Okay, it’s not new or novel to most of you who know me, but let me say it again this year, I don’t like the Christmas song, “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” AT ALL! Why? Not because I’m a yuletide scrooge, or because I think the only acceptable Christmas songs are the ones which are overly religious. Rather, it’s because the premise of the song is all wrong. We shouldn’t be singing about a merry little Christmas, rather a majestically large one!
The Scriptures tell the story of the arrival of Jesus as the arrival of redemptive sabotage. The true King has arrived and he brings the subversive power of his kingdom to hearts, to every nation, and to every sphere of life! Jesus was born to utterly reverse the effects of sin and death. Isaac Watts captured the true meaning of Christmas in his hymn, Joy to the World. You sing the line every year but have you ever pondered the meaning of these words.
Joy to the world! the Lord is come; Let earth receive her King!.. 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.
Don’t you love the ring of those words… “far as the curse is found”! There is not one square inch of the universe or one corner of your heart which is not subject to Jesus’ kingdom. Everywhere there is brokenness, Jesus is showing up to demonstrate the transforming power of the wonders of his love. One day he will return to make all things completely new, but the process has already begun… in his people and through his people.
So what do you really want for Christmas this year? Whatever it is, your desires are simply not grand enough. C. S. Lewis once said…”Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”
How about wanting and expecting Jesus to work in yur hearts this Christmas to more fully free you and me from the prison-house of selfishness and self-pity! Why don’t we ask for the privilege of bringing the shalom of our God to the broken and dark places in our web of relationships, in the community he has placed us, the vocation he has given us, and among the nations who will, indeed one day, prove the wonders of his love! Don’t have a merry little Christmas… have a majestically large one. The redemptive sabotage is under way. The subversion of grace and mercy has arrived with Jesus. That’s what I’m thinking about on a Saturday afternoon in Dallas!