This Sunday we will leave the season of Pentecost behind (be honest, who remembered that we were still in Pentecost?) and enter into the four-week season of Advent. The four Sundays preceding Christmas have traditionally been a time when Christians long for Christ’s coming (“advent” means “appearance; arrival; coming”)–both in remembrance of the first Christmas and also in anticipation of His promised return. Against our present-day cultural norms, this is a time of solemn darkness traditionally ornamented not by lights and holly but by hues of deep purple, blue, and pink, to represent the changing colors of the sky as night’s darkness gives way to the dawn of Christmas morning.
“O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” might very well be the most perfect Advent song, as its mournful tune and expectant lyric teach our souls to groan with a desperate longing for God to make His dwelling place here among us, setting all our brokenness aright once and for all. However, even though Advent is not, strictly speaking, a time for lights and celebration, the reality of things past (His first coming), the gift of things present (His Holy Spirit and Word), and the bright hope for tomorrow (His coming again in glory), inspire us to sing with glad hearts, “Joy to the world! The Lord is come!” We sing in faith, believing it is as good as done!
Appropriately, then, we will open this Sunday’s service with the hymn, “Joy to the World.” Be sure to click the link below to become familiar with its modernized arrangement before Sunday.
Here’s a fun factoid for you: did you know that the popular hymn was not originally written to be a Christmas song? In fact, it was not originally written to be a song at all, but a poem
having little or nothing to do with Christmas. Isaac Watts, one of the greatest hymn writers in church history, first published what we know today as the lyrics of “Joy to the World” in 1719 as a poetic adaptation of
Psalm 98. Watts rightly interpreted the Old Testament text in light of its fulfillment in Christ. He understood that Psalm 98 is about Jesus, who is the King and ruler of all the earth. More than 100 years later, a portion of his poem was adapted and set to music, giving us the Christmas carol we know today as “Joy to the World.”
Take some time over the weekend to meditate on the following words. It’s easy to let a Christmas carol like this become so familiar that we sing it by rote, without much consideration given to the weight of its message. Read Psalm 98 (linked above) and see if you can make sense of how its words and themes inspired Watts’ poetic reflection.
Joy to the world, the Lord is come;
Let earth receive her King!
Let every heart prepare him room And heaven and nature sing!
And heaven and nature sing!
And heaven . . . and heaven . . . and nature sing.
Joy to the earth, the Savior reigns!
Let men their songs employ
While fields and floods, rocks, hills, and plains,
Repeat the sounding joy! Repeat the sounding joy!
Repeat . . . repeat . . . the sounding joy!
No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make his blessings flow
Far as the curse is found!
Far as the curse is found!
Far as . . . far as . . . the curse is found!
He rules the world with truth and grace
And makes the nations prove
The glories of his righteousness
And wonders of his love!
And wonders of his love!
And wonders . . . wonders . . . of his love!
