Fruitful Living
Christmas is: Immanuel – God with us (2)
“The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a Son, and they will call Him Immanuel” – which means, “God with us.” – Matt 1:23 (NIV)
Introduction
Today we bring you the final part of Christmas Is: Emmanuel – God With US. God chose to come among us in order to reveal Himself fully to us. In that respect, He chose not to come out of the sky as a grown up man but as a baby so that He would totally share our humanity yet in doing so, sanctify our humanity by living a sinless life so that we would know that the life He gives us comes with His righteousness.
The Word Became Flesh
The opening verses of John’s gospel give us the most profound and most beautiful description of God becoming man in Jesus. John tells us that in the beginning of things God’s WORD already existed and that this pre-existent WORD was with God. This means that Jesus was with God before creation and was part of the process of creation. It, therefore, means that it is only the one who is with God and is God who can reveal who God really is. Since God is Creator and Father and wants to restore an intimate relationship with us, what better way could He do it than to come among us and show by the way He lives that He truly is interested in us and cares for us as a Father to His children. So John tells us that it’s He, the Word who became a person – the person Jesus and who lived among us humans to reveal the grace and glory of God our Creator and Father. He who created the world out of nothing can, indeed, take on the form of the highest of His creation.
Grace, Truth and Glory
“The word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only who came from the Father, full of grace and truth” – John 1:14
When God walks the earth, there surely must be a difference between the things He does and what merely mortal and finite man would do.
So God came with His unmerited favour (Grace), that favour which made Him substitute our death for His life. He did it out of pure love and a desire to make us who He always wanted us to be. Through Jesus’ death, God brought us back from slavery to sin. God did this through another aspect of grace which translates as charm. In Jesus, God revealed His loveliness and gentleness. Humans always saw God in terms of His might, majesty, power and judgement and though Jesus embodied all these qualities, He revealed also that power,(might, majesty and the right to judge) which is best wielded not in tyranny and oppression but in love and gentleness.
Truth: Jesus is the very embodiment of truth – “I am the way the truth and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:6 (NIV) Truth is God and He sets us free from our wrongful motions, prejudices and fears. Truth cannot be known unless it is communicated and Jesus communicates the truth of God – who He is, what He does what He does, and who He wants us to be. In knowing the truth we become free from all that seek to rob us of our true heritage. When ignorance flees as a result of truth, knowledge comes in and enables us to do things to enhance our lives.
Glory: Jesus’ life and work on earth reflected God’s glory whether in the performance of miracles, the authoritative teachings He gave or the standing up to the falsehood and hypocrisy of the Pharisees. In Jesus’ life the reality of the glory of God shown to Moses in Exodus 33:12-20 & 34:6-7 became really manifest.
Immanuel: God With Us
Ever since Jesus (meaning Jehovah is Salvation) walked the earth God has been permanently with us. In Old Testament times, God, Through His Holy Spirit visited humans from time to time (the Israelites in the desert; at the dedication of the temple built by Solomon; with Isaiah; Jeremiah; Ezekiel; Zechariah and so on), but since 2,000 years ago when baby Jesus was born in that manger in Bethlehem, God is, indeed, with us all the time. He is with us to save us from sin, to fill us with His Holy Spirit’s power so that we can live as Jesus did, revealing God’s grace, truth and glory to a world filled with the darkness of greed, injustice, corruption, murder, idolatry, adultery and all manner of unkindness and wickedness. But as we read in Titus 1:11-14 NIV
“They must be silenced, because they are ruining whole households by teaching things they ought not to teach—and that for the sake of dishonest gain. One of their own prophets has said it: “Cretans are always liars, evil brutes, lazy gluttons.” This testimony is true. Therefore, rebuke them sharply, so that they will be sound in the faith and will pay no attention to Jewish myths or to the commands of those who reject the truth.”
Let this Christmas season be a time that you will build a throne in your heart and invite God, through Jesus, to take His rightful place. John 1:12-13 and Revelation 3:20.
“Yet to all who did receive Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God — children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.” – John 1:12-13 NIV.
“Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.”- Revelation 3:20 NIV.
Stay Blessed!
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BY DR JOYCE ARYEE, THE AUTHOR
Fruitful Living
Sanitation, Hygiene, and the Morality of Public Space: Reclaiming Ghana’s Civic Virtue through Faith and Policy (Part 2)
Classical scholars like Al-Qaradawi (1990) emphasized that tahārah extends beyond the body and home to include the collective environment. Polluting rivers or littering public spaces constitutes a moral transgression against Allah’s creation.
