Beyond Bethlehem - Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus

COME, THOU LONG-EXPECTED JESUS

Gift-giving is one of the traditions most closely associated with Christmas. Whether made by hand, purchased in a store, or, in our modern age, bought online, gifts and Christmas cannot be separated from each other. A very quick Google search will tell you all kinds of things about the origin of gift-giving at Christmastime, but most people are divided into two camps—those who think the tradition began with pagan festivals such as Saturnalia, and those who adamantly insist that it began with the Magi giving gifts to Jesus. Regardless of which camp you fall into (if either), most likely you give some kind of gift to family and friends at Christmas.

Over the past several decades, many people have become increasingly vocal about their disillusionment over what they see as materialism and consumerism swallowing up the joy of the Christmas season. Would it surprise you to learn that even in the 1800s, people were concerned about Christmas becoming too commercial? One article I read stated that by 1860, women were already spending most of December shopping and preparing for Christmas. In 1877, a journal was published questioning what Christmas was for and lamenting over the fact that Christmas was making shopkeepers rich. And, of course, who can forget Charlie Brown, from A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965), taking dictation from his little sister for her letter to Santa which ends with her stating that if any of the gifts she’s asking for are too difficult to procure, she’ll take cash, preferably tens and twenties. Solomon was so very correct—“The thing that has been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.” (Ecclesiastes 1:9)

Admittedly, one of my earliest Christmas memories is of my sister and brothers and I waiting with almost uncontainable anticipation to be allowed into our family room where all the Christmas gifts were sitting under the tree, just waiting for us to rip into them. That was the year I was given a doll I had wanted with all the longing a little girl can muster in her little heart. A family photo shows me standing in front of the Christmas tree, dressed up in my holiday finest, holding my new doll and beaming like I had just been crowned Miss America.

Very few people I know completely despise receiving a gift. And even though we as human beings go to extremes, sometimes turning the giving and receiving of gifts into little more than a materialistic exercise or a guilt-ridden obligation, gift-giving is not inherently wrong. Neither is desiring a particular gift or waiting with eager anticipation for the gift to be given to you. In fact, anticipation and longing are often used by God to accomplish His purposes in our lives.

Throughout its often tragic history, the nation of Israel eagerly anticipated and desperately longed for a gift that God had promised to them over and over again: deliverance. One main theme throughout the entire Hebrew scripture is that of deliverance. The patriarchs of the nation (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob) cried out for deliverance, and the formation of the nation came about when the LORD delivered the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob from the oppression of Egypt. Other than Egypt, the Bible mentions eleven nations or peoples from whom the LORD delivered His people, Israel.

Amalekites – Ham
Edomites – Shem (through Abraham and Isaac)
Amorites – Ham
Canaanites – Ham
Arameans – Shem
Moabites – Shem (through Lot, Abraham’s nephew)
Ammonites – Shem (through Lot, Abraham’s nephew)
Midianites – Shem (through Abraham and Keturah)
Philistines – Ham
Assyrians – Shem
Babylonians – Ham

As you can see, all of the peoples listed were descendants of either Shem or Ham, two of the sons of Noah. Four of the peoples were closely related to Israel through Abraham. No need to wonder at family dysfunction—it’s in our blood, quite literally!

Israel had to contend with two other peoples in the centuries leading up to the birth of Jesus. The first was Greece, mentioned in Zechariah 9:13. The LORD promised to raise the sons of Israel against the sons of Javan (the ancestor of the Greek people; Javan was the son of Japheth, and the grandson of Noah).

If you remember the story of Chanukah, a small Jewish family rose up against the Greeks and began a revolution, defeating the much larger and better-trained Greek army and establishing the Hasmonean dynasty which lasted until a few decades before Jesus was born. Were the Hasmoneans, originally known as the Maccabees, the fulfillment of the promise in Zechariah 9:13? It’s entirely possible, although the Hasmoneans were most certainly not a fulfillment of the prophecy concerning the LORD’s Messiah. Simon Maccabee, brother of Judah Maccabee who had led the Jews to military victory over the Greeks, was granted the office of King and High Priest by a large assembly of priests, elders, and people of the land—a position they had no business “granting” to anyone. No indication or evidence exists that anyone sought the LORD throughout the whole process, and if they had, they would have been told that only One would be King and High Priest, and He was yet to be born.

