Immanuel – God With Us
 
In Thailand Christmas is celebrated the entire month of December.  It is a time when youth groups and evangelists go from village to village as an outreach to share the Christmas story with those who are not yet Christians. 

Christmas day is not a public holiday, but when the Christians are finished with work and with school they all come to church to celebrate together.  They share a meal and then spend the rest of the evening singing, praying, performing, and worshiping. The message they have to share is, “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel- which means ‘God with us.’”

My experience in Thailand has taught me that Jesus was born into a world that was troubled, but Jesus came, fully God and fully man, to be with us and to redeem our experiences.  And Jesus remains with us today.  In the midst of the troubles we face, Christ stands with us; Christ makes his presence known in very personal ways.  Christ has come to preach the good news to the poor, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, and to comfort all those who mourn.  Jesus also comes to call us, the children of God, to make God’s love visible and available in a broken world.  One of my favorite Christmas stories that reflects Jesus as Immanuel spans back to the first years the House Of Love was in operation. 

Nakha was an orphan, living in a tribal village in the mountains of Burma, raised by a woman who physically abused her, neglected to feed her, and on occasion forced her to sleep outside on the ground.  When Nakha was only 11 years old a man enticed her to run away with him. 

They walked for many days through mountainous terrain until they reached Northern Thailand, where Nakha soon realized that the man she had trusted had sold her into a life of domestic servitude.  It was not long after that when she was again sold, this time to a brothel in Bangkok. 

Nakha worked in so many different brothels in and around Bangkok that (after ten years) she lost track of how many places she had worked and how many men she had slept with.  One night the brothel was raided and the police saw that Nakha was pregnant and took her to a hospital.  It was there that she was told that she was HIV positive and that she would die, there was no hope for her.  After giving birth to a daughter she was brought to us.  Nakha was bound by her fear of death and her feeling of hopelessness.

And Nakha met Jesus during her first Christmas at the House of Love.  She heard the other residents talking about buying gifts.  Nakha asked, “What is a gift?” After being told, she stated that she had never received a gift, nor had she ever had the opportunity to give a gift to someone else.   But she immediately became excited about buying a gift for Da; she did not want her daughter to grow up without ever receiving a gift.   For two days Nakha went to the market in search of the very best gift that she could find, so that she could give it as a perfect reflection of how much she loved Da.  She wrapped the gift, and with great pride showed it to everyone. 

On Christmas day she gave it to Da.  It was then that others living and working at the House of Love explained to Nakha that just as she loves her daughter God loves her.  God wanted to give her the very best gift possible, and He did, He gave the gift of His son, Jesus.  Nakha accepted that gift. My prayer for each of us is that we too take that gift and reflect that love into our world!  May each of you have a blessed and joyous Christmas.