For our 2016 midweek Advent worship services, we are looking at the stories of some favorite Advent hymns. St. Peter Lutheran is doing these services in conjunction with First Presbyterian Church of Greene, so I am preaching only two Wednesdays in Advent.
This sermon is from December 7, 2016, looking at the classic Advent hymn Joy to the World, based on Psalm 98.
How many of you would say Joy to the World is one of your favorite Christmas carols?
I would say it’s one of my favorite songs, and we do sing it at Christmas, but asking if it’s one of your favorite Christmas carols is a trick question, because Joy to the World is not a Christmas carol.
It’s actually written about the promise of Christ’s second coming, looking forward to the future. Some hymnals label it as Christmas, because it talks about the Lord coming, but there are hymnals that more accurately categorize it under Advent. Remember, Advent is a season of watching and waiting, of anticipating the fullness of God’s kingdom coming.
I don’t know for sure about the Presbyterians, but during Advent, the readings for Lutherans are apocalyptic lessons about the end of the world and the second coming. The season of Advent leads up to Christmas, looking forward to the celebration of Jesus’ birth, but it also looks even farther forward to the triumphant reign of Christ.
If you look at the words of Joy to the World, it’s describing the future, not the present.
Joy to the world, the Lord is come;
let earth receive her king;
let every heart prepare him room.
That’s describing the future, not the past or present. The reality of our world is that not everyone recognizes that Christ has come. When Jesus came as a baby on Christmas, not everyone welcomed him. Instead, he was seen by many as a threat, and as we’ll hear about right after Christmas Day, King Herod even tried to have him killed.
I wonder if even for us, the idea of the Lord coming sometimes feels like a threat. Sometimes I like things the way they are.
We know we should look forward to Christ’s return, but the idea of judgment day is scary, especially when we forget that the one judging is the same one who has already forgiven us. The Lord’s coming ought to be joyful, a celebration to look forward to.
Verse 3 explains a little more of what the Lord’s reign, the kingdom of God, will be like. 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.
That image of thorns infesting the ground comes from the third chapter of Genesis, from way back in the garden of Eden. If you remember the story, Adam and Eve had one command to follow: Don’t eat the forbidden fruit, but they didn’t listen. When the snake tempted them, they ate.
One consequence of their sin is in Genesis 3:17-18. God said to the man, Adam, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten of the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field.”
According to Genesis, the human condition of needing to do hard work to grow food is the result of sin. The thorns – literal or metaphorical – of life are the result of our rebellion against God.
So the promise is that when the kingdom of God is fully realized, no more will sins and sorrows grow, nor thorns infest the ground. Instead, Christ the king comes to make his blessings flow as far as the curse is found. That’s worth looking forward to!
The story behind this song is interesting as well. The composer, Isaac Watts, was born in England in 1674, and grew up in a strict Christian tradition where the only hymns sung in worship were directly from the Psalms.
As the story goes, around the age of 16, young Isaac complained to his father that the hymns were boring, had tiresome tunes, and meaningless words. His father challenged him to do better, so he started writing new hymns. By the end of his life, he’d written over 750 English hymns, including some you may know, like When I Survey the Wondrous Cross.
One of his projects was to paraphrase each of the Psalms, to make them into new songs. Joy to the World is Isaac Watts’ paraphrase of Psalm 98, the one we read a couple of minutes ago.
Even though it’s really an Advent hymn about Christ’s second coming, I love singing it as a Christmas carol, because there is no second coming without a first coming. Everything is based on that foundational Christian story of God coming and dwelling with us, beginning as a child.
Joy to the World shows the fulfillment of what Christ came to do in the first place. Jesus comes as a helpless baby, but he doesn’t stay that way. The little baby in the manger really is the king, the savior coming to reign, the one bringing joy to the world.
Amen.