there are lots of people – good intentioned people – who have stories to tell you. They say, “My sister tried for 3 years and did IVF and when they finally stopped trying, they had a baby!” “My coworker’s cousin’s best friend adopted a child and then got pregnant!” These stories tended to jump over the pain and struggle to the “and they all lived happily ever after, the end!” There were also women who took me aside and quietly told me their stories – how they had 6 miscarriages before getting divorced. How they tried and hoped and prayed for years and never once got pregnant. In spite of their pain, they built good, full lives, but they didn’t have the happy ending that people like to hear. And when you’re in the midst of it, there is no way to know what the outcome will be – will I have a child or learn to build a life without raising a child. Often, when people told the “and they all lived happily ever after” kinds of stories, it felt like they were dismissing the very real uncertainty in which I was living and were jumping ahead to some cheerful outcome that was not guaranteed.

But Advent isn’t about unfounded optimism. I grew up in the Evangelical church, and one thing I love about the Episcopal church – and especially seminary where I spend a ton of time learning about the Bible – is that now I get to hear familiar Bible passages that I grew up with in new ways. Often when I’ve heard sermons on this gospel passage, the attitude has been kind of like, “ha ha, oh Joseph, he really needed to trust God.” But imagine your fiancée – or your friend or your sister – came to you and said she had gotten pregnant from the Holy Spirit. You would be skeptical, right? And if Joseph did believe her, what would it mean for his life to raise a holy child? Raising a child is difficult as it is – being responsible for raising the Son of God seems especially daunting.

We hear in this text that Joseph was righteous. He didn’t want to publicly shame Mary so he planned to end their engagement quietly. He was taking a compassionate approach to difficult circumstances. I think that God, knowing this was an unbelievable situation, gave Joseph a dream, not to shame him and his doubt but to reassure him. “Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife” – I don’t read this a rebuke. To me, it sounds like an acknowledgement of Joseph’s anxiety and an encouragement in this seemingly impossible situation.

In the passage from Isaiah, we see something similar. Ahaz was the king of Judah around the year 730 BC. Jerusalem, the capital of Judah, was under threat from other nations due to shifting political alliances. King Ahaz was afraid and unsure how to proceed. He called in the prophet Isaiah to help him figure out what God wanted him to do. Through Isaiah, God tells Ahaz, “Ask a sign of the Lord your God; let it be deep as Sheol [the underworld] or as high as heaven.” Ahaz refuses, saying he won’t put God to the test. This could be read as stubbornness or false piety – in 2nd Kings we learn that Ahaz was not a righteous man and did not follow God’s commandments. But, there are also verses in the Bible where God’s people are told not to put God to the test (Deuteronomy 6:16, Exodus 17). Whatever his reason for refusal, God offers Ahaz a sign anyway. God tells King Ahaz that a young woman is pregnant, and by the time her child is born and weaned off of milk, he will eat curds and honey – foods that signify abundance and prosperity – and the nations who were threatening him would no longer be powerful. While the situation Ahaz faced was daunting and overwhelming and may in fact lead to great strife in the short-term, God assured him that there was peace on the horizon. Like with Joseph, God sees the king’s distress and provides encouragement.

Our Gospel reading today quotes the Isaiah passage. The author of Matthew often uses scripture to weave the story of Jesus together with the Hebrew Bible, highlighting Jesus as the long-awaited Messiah. However, for Ahaz, this message was not about Jesus, a baby to be born hundreds of years later. It spoke to the situation he was in, providing hope in a challenging time. In Isaiah (and quoted again in Matthew), we see that the baby is named Immanuel, which means “God is with us.” King Ahaz and Joseph are both assured of God’s presence in uncertain and difficult times.

When I was in the midst of my infertility journey and anxiously awaiting Julia’s arrival, God was with me. While I was not visited by an angel in a dream, there were people who walked with me on that path, holding lightly to hope when I couldn’t see it or feel it. They didn’t offer the type of hope that jumped over my pain to a happy ending. They sat with me in my fear, grief, and frustration, and helped me to see that – regardless of whether or not I ever had a child, God was with me.

Today, we are formally welcoming new members into our community. Roz, Shawn, Jorge, Connie, and Mike, you are already part of the St. Luke’s community, but we are so glad to make it official (and to make it re-official for Cheryl). This is not a place where you have to have boundless optimism. When you are in an impossible situation and struggling to see God with us, you have a community that can sit with you in that. We see this every week in our community prayers, as people lift up their joy and heartache side by side. I experienced it last Advent as your gentle excitement helped me believe that maybe I could open the door to hope. And when things don’t work out, when the worst happens, we are here to remind you that God does not judge your anxiety and pain but is with you through it.

This week, I bought Christmas presents and cute wrapping paper for Julia’s presents (knowing full well I will have to vigilantly make sure she doesn’t try to eat it). I also bought a poinsettia in memory of Olivia. My joy this Advent is layered on top of my grief. When I reflect on the past few years, I remember the high points and the low points. The times when I needed others to be a sign of God’s presence. Through today’s scriptures, we see the way God sits with us in those low points. God sends us signs – whether through our dreams or through our friends – reminding us – Immanuel, God is with us.