Rejoice, rejoice! Immanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.
So often we rejoice not because of what God has promised, or who God is, but because of what God has done. But the Biblical story is filled with people who rejoiced in God’s promise and lived their trust in that promise, whether or not they ever saw it come to pass. The promise had nothing to do with them personally but everything to do with humankind. They were able to trust and rejoice because their identity was not in their own personhood.
I want to live like this.
