Catch a replay of our Sunday Morning service:
"His Salvation Is Nigh Them"
Psalm 85:1-13
Years ago a new Nashville radio station offered Predators hockey tickets as the prize to the person who had the most horrendous Christmas shopping story occurring the day after Thanksgiving. The guy who won said he didn’t want to go shopping in the first place, but his wife convinced him to go with her to the mall. Arriving early, they bought a couple of cups of coffee, but in the video game section of a toy store a teenager elbowed him, knocking the hot coffee all over the front of his shirt. A little later in a department store, he reached between two women to pick up a jacket—one of the last in its size—and ended up getting kicked in the shin and kneed in the groin. By the time he limped back out to the parking lot, he discovered his car dinged both on the driver- and passenger-side doors. And in his rush to just get safely home, he was awarded a speeding ticket on Briley Parkway—the last of the day’s big-ticket items! And so it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas!
It’s officially countdown time! As soon as you wiped the cranberry sauce off your chin and cleaned off the tablecloth, you initiated Black Friday—which in turn starts the countdown of diminishing days until Christmas. That tick-tock of passing time is supposed to induce you into a buying panic and jumpstart your frenzied consumerism. And it pretty much works. It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas!
But what does Christmas look like? Is it a thousand lights plus lighted figures of Joseph, Mary, baby Jesus, shepherds and wise men, along with Santa Claus, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and his other eight companions, in addition to Frosty the Snowman, the Little Drummer Boy, the Cat in the Hat, as well as Winnie the Pooh and Tigger and Piglet—all in the same cluttered yard? Is it a man dressed in a Santa suit ringing a bell over a red bucket in front of a department store? Or is it a facial expression of a person who’s over-committed, overspent, overbooked, overeaten, overdone, overkilled, overrun, overspread, and overcome?
What are we preparing for? Are we getting ready for yet another month-long shopping spree that some have called economic first-degree murder because we willfully and with malicious forethought murder our bank accounts? Or are we preparing for the seven to ten pounds the average American will gain during the season? (Oh, Lord, please let me be an underachiever this year!) Or are we getting ready for the suicidal traffic jams at the mall or the general atmosphere of surliness and desperation? (I remember hearing about when in West Tennessee shoppers actually came to blows for the right to buy a Holiday Barbie doll!) Or are we preparing for the depression, the anxiety, and even the rage that accompanies the secular holiday season? If we allow ourselves to get caught up in the consumeristic Christmas—and I firmly believe that we in America celebrate two separate events on December 25—we can easily find that instead of getting ready to sing “O Holy Night” we will find ourselves living out one holy nightmare!
What’s the antidote? The church has its own countdown to Christmas. It’s called the season of Advent, and today marks the beginning of it. Instead of being a time of consumer manic panic, Advent is supposed to be a time of preparation for the gift of a miraculous presence. This preparation is not about decking the halls or trimming the tree. This preparation is not about baking cookies or wrapping packages. This preparation is about a truth that comes into the world, not abstract pure and antiseptic clean, but cradled in dirt and mangered in mystery.
Advent is about anticipation and expectation. But what exactly is it that we anticipate? What are we getting ready for? What do we expect to happen? Advent is like an alarm clock, a moment of truth to rouse us out of the get-by-and-keep-going stupor of this world and wake up! Wake up to the impending gift of a new beginning! Wake up to the first baby steps of the Kingdom entering this world through a stable of animals and a cradle of straw! Wake up from our dogmatic slumbers into the new light of life! Wake up to the epiphany of Jesus in the world—and in us! In a phrase, Advent means Jesus is on His way—that we have a God who comes to where we are. And so it’s about preparing our hearts and spirits to receive again the coming of the Christ child into the world—and into us.
This psalm demonstrates how we’re to make these preparations. It’s a pilgrimage psalm about the people’s journey to the Temple to meet with God. But to get to Jerusalem to do so, they had to pass through the barren Valley of Weeping. In many respects, this remains true for us today. God has designed that on our way to Him, we will have times of struggles and tears—and yes, sin as well. We will get tired; we will get weary. That’s why the psalmist prayed asking God to revive His people—to bring them back to spiritual life. For out of a bleak situation this psalm leads up to a point at which a gloriously fertile stretch of country comes into view. But we’ll never see it if we don’t keep walking and hiking and plodding along.