Greece was eventually conquered by Rome, and in 63 B.C., the land of Israel also came under Roman rule after the victory of Pompey the Great over Jewish forces. The last autonomous Hasmonean ruler, Salome Alexandra, had recently died and her sons were embroiled in a civil war. Pompey established the eldest son, Hyrcanus II, as Ethnarch and High Priest. In 44 B.C., after his defeat of Pompey, Julius Caesar took a courtier of Hyrcanus II, Antipater the Idumaean, and made him the first Roman Procurator of Judea. Upon Julius Caesar’s murder, the Roman Senate designated Herod the Great (son of Antipater) as “King of the Jews.” It was shortly after Herod’s elevation to King of the Jews that Augustus Caesar declared his adoptive father, Julius Caesar, to be divine, thus making him “son of the divine” or “son of god.” Augustus Caesar was worshipped in the Roman provinces of Asia and Bithynia as “deliverer” and “savior.” And into this crazy political and religious environment, Jesus was born in the small village of Bethlehem.

As we’ve seen in previous studies, the concept of a messiah had come to mean very specific things to the first-century Jews. Passages like Psalm 2, Psalm 110, Micah 5:7-14, Zephaniah 1-3, Haggai 2:6-9, Zechariah 9, Zechariah 14:12-15, and Malachi 4:1-6 (Malachi 3:19-24, JPS) led most to believe that when the LORD delivered His people once more, it would be a day of awesome judgment wherein Israel would be exalted and the other nations brought low. The LORD would raise up His Anointed One (Messiah), a mighty man of valor in the spirit and lineage of King David, who would crush Israel’s enemies, and this Messiah would rebuild the Temple, allowing the prophecy of Ezekiel 43:1-9 to be fulfilled. Centuries of persecution and oppression at the hands of empire after empire had distilled the belief in the coming of the LORD’s Anointed One into a deep, desperate hope and longing.

The Gospel of Luke mentions two individuals who had turned their hope and longing into lives of complete devotion to the LORD. Simeon (Hebrew: Shimon, meaning “hearing with acceptance” from the root shamah, which is translated “to hear, listen, obey”) is described by Luke as a man who was righteous and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him.

Consolation is a word that is used to translate two very interesting words in Hebrew and Greek. The root of the word translated from Hebrew as consolation in the King James Version is nacham, “to pant, to groan; lament, grieve”. In Greek, the root word is para, “from, beside, near,” from which come two child words, parakaleo, “to call to one’s side, summon, console, comfort,” and the word which Luke used, paraklesis, “summons, consolation.” Put those concepts together, you get a phenomenal picture of what happened when the LORD clothed His Word in flesh and was born as a baby in Bethlehem. When Simeon was led to the Temple by the Holy Spirit, he saw the Consolation of Israel with his own eyes. He saw the One who had come to pant and groan, lament and grieve right alongside the image-bearers of the LORD. In a burst of Spirit-filled joy, Simeon declared that Jesus was the LORD’s promised salvation, the light of revelation for the nations, and the glory of Israel.

Luke tells us that no sooner had Simeon finished speaking about Jesus to His astonished parents, Anna came up to them and gave thanks to God. She, too, recognized who Jesus was and what He had come to do. We are told that she began speaking about Him to everyone who was waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, Anna realized that Jesus had come to ransom His people, to deliver them and set them free.

Anna is an absolutely fascinating woman to me. Luke gives us only a few small details about her, but she stands out in my mind as a great woman of faith. Her name in Hebrew is Chanah, which means “grace.” The root word of her name is chanan, “to be gracious, to show favor, pity, mercy.” We are told that she was a prophetess, married for seven short years before she became a widow. As it is rendered in the Greek, the information Luke writes about Anna could be interpreted in one of two ways—1) she was widowed after a seven-year marriage and was now eighty-four; 2) she lived as a widow for eighty-four years after her husband died. The latter interpretation is less likely, but if that were true, Anna could have been one-hundred and four! Either way, she was quite long-lived, even by today’s standards.

My favorite detail in Luke, however, is the fact that she never left the Temple but worshipped the LORD with fasting and prayer, day and night. Now that is a life devoted to God! How did she find food? Where did she sleep? We aren’t told, but obviously the LORD provided for her (much as He provided for Elijah). She had her heart and mind set on one thing, and that was worshipping the LORD. Looking at her life brings the words of Jesus into a much clearer focus for me. “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” (Matthew 6:33, KJV)

Sometimes it’s easy for us to overlook details in stories that we’ve heard more times than we can count. I mentioned one such detail just a moment ago. Joseph and Mary were astonished at what Simeon said about their infant son. The English word comes from Latin “to thunder.” Being astonished may be likened to the emotional and even physical impact of hearing an intense, deep, incredibly loud boom of thunder. That is exactly how the words of Simeon struck Joseph and Mary, which might not make a whole lot of sense to us. I mean, hadn’t Mary received an angelic annunciation about becoming pregnant when the Holy Spirit came upon her and the power of the Most High overshadowed her? And hadn’t Joseph been told by an angel in a dream that Mary’s baby was from the Holy Spirit? Why would their world be rocked by Simeon’s words?

