The Everlasting Arms

The Everlasting Arms

The eternal God is your refuge, And underneath are the everlasting arms.

(Deuteronomy 33:27)

Simeon took Him up in his arms and blessed God and said:

“Lord, now You are letting Your servant depart in peace, According to Your word; For my eyes have seen Your salvation”. (Luke 2:28-30)

It was a beautiful moment when Simeon held the Lord Jesus in his arms. It was a simple scene and, at the same time, the most profound scene. The Person who made everything lay in the arms of His old servant, just as He had lain in the manger. The theme of laying down runs throughout the life of the Lord Jesus.

The Lord Jesus lay in the manger as Immanuel. Isaiah 7:14 prophesied of the virgin bearing a child and calling His name Immanuel: “God with us”. When our Queen visits the home of someone, the amount of work that goes into that visit is considerable, and its primary concern is the Queen’s safety. When God stepped into creation, His primary concern was our salvation. So He came directly into the loneliness and darkness of this world. His first act was to lie down; it was to be His last act too. Jesus lay in Simeon’s arms as the Saviour. Simeon said, “For my eyes have seen Your salvation”. He saw in the tininess of Christ the power of redemption. Only by taking a body and becoming a man could Jesus be our Saviour. This is fundamental to our understanding of God. We cannot reach up to where He is. He comes down to where we are and in doing so brings us to Himself.

At first, it is difficult to see the Mighty God in the lowly Nazarene who, exhausted, lay down and fell asleep in the disciples’ boat. But when the storm comes and the disciples fear for their lives, the Mighty God reveals Himself, and with the voice of the Creator stills the wind, sea and waves instantaneously (Mark 4:35-41). It is a marvellous illustration of how Christ lays down His life in death and rises up in all the mighty power of resurrection to lay the basis of our peace with God. There came a time when all of the prophecies, pictures and parables were fulfilled. Calvary was the place where the Lord of life laid down His life in love as the Good Shepherd. That scene of suffering, death, and sorrow was also the place where the power of the love of Christ was told out: “Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down” (John 10:17-18). It was the power of love.

The Lord lay down for the last time in the grave of Joseph of Arimathea. It was from that place that He demonstrated the power of His glorious resurrection, and ensured He could place us for ever in the security and power of His everlasting arms of love. This love reminds us, in days of insecurity and uncertainty, that “underneath are the everlasting arms”.