So this Advent season is a pilgrimage not so much to Jerusalem and the Temple as it is to Bethlehem and the stable into which our Redeemer has been born. For it is there that we find forgiveness. It is there that we find salvation. It is there that we find revival. It is there that we find mercy and grace. Look again at the words of this psalm: It is in Jesus that mercy and truth are met together! It is in Jesus that righteousness and peace have kissed each other! It is in Jesus--the Son of Man--that truth springs out of the earth! It is in Jesus--the Son of God--that righteousness looks down from heaven! Yes, righteousness goes before Him, and He shall set us in the way of His steps! For all this comes together in Jesus Christ!
The Army chaplain of the 106th Division tells the story of how he was captured in the Battle of the Bulge in World War II. Along with many other Americans, he was herded on to a freight car and taken into the heart of Germany. It was the evening of December 23. These prisoners of war were in the railroad yard of a German city when the British Royal Air Force launched a devastating attack. Many of the American prisoners were killed as well as many Germans.
The next night, Christmas Eve, the air raid was repeated. When the planes began to fly over, there was fear and alarm among the prisoners who were packed like sardines into these freight cars. The chaplain persuaded the German officer in charge to let him go up and down the line of the cars to talk to the men. As he passed by he said, “Boys, this is Christmas Eve and we are in a tough spot. But if you have your Bibles, get them out, and let’s read the story of the birth of Jesus. Do that, and you will know He is with us—even here. And if you can’t read because of the darkness, then let’s sing.”
Immediately there was a medley of response. Some sang revival songs; some sang hymns. Then a rich baritone struck up “Silent Night, Holy Night.” Almost immediately, he was joined by others. Carload after carload joined in singing the heartwarming Christmas carol. But then something marvelous happened. Other voices—German voices—began to sing the song in the original “Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht.” That night German voices and American voices blended together in praise of the Christ who came to bring all people together in peace. For it is in Jesus—the Son of Man—that truth springs out of the earth! It is in Jesus—the Son of God—that righteousness looks down from heaven! All this comes together in Jesus Christ!
So where is your Advent pilgrimage taking you? If you’re walking through your own valley of weeping today—or a valley of struggle or tears or even sin—be sure your pilgrimage is leading to the Christ child. Don’t be distracted on your way. Don’t let stuff come between you and Him. Let Him set you in the way of His steps.
Wally was big for his age—seven years old. And everyone wondered what role the director would give him in the annual children’s Christmas play—especially considering the fact that he was also a slow learner. Perhaps he could pull the curtain? But to everyone’s surprise the director gave Wally the role of the innkeeper, and the boy was absolutely delighted. All he had to learn was one line: “There is no room in the inn.” And he had that down in no time.
The night came for the program; the parents took their places; every seat in the auditorium was filled. The children entered singing, “Oh come all ye faithful,” and the lights dimmed as a hush moved over the audience. The curtain opened on the first scene. Mary and Joseph entered the stage and walked up to the inn: “Please sir, my wife is not well. Could we have a room for the night?” Wally was ready for his line; he’d rehearsed it all night. He began, “There is…” and hesitated. He started over again: “There is…” and again his mind went completely blank. Everyone was embarrassed for him, but poor Wally just didn’t know what to do. Joseph thought he would improvise and started walking away toward the stable on stage left. Seeing him leaving, Wally called out in desperation: “Look, there’s plenty of room at my house, just come on home with me.” Is there room for Jesus in your house?
Angelus Silesius summed it up in a little poem: “Tho Christ a thousand times / In Bethlehem be born, / If He’s not born in thee, / Thy soul is still forlorn.” Advent is about anticipation and expectation. So what are you anticipating? What are you getting ready for? What do you expect to happen? Where is your pilgrimage taking you?
Let us pray: Make ready our hearts, Lord, for You to be born in us—and not just this Christmas season, but on every single day of our lives. Bring together in our souls forgiveness and salvation, mercy and grace, righteousness and peace, revival and the strength to live for You. For Your sake and in Your name, we pray.
