Songs that Bring Hope
Good Morning Friends,
My guess is that you at some point will sing or at least listen to a Christmas Carol this season. Some will be old ones like Silent Night but others will be newer ones…secular ones. We may think about it starting with Irvin Berlin and White Christmas, followed by Let It Snow, Santa Baby, I’ll Be Home for Christmas, Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire, Silver Bells, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and now from the movie Frozen, Idina Menzel singing Let it Go! Ok Frozen is not exactly Christmas. Still there are a lot of Jews singing and writing about this very Christian themed holiday. Yes Barbara Streisand and Neil Diamond sing about Christmas too… and it may baffle some Christians, until perhaps we remember the long…long history of Jews singing. David sang. Hannah and Mary sang and yes, on the first night of Passover, after Jesus had shared his last supper with his friends, they did one last thing together before they headed out into the night. They sang a hymn. There is every reason to believe it was the Hallel—Psalms 113 through 118 but it may have been Psalm 121 or a new song. Regardless my spirit tells me they sang, as we sing at Christmas, Songs that Bring Hope.
Scripture: When they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.
Matthew 26:30 (NIV)
A song of ascents. I lift up my eyes to the mountains—where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip—he who watches over you will not slumber; indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord watches over you—the Lord is your shade at your right hand; the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all harm— he will watch over your life; the Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.
Psalm 121 (NIV)
Message: Yesterday my wife’s church circle invited the men to join them for pot luck dinner, and to decorate the three Christmas trees in the sanctuary with the symbols of our faith. The food and fellowship was great and then we moved to the sanctuary to place, on the trees, ornaments that had been handmade by church members. I noticed that many of the ornament had depicted crosses…made by crossing thread upon thread. When we were finished we turned on the tree lights and dimmed of the house lights. Then we took seats in the pews and sang the song, O Christmas Tree. And yes I know there were no Christmas trees at Christ’s birth. And yes the concept is a bit pagan but the third verse of the song, kind of connected the dots for me, helping me to make sense of this tradition and to better understand the merit of all these new songs and traditions. It reads:
O Christmas Tree, O Christmas tree,
Your beauty green will teach me
That hope and love will ever be
The way to joy and peace for me.
O Christmas Tree, O Christmas tree,
Your beauty green will teach me.
So, today as I contemplate Christ’s birth and new songs and the ever present hope of Christ, I find myself reading the Psalmist Gospel… David’s Good News that God is the omnipotent and self-existent One. Here I read that it is God who preserves His people… that we, grafted onto the rootstock, will have everlasting salvation. I imagine it as a song about a tree! I experience it as a song that is the character of Christ….Jesus….the keeper of the faithful….the ever present influence of the shadow of a great tree…a great rock in a weary land. He is our shade… when we are under His wing. Here we need not fear the shifting shadows of our minds. If we know the source of where our help comes, we can look to the Lord and learn that His life does not caste a shifting shadow. His light obliterates those things that do. Even in the unnatural darkness of the crucifixion there is the promised hope of resurrection. Here we take note that the Lord is our helper, that He is our keeper….that He is our preserver, that by the grace of God…Jesus is God with us.
Friends, you can always count on Jesus. He looks at us with the desire to make us into children of God. He sings with us through scripture and in a still small voice of the Spirit. He illumines our spirit in the lights on a Christmas tree. He calls us to be part of His forgiven family in a new song and new traditions. Friends, know that Jesus is praying for us right now pleading our case before the Father in the key of love. Here He answers the desires of our hearts to repent and to be faithful to His will. He forgives us. He protects us. He supplies us. He cares for us. He loves us. He loves us. He loves us. Yes He loves us no matter what. He loves us in the good times and the bad times. And when finally we begin to follow Jesus we discover that God does not caste a shifting shadow but sings light into our soul.
From where does our help come? It comes from the Spirit of Jesus. And that is hope worth singing about in any season.
Pray that we lift our eyes up to the Lord. Pray that we hear God’s still small voice. Pray that we believe in our hearts that He can and will save us if we but ask. Pray that we repent… trust …serve…and sing His praise. Pray that we allow the Lord to have His way with us. Pray that we stand firm in His love. Pray that God is with us.
Pray that Christ is closer than our shadows. Pray that we are afforded the shade from the scorching rays of the sun in Christ’s tree. Pray that under His shadow we may sit with delight and assurance. Pray that we are called from the earthly shadows of our life into the light of a relationship with Jesus….the very same Jesus who became sin so we might be saved… the very same Jesus who was born so we might see. The very same Jesus who sang of hope so we might find harmony.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 