Today is Christmas Day, the day we celebrate the birth of Jesus, the Messiah, the one who
brings salvation to all who believe in him. This is a time to celebrate as the
people had been waiting for thousands of years for the Messiah to come. The
birth of a child is always a reason to rejoice and praise God, because every
life is precious as each child is born in the image of God.
Isaiah is one of the prophets who especially point
ahead to the Messiah, to the time when
God begins the next chapter in his plan of redemption and restoration of all
creation. Isaiah uses the return of Israel back to their homes after the exile
in Babylon as a picture of what kind of Messiah God is sending and what he’s
coming to do, “He has sent me to bind up the
brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness
for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and
the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for
those who grieve in Zion—to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes,
the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit
of despair.” We see God’s heart here for the captives and
oppressed, for those who mourn, and we see a Messiah will come and bring
freedom, comfort, and joy.
But we often overlook that the Messiah is also bringing “the day
of vengeance of our God.” We hear this echoed in Psalm 98, “for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world
in righteousness and the peoples with equity.” Jesus is not just any
child, this is not just a charming story, there’s a lot more to Jesus’ birth
than shepherds in a field and magi travelling to see a young child. Angels
don’t come announcing a regular child’s birth, people don’t travel for a couple
of years to visit just any child. Jesus is the promised Messiah, the one who
has come to crush the serpent’s head, to defeat Satan, to bring judgment against
evil, and punish the wicked, and to restore the poor, the orphan, the widow,
those oppressed and broken so they might flourish in the kingdom of heaven
that’s already here, though not yet fully established. The angel’s
announcement is, “I am bringing you good news of
great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a
Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.”
Our
World Belongs to God summarizes why Jesus came: Article 5. “God
holds this world with fierce love. Keeping his promise, he sends Jesus into the
world, pours out the Holy Spirit, and announces the good news: sinners who
repent and believe in Jesus live anew as members of the family of God— the
first-fruits of a new creation.” Then in Article 23 the confession reminds
us, “Remembering the promise to reconcile the world to himself, God joined
our humanity in Jesus Christ—the eternal Word made flesh. He is the
long-awaited Messiah, one with us and one with God, fully human and fully
divine, conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary.” Jesus is
both human and God, he’s someone to approach with awe and reverence, but also
the one who knows our hearts and demands our full allegiance so we don’t have
to face his judgment.
Isaiah
writes in verses 10- 11, “I delight greatly in the Lord; my soul rejoices in my
God. For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe
of his righteousness, as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest, and as a
bride adorns herself with her jewels. For as the soil makes the sprout come up
and a garden causes seeds to grow, so the Sovereign Lord will make righteousness and
praise spring up before all nations.” In these verses we
come back to our Advent focus on the images we’ve reflected on of stumps,
thorns, gardens and vineyards, of planting and growing. An important question
to ask ourselves today is “Am I part of the garden, planted in good soil so
that I can grow?” There’s this image of growth, of our spiritual growth,
here in Isaiah. Jesus and the Spirit offer us new life, to bring growth in our
hearts and souls, so that praise and righteousness spring up and flow out of
our churches and personal lives, so that the people and nations will notice
what the Lord is doing in our lives, how the presence of Jesus transforms us
and brings new life.
Peter
reminds us of who we are in 1 Peter 2:9, “But
you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special
possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of
darkness into his wonderful light.” We’re chosen by
God, saved through Jesus, filled with the Holy Spirit in order to praise and
worship and glorify the Father and the Son. We glorify God because he “has remembered his steadfast love and faithfulness”
as we read in Psalm 98:3. This same Psalm also warns, “he
is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world with righteousness and
the peoples with equity.”
The
coming of the Messiah is a time of joy and praise to God, but also a time that
points to Jesus’ return. It isn’t just a feel-good time, but also a warning to
the world that God is serious about justice and righteousness. Isaiah reminds
us that we need to be more aware of, and committed to walking the way of Jesus,
showing our love through obedience to Jesus’ way. This is not something we need
to fear as we’ve been reflecting on this these over Advent. God hears his
people’s cries, he sees our struggles and the wrong in the world, and he
responds in sending Jesus, who sends his Spirit to be in us, reminding us to
keep looking forward to Jesus’ return, as we sing with the angels, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to
those on whom his favour rests.”
We’re
challenged as we celebrate Jesus’ birth today to reflect on how
we’re growing in Christ. How are we growing in our faith and in our witness to
the world? Jesus gets to the heart of faith, to the goal of Christian living
with one two-word command, “Follow me.” Sanctification,
becoming more Christ-like, and justification, being made right through Jesus’
finished work on the cross, are intertwined spiritual realities. When you place
your complete trust in Jesus, his Spirit begins to renew you from the inside
out until the fruit of that Spirit becomes the core of our character, leading
us to become more like Jesus. We’re then equipped to become the change we seek in
the world, as the Spirit transforms our hearts, forms our habits, and becomes
our character. When this Spirit-led change takes priority in our lives, obedience
to Jesus out of love for him becomes a natural part of who we are, and we get
closer to becoming the righteous society that is God’s new creation in God’s
redemption of the world. As we go into the world, go with the joy and peace of
our Lord Jesus Christ, shaped by his Spirit.
No comments:
Post a Comment