Psalm 85:1-13
Years ago a new Nashville radio station offered Predators hockey tickets as the prize to the person who had the most horrendous Christmas shopping story occurring the day after Thanksgiving. The guy who won said he didn’t want to go shopping in the first place, but his wife convinced him to go with her to the mall. Arriving early, they bought a couple of cups of coffee, but in the video game section of a toy store a teenager elbowed him, knocking the hot coffee all over the front of his shirt. A little later in a department store, he reached between two women to pick up a jacket—one of the last in its size—and ended up getting kicked in the shin and kneed in the groin. By the time he limped back out to the parking lot, he discovered his car dinged both on the driver- and passenger-side doors. And in his rush to just get safely home, he was awarded a speeding ticket on Briley Parkway—the last of the day’s big-ticket items! And so it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas!
It’s officially countdown time! As soon as you wiped the cranberry sauce off your chin and cleaned off the tablecloth, you initiated Black Friday—which in turn starts the countdown of diminishing days until Christmas. That tick-tock of passing time is supposed to induce you into a buying panic and jumpstart your frenzied consumerism. And it pretty much works. It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas!
But what does Christmas look like? Is it a thousand lights plus lighted figures of Joseph, Mary, baby Jesus, shepherds and wise men, along with Santa Claus, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and his other eight companions, in addition to Frosty the Snowman, the Little Drummer Boy, the Cat in the Hat, as well as Winnie the Pooh and Tigger and Piglet—all in the same cluttered yard? Is it a man dressed in a Santa suit ringing a bell over a red bucket in front of a department store? Or is it a facial expression of a person who’s over-committed, overspent, overbooked, overeaten, overdone, overkilled, overrun, overspread, and overcome?
What are we preparing for? Are we getting ready for yet another month-long shopping spree that some have called economic first-degree murder because we willfully and with malicious forethought murder our bank accounts? Or are we preparing for the seven to ten pounds the average American will gain during the season? (Oh, Lord, please let me be an underachiever this year!) Or are we getting ready for the suicidal traffic jams at the mall or the general atmosphere of surliness and desperation? (I remember hearing about when in West Tennessee shoppers actually came to blows for the right to buy a Holiday Barbie doll!) Or are we preparing for the depression, the anxiety, and even the rage that accompanies the secular holiday season? If we allow ourselves to get caught up in the consumeristic Christmas—and I firmly believe that we in America celebrate two separate events on December 25—we can easily find that instead of getting ready to sing “O Holy Night” we will find ourselves living out one holy nightmare!
What’s the antidote? The church has its own countdown to Christmas. It’s called the season of Advent, and today marks the beginning of it. Instead of being a time of consumer manic panic, Advent is supposed to be a time of preparation for the gift of a miraculous presence. This preparation is not about decking the halls or trimming the tree. This preparation is not about baking cookies or wrapping packages. This preparation is about a truth that comes into the world, not abstract pure and antiseptic clean, but cradled in dirt and mangered in mystery.
Advent is about anticipation and expectation. But what exactly is it that we anticipate? What are we getting ready for? What do we expect to happen? Advent is like an alarm clock, a moment of truth to rouse us out of the get-by-and-keep-going stupor of this world and wake up! Wake up to the impending gift of a new beginning! Wake up to the first baby steps of the Kingdom entering this world through a stable of animals and a cradle of straw! Wake up from our dogmatic slumbers into the new light of life! Wake up to the epiphany of Jesus in the world—and in us! In a phrase, Advent means Jesus is on His way—that we have a God who comes to where we are. And so it’s about preparing our hearts and spirits to receive again the coming of the Christ child into the world—and into us.
This psalm demonstrates how we’re to make these preparations. It’s a pilgrimage psalm about the people’s journey to the Temple to meet with God. But to get to Jerusalem to do so, they had to pass through the barren Valley of Weeping. In many respects, this remains true for us today. God has designed that on our way to Him, we will have times of struggles and tears—and yes, sin as well. We will get tired; we will get weary. That’s why the psalmist prayed asking God to revive His people—to bring them back to spiritual life. For out of a bleak situation this psalm leads up to a point at which a gloriously fertile stretch of country comes into view. But we’ll never see it if we don’t keep walking and hiking and plodding along.
