I hope what I am about to say is not a “spoiler” for anyone. But I am sort of hoping that most of you have seen at least one of the many productions of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Story. Remember that scene towards the end where Scrooge is in the cemetery with the Ghost of Christmas Future? The spectre points to a gravestone he wants Scrooge to look at. Scrooge resists and protests. He has a hunch he knows whose name is on the stone.
We’ll begin tonight by reminding ourselves where our theme comes from this year. We are meditating on verses in the Old Testament that contain the Hebrew word, “hin-nay.” Hin-nay is word that would be roughly translated in English as “look” or in old English, “behold!” We might say today, “Check this out!”
We have now reached the third Sunday in the season of Advent, and from ancient times, this Sunday has been known as Rejoicing Sunday, or, in Latin, Gaudete Sunday. This Sunday’s emphasis on rejoicing is represented here in our sanctuary: if you look to your left to the banners on the wall, we have one banner for each of the four Sundays in Advent. The third of those banners shows a rose colored-candle with the word “Rejoice” written on it.
Impossible. It just does not happen. A child is not conceived and born without the involvement of a human father. Any biology textbook will tell you that. Any child support office will tell you that. Any soap opera from the 1990s will tell you that. A human child is not born without a human father. It is impossible. It does not happen, unless – unless the Almighty God has determined for it to happen.
Are there certain voices you have come to associate with this time of year? There are voices that have become iconic during this season. Maybe nothing quite gets you thinking Christmas thoughts like hearing Judy Garland sing Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. Or Elvis Presley singing Blue Christmas. Or Nat King Cole singing Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire.
In our devotions these next weeks, we are going to zero in on a little word. It is a word we don’t use much nowadays. It is the word “behold.” In the Hebrew Old Testament the word is “hin-nay’”or the related word “hen.” These words appear over 1100 times in the Old Testament. The old King James Version always translated it as “behold!”
It was a busy day in Jerusalem. It was the first day of Passover week. And since Jewish law required all Jewish men to present themselves in Jerusalem for the feast, the whole city and all of its suburbs overflowed with pilgrims who had travelled from all over the world. It was Sunday, so the Sabbath was ended, and all of these throngs of people would have been bustling about, as busy as worker ants in an ant colony.
It is hard for us to know the motivations of Simon, the Pharisee, in our text. Why did he invite Jesus to dinner? One would like to think that it was born of noble motives. A genuine attempt to get to know him better.
One of the major themes of the Gospel of John is “truth.” We see this in the very first chapter. In that section sometimes called the Prologue of John’s gospel, John tells us that Jesus came full of grace and truth (v. 14). John concludes the Prologue by telling us: For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ (1:17). John wants us to know that truth, lasting eternal truth, is to be found in Jesus.
Our opening hymn on this Saints Triumphant Sunday was a hymn called “For All the Saints.” It is a long hymn. We didn’t sing all the verses, but I would like to read for you now one of the verses that we missed:
And when the fight is fierce, the warfare long,
Steals on the ear the distant triumph song,
And hearts are brave again and arms are strong.
Alleluia! Alleluia! (CW 551:5)
