"God with us and for us and in us and holding us"

"Emmanuel -- God with us. God with us and for us and in us and holding us and this is the Christmas miracle that outlasts all of time." 

- Ann Voskamp

This is part of the post A Sorta Gift Guide for the Overwhelmed & Broken Hearted This Christmas from the blog A Holy Experience, which I enthusiastically recommend.  But if you only have a couple minutes, here's a snippet...

Can all the hurting hearts believe that He withholds no good thing from us? (Ps. 84:11) Don't you have to believe that first -- before you open up your tender heart? 

The children's choir singing O Come, O Come Emmanuel and our Hope-girl, she's smiling at me from the back row. 

How many people standing here in this church are trying to stand through cancer and divorce and debt and the sharp edge of life that's cutting their heart right open and they're singing through this Christmas but they're really bleeding quiet? We sing it like a plea: "O Come, O Come Emmanuel" 

Emmanuel -- God with us. God with us and for us and in us and holding us and this is the Christmas miracle that outlasts all of time. 

He withholds no good thing from us.  

The church is filling with song of children and old men and broken hearts and my back's to the wall and wind of the world can't get into this place. I can see it from where I'm standing, there's a star on the back wall of the chancel, right at the very top. They are hitting the chorus now: 

"Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel shall come to thee O Israel". 

We're all here and hurting and singing and I think: Wise men follow more than a star -- they follow the God of the scars. Who heals our scars. 

The God who knows: Evidence of God's existence is cold comfort. What warms us is the wounded, weeping God who doesn’t write answers in stars --- but writes His ardent love in our scars.  

With His scars. 

The God who enfolds us close:  We get our Christmas miracle. We get God with us.
He withholds no good thing from us. 

And the good things in life are not so much health but holiness, not so much the riches of this world but relationship with God, not so much our plans but His presence --
and He withholds no good thing from us because the greatest things aren't ever things. 

He doesn't withhold Jesus from us.