So this Advent season is a pilgrimage not so much to Jerusalem and the Temple as it is to Bethlehem and the stable into which our Redeemer has been born. For it is there that we find forgiveness. It is there that we find salvation. It is there that we find revival. It is there that we find mercy and grace. Look again at the words of this psalm: It is in Jesus that mercy and truth are met together! It is in Jesus that righteousness and peace have kissed each other! It is in Jesus--the Son of Man--that truth springs out of the earth! It is in Jesus--the Son of God--that righteousness looks down from heaven! Yes, righteousness goes before Him, and He shall set us in the way of His steps! For all this comes together in Jesus Christ!
The Army chaplain of the 106th Division tells the story of how he was captured in the Battle of the Bulge in World War II. Along with many other Americans, he was herded on to a freight car and taken into the heart of Germany. It was the evening of December 23. These prisoners of war were in the railroad yard of a German city when the British Royal Air Force launched a devastating attack. Many of the American prisoners were killed as well as many Germans.
The next night, Christmas Eve, the air raid was repeated. When the planes began to fly over, there was fear and alarm among the prisoners who were packed like sardines into these freight cars. The chaplain persuaded the German officer in charge to let him go up and down the line of the cars to talk to the men. As he passed by he said, “Boys, this is Christmas Eve and we are in a tough spot. But if you have your Bibles, get them out, and let’s read the story of the birth of Jesus. Do that, and you will know He is with us—even here. And if you can’t read because of the darkness, then let’s sing.”
Immediately there was a medley of response. Some sang revival songs; some sang hymns. Then a rich baritone struck up “Silent Night, Holy Night.” Almost immediately, he was joined by others. Carload after carload joined in singing the heartwarming Christmas carol. But then something marvelous happened. Other voices—German voices—began to sing the song in the original “Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht.” That night German voices and American voices blended together in praise of the Christ who came to bring all people together in peace. For it is in Jesus—the Son of Man—that truth springs out of the earth! It is in Jesus—the Son of God—that righteousness looks down from heaven! All this comes together in Jesus Christ!
So where is your Advent pilgrimage taking you? If you’re walking through your own valley of weeping today—or a valley of struggle or tears or even sin—be sure your pilgrimage is leading to the Christ child. Don’t be distracted on your way. Don’t let stuff come between you and Him. Let Him set you in the way of His steps.
Wally was big for his age—seven years old. And everyone wondered what role the director would give him in the annual children’s Christmas play—especially considering the fact that he was also a slow learner. Perhaps he could pull the curtain? But to everyone’s surprise the director gave Wally the role of the innkeeper, and the boy was absolutely delighted. All he had to learn was one line: “There is no room in the inn.” And he had that down in no time.
The night came for the program; the parents took their places; every seat in the auditorium was filled. The children entered singing, “Oh come all ye faithful,” and the lights dimmed as a hush moved over the audience. The curtain opened on the first scene. Mary and Joseph entered the stage and walked up to the inn: “Please sir, my wife is not well. Could we have a room for the night?” Wally was ready for his line; he’d rehearsed it all night. He began, “There is…” and hesitated. He started over again: “There is…” and again his mind went completely blank. Everyone was embarrassed for him, but poor Wally just didn’t know what to do. Joseph thought he would improvise and started walking away toward the stable on stage left. Seeing him leaving, Wally called out in desperation: “Look, there’s plenty of room at my house, just come on home with me.” Is there room for Jesus in your house?
Angelus Silesius summed it up in a little poem: “Tho Christ a thousand times / In Bethlehem be born, / If He’s not born in thee, / Thy soul is still forlorn.” Advent is about anticipation and expectation. So what are you anticipating? What are you getting ready for? What do you expect to happen? Where is your pilgrimage taking you?
Let us pray: Make ready our hearts, Lord, for You to be born in us—and not just this Christmas season, but on every single day of our lives. Bring together in our souls forgiveness and salvation, mercy and grace, righteousness and peace, revival and the strength to live for You. For Your sake and in Your name, we pray.
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