Beginning to read a novel in the middle of the story could confuse the story. The introduction of characters would find you bewildered and perplexed. The meaning of important details would be lost. In fact, the entire conclusion of the book would be thin, if not anti-climactic and hollow. This would be the case if you only read the resolution in the closing half of a story.
Such is the case for so many people who drop themselves into the Christmas account. Why is Herod so scared? Why the singing angels, the wise men with their gifts and why the shepherds?
The Christmas account of the birth of Jesus is profound because it is the beginning of the resolution of thousands of years of promise and conflict. The baby in the manger in Bethlehem is none other than the incarnated Son of God. He is the one promised in Genesis 3 who will crush the serpent’s head. He is the perfect Noah, saving all of his family from the coming wrath and judgment of God. He is the great fulfillment of the covenant God made with Abram in Genesis 12, by whom all nations of the earth shall be blessed. He is the one prefigured in Isaac, who willingly offered his life as a sacrifice. Even Jacob pointed ahead to the baby born on that first Christmas. We could go on, but you see my point.
Christmas does not begin in the manger in Bethlehem. It is the fulfillment of everything God had ever promised. Everything from the creation of the cosmos and that which the prophets, like Isaiah, longingly wrote reaches crescendo on Christmas morning. More precisely, the fulfillment is not to be found in an ‘it’ but a ‘he’ – a person; God in human flesh.
So we at St. George’s observe Advent. In advent we look at the ways Jesus’ coming (i.e., adventus in Latin) connects the stands of the scriptures. We will spend the next four Sundays looking at the ways that the coming of the Son of God on Christmas fulfilled God’s promises. In other words, we are going to open the book at the beginning rather than the middle.
On the evening of December 9th we will meet to consider the history, theology and music of Handel’s Messiah. We have group seating for the performance of the Messiah at Roy Thompson Hall on December 19th. The scriptures chosen for the libretto of the Messiah all show how God was working out His perfect plan; a plan that began before the foundations of the earth, continuing with a trajectory that lead through Christmas, Easter, Ascension and the Resurrection of the dead on the last day.
I pray that this Advent season will deepen your understanding of the coming Christmas season. I pray that when Christmas day comes you will look upon Jesus, through the eyes of faith, and see in Him all of the promises of God (2 Corinthians 1:20). I pray that your heart will warm as your mind begins to connect the dots of the story of God’s redeeming grace. I pray that you will see Jesus as the treasure of measureless worth, and like the man in the parable, joyfully sell everything you have in order to gain him (Matthew 13:44).
