O Holy Night--Part 2

Truly He taught us to love one another,
His law is love and His gospel is peace.
Chains he shall break, for the slave is our brother.
And in his name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we,
All within us praise His holy name.
Christ is the Lord! Then ever, ever, praise we,
His power and glory ever more proclaim!
His power and glory ever more proclaim!

We return to O Holy Night because there is so much richness in each verse. The third stanza is my favorite because the author spells out not only what the birth of Jesus means for us personally, but also the power of the gift to this broken world. He describes not just the holy night, but the shalom that Jesus ushers in with His life and ministry. The power of our Servant King, the Son of God, the Bearer of Good News showing up on our doorstep brings us once again to our knees.

First, we see that Jesus taught us what it looks like to love one another. Jesus lived a life in which He loved each person He encountered perfectly. Sometimes it looked like not casting a stone, but protecting an adulterous woman from an angry mob, gently telling her to go forth and sin no more. Sometimes it looked like healing a woman who had been bleeding for 12 years, and acknowledging her in a crowd of those who had deemed her untouchable. Sometimes it looked like causing loved ones to wait for healing or redemption, like Mary and Martha as they grieved over the death of their brother Lazarus. Sometimes it looked like raising a man from the dead, as He did with Lazarus. And sometimes, as with the Pharisees, it meant speaking the harsh truth that their hearts lay empty, that their good deeds were selfish, and they did not, in fact, love others or God. Jesus comes to teach a course in Love Your Neighbor 101, and we are privileged enough to sit in on the seminar. In His life He embodies selfless love like we have never seen or known, love that sets aside any selfish concerns and instead embraces the tender needs of others. Truly He taught us to love one another.

His law is love. Oh how I love this line! In a world where law and rules get such a bad rep, this line reminds us that the laws of Jesus are pure love. It is love that sets hedges around us so we don’t wander into the dangerous streets. It is love that says no to some things so that we might enjoy the richness of others. It is sweet love that leads us in the ways of righteousness so that we might know true freedom. Just as a loving parent creates rules for their children, seeking to protect them from harm, whether physical or emotional, so God sets His law around us. His law is love, and when we see that His heart for us is love, we experience such freedom and joy! We do not begrudge the things we are told not to do, but instead we rejoice in God’s beautiful protection of our hearts and lives. His law is love and so we rejoice in His law.

And thus His gospel is peace. In knowing the Good News, both that the law is to protect us, and that Jesus’ blood allows us to stand in the presence of God in our failure to live out the Law, we can rest. We need not strive to constantly perfect the law, we need not fret constantly about which ways we’ve fallen short today. Instead we look at Jesus and know that His death and resurrection gave us His righteousness, His perfection. Because He came, and lived, and died, we can live without needing to please our Creator. Because He came, and lived, and died, we are at peace with, united with our Creator. While our sinful souls once warred against the laws of God, we now find our souls at peace with the laws He has set forth. We find that Jesus has gifted us with His righteousness; we need not fight to do good, for good has already been done on our behalf. We are free from striving.

So we now know that chains shall He break, for the slave is our brother. We are no longer chained to our sin, to our selfish desires. We are no longer in bondage to our desire to please a Holy God. We no longer have to prove anything to anyone. We no longer have to feel we need to work for love and approval. All of these things are given freely. Freely! Our chains are broken! We can get up and run free! And yet, for some reason, we often still sit in on the floor, holding onto the chains that have already been shattered. We allow ourselves to still be bound to a need for approval or a desire to be enough or even to a sin that still appeals to our flesh. We forget that our Savior, our brother, who knew the pain and anguish of this world, who knew the exhaustion of temptation, demolished the chains on the cross so very long ago. We are free. We are free. We are FREE! This is the gift He gave to us on that night in Bethlehem.

Oppression shall cease! The cruelty of this world, the unjust treatment of a world chained to sin, will be no more. In the birth of Jesus, we know that the oppression of our souls by sin will end, and when Jesus comes again we will know in full that the oppression of every earthly thing shall cease. Sin will no longer reign, evil will no longer have a say, sorrow will be a distant memory. Sadly, we are not there yet, but our souls are. Because of Jesus we can taste the goodness of freedom from oppression within our hearts, and we can seek to share that taste with the world. We can scream Look at me! I know freedom, I know joy. It comes from being delivered from sin, from evil. Come and see what Jesus has done for me. You’re next! The world is next! Oppression will come to an end! Thank you, Jesus, for the promise that our world will not be this broken forever! Thank You that You are the salve to our gaping wound. 

And there it is—our sweet hymn of joy, in grateful chorus raise we. Let all within us praise His holy name. Everything within our being cries out for freedom from oppression, every ounce of our broken hearts calls for freedom from this aching world. And then, in one amazing night, God responds to our cries and sends His son. Jesus has come. He has taught us to love one another in a world full of hate. He has taught us to trust in the goodness of His law. He has shown us incredible peace in the Good News He brings. He has brought the end of oppression to our souls. And the weary world rejoices, we raise a grateful hymn, we are full of joy. All that is within us cannot help but praise Him. The power which broke our chains, and the glory which gave us His righteousness is something we will ever more proclaim. We can’t help it! He has given us freedom, and for that a lifetime of thanks just isn’t enough.