My prayer for you is that when the trials are hard on earth take comfort in our heavenly destiny. The outcome is sure! We often feel that we are in captivity to circumstances. During the complete ruin of the Babylonian captivity Habukkak ends his theodicy by declaring complete faith and trust amidst apparent bad circumstances “though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the lord, I will be joyful in God my saviour. The sovereign lord is my strength: he makes my feet like the feet of a deer; he enables me to go on the heights.” Hab 3:17-19. Maranatha – the Lord is coming. Emmanuel – God is with you.

Providence had directed the movements of nations, and the tide of human impulse and influence, until the world was ripe for the coming of the deliverer. As God had sought our first parents hiding in the Garden, the infinite had now stepped within the bounds of time seeking the lost sheep that was away from the 99; the one world that had strayed into the wilderness of sin and rebellion. He was “God with us,” Emmanuel.