This is Canon Victoria’s letter in our weekly Parish News email.  To sign up for our newsletter, please visit: Constant Contact. To see the full weekly Parish News email from Dec 23rd, please visit: http://conta.cc/2hQnRTo

For a child has been born for us,

a son given to us;

Authority rests upon his shoulders;

and he is named

Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,

Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

His authority shall grow continually,

and there shall be endless peace.”

Of all the names that Jesus carries, the one that is dearest to me is Emmanuel, which means “God with us.”  Emmanuel wraps up in one name, the purpose of the Incarnation.  God has come among us.  We are no longer alone. We are never alone, and, further, God has lived with us.  God has known hunger and thirst and fatigue and anger and frustration at not being understood by the people closest to him.  God has known pain beyond bearing and the temptation to despair, and God has known what it is to feel abandoned by God.  Yet, and especially yet, God is with us.  We are never alone,  will never be alone again  and as the angels told the shepherds, when God comes, the news “Is good news of great joy.”  The sign of Emmanuel begins the story of Christ our Redeemer, and ends with the promise in Matthew, “I am with you always.”

–Canon Victoria Heard