The Qur’an warns:
“Do not cause corruption on the earth after it has been set in order.” (Qur’an 7:56)
Environmental neglect is a form of fasād (corruption), and every citizen who litters or dumps waste unlawfully becomes a participant in social and spiritual corruption. When Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) prohibited urinating in stagnant water (Sahih Bukhari, Hadith 236), he set a timeless precedent for environmental hygiene and ecological awareness.
Faith and sanitation are thus inseparable. Islam’s concept of ʿibādah (worship) encompasses every act done in obedience to Allah and for public benefit. Sweeping one’s compound, cleaning a drain, or preserving public water sources can be acts of worship if done with sincerity. The believer’s environment is a reflection of their inner purity, for as the Prophet said:
“Allah is beautiful and loves beauty.” (Sahih Muslim, Hadith 91)
Clean surroundings, therefore, are an aesthetic expression of divine beauty and an essential pillar of social morality.
III. The Erosion of Shared Responsibility: The Moral Decay of the Commons
Public space in African societies once symbolized collective dignity. The village compound, the communal well, and the shared road reflected moral unity. Today, however, Ghana’s public spaces have become neglected, reflecting an erosion of shared moral responsibility.
This decline is rooted in what Garrett Hardin (1968) called the “Tragedy of the Commons”—when individuals act for personal convenience while imposing costs on the community.
A. Violation of Huqūq al-Jīrān (Rights of Neighbours) – Best Environmental Practices
Islam places extraordinary emphasis on the rights of neighbours. The Prophet (peace be upon him) said:
“Gabriel kept advising me concerning the neighbour until I thought he would make him my heir.” (Sahih Bukhari, 6014)
When a person dumps refuse near a neighbour’s home or blocks drainage systems, they violate this sacred right. Such acts not only spread disease but represent injustice (zulm), which the Qur’an unequivocally forbids:
“And do not wrong one another.” (Qur’an 2:279)
By harming others through unhygienic practices, one sins against both humanity and Allah. Cleanliness thus becomes a moral expression of ihsān (excellence) toward neighbours and society.
B. The Deficit of Amanah (Trust and Stewardship)
The Qur’an teaches that stewardship of the earth is a divine trust:
“Indeed, we offered the trust (amanah) to the heavens and the earth and the mountains, but they declined to bear it… yet man undertook it.” (Qur’an 33:72)
To pollute air, soil, and water is to betray this amanah. As custodians of Allah’s creation, humans are accountable for how they treat the environment. The Prophet (peace be upon him) said:
“The world is sweet and green, and verily Allah is going to install you as vicegerents in it to see how you act.” (Sahih Muslim, 2742)
Each overflowing gutter or choked waterway is thus evidence of collective betrayal of that sacred trust. As Ofori-Atta (2019) notes, environmental ethics in Africa are inherently communal and intergenerational—pollution today mortgages the moral and physical health of tomorrow’s generation.
By Imam Alhaji Saeed Abdulai, the Author
Prayers of Complaining
Prayers of lament may look like prayers of complaining, but they can still be prayers of faith. This type of prayer declines to let God go even in difficult situations. God may seem to be absent, but He will still be with us.
Prayers of lament are honest before God and bring us face to face with Him as we do our best to understand what is going on in our heart.
Let us consider Job. He prayed deep prayers of lament when he lost everything — his family, friends, home, and health — yet he did not give up. He wrestled through prayer of lament with God and clung to Him as he sought for meaning to his struggles. He held onto his faith in God and turned to Him with all his heart. He wanted to see God in the midst of his pain – John 16:33.
Job did not let God go. He said:
“I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end He will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see Him with my own eyes—I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!” – Job 19:25–27
In the end, God gave him back so much more. Job was able to see God in a far deeper way than before his trial. Not letting go and bringing our heart to God in the midst of pain is an act of faith.
Michael Card, a well-known musician, tells us how we can learn faith from Job’s prayer of lament:
“Finally, we see in Job one of the most fundamental lessons we can learn from lament: that protesting and even accusing God through the prayers of lament is, nevertheless, an act of faith.
The lament of faith does not deny the existence of God. Rather, it appeals to God on the basis of His loving kindness, in spite of current conditions that suggest otherwise.
Job simply would not let go of God — in spite of death, disease, isolation, and ultimately, a fear that God had abandoned him.”
— Michael Card
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