In order to answer that question, we have to put centuries of tradition out of our minds. We have to look at the situation with first-century eyes, not twenty-first century eyes. What, exactly, did the angel tell Mary about the baby she was to bear?

He would be male
She would call him Jesus
He would be a great man
He would be called Son of the Most High
He would be given the throne of David
He would reign over the House of Jacob forever
His kingdom would have no end

And what did Simeon say about Jesus?

He was the LORD’s salvation
He was the light to the nations (the Gentiles)
He was the glory of the LORD’s people, Israel

When we look at those two lists, we think, “Duh. How could they be astonished at any of that?” But we have to remember that if a first-century Jew heard all the things in the first list, their thoughts would immediately go to “Messiah,” the LORD’s Anointed One. And remember what they thought the Messiah would be? The hand of the LORD’s vengeance, a great man of military might, and the one who would rebuild the Temple. THAT is what Joseph and Mary were expecting of their newborn son. Salvation through Him? Perhaps, but salvation for Israel and Israel alone. A light to the nations? No, the Messiah was meant for Israel...if the nations were to be given light, it was only for the purpose of blinding them with the blazing fury of God’s wrath. By the time Simeon got to the third point on the list, it’s entirely possible that Joseph and Mary were so hung up on the first two (especially the second one) that they didn’t even hear the declaration that their Son would be what the LORD had always intended Israel to be from the moment He snatched them out of Egypt. He would be the glory of Israel, the true Servant, fulfilling the words of the LORD spoken through Isaiah (Isaiah 49:6).

Simeon also told the young mother of Jesus that her child was destined to cause many in Israel to fall and rise again (the Greek word translated “rising again” is translated elsewhere in the New Testament as “resurrection”). He was trying to tell Mary that her son was not going to be the Messiah everyone was expecting. Jesus would fall, much to her immense sorrow (a sword would pierce her soul). But in the book of Amos, the LORD made a very interesting prophecy (Amos 9:8-11). The beginning of verse 11 could also be rendered, “In that day, I will raise up the tabernacle of David which has fallen…” Just as Jesus would cause many to fall and rise again, He would also fall and be raised up.

Through the prophet, Amos, the LORD not only prophesied the resurrection of Jesus, He also declared that He would shake His people through the nations, as one shakes sand through a sieve in order to cleanse and purify it. Then He would restore Israel, delivering and rescuing them from the hands of their enemies (Amos 9:14-15). Similar imagery was used by the prophet, Haggai. The LORD said that He would shake the nations and then the Desire of nations would come to the Temple, filling it with glory (Haggai 2:7-9). The JPS translates the phrase “Desire of nations” as “the precious things of all nations”, which is fascinating because even that phrase points to Jesus. The word translated as “desire” or “precious” is the Hebrew word, chemdah. In his teaching, “Jesus in the Old Testament,” Israeli pastor and teacher, Meno Kalisher, stated that the Hebrew word, chemdah, could be translated “cutie.” The word is used not only in Haggai but also in Daniel 9:23 and Daniel 10:11 where an angel calls Daniel precious to the LORD. Kalisher points out that the LORD was calling Daniel His precious one, His “cutie.” It is a term of great affection in Hebrew. The King James Version translates that word, chemdah, as “beloved.” Do you remember what the voice from heaven said when Jesus was baptized? Most translations render it as, “This is my beloved (emphasis mine) Son...” Although the original New Testament manuscripts were most likely written in Greek, it is doubtful that the voice from heaven spoke in Greek. It is entirely possible that the Father used the Hebrew word, chemdah, when He spoke of His Son, the One He gave in order to show the manner in which He loved.

I’ve seen a lot of posters and bumper stickers and posts on Facebook that state, in one way or another, that Jesus is the greatest gift of all. There’s even a song called, “The Greatest Gift of All,” which includes lyrics claiming that “knowing Christ is born to me” is the greatest gift of all. While I am all for expressing how we feel about Jesus, I think it’s incredibly important that we don’t relegate Him to clever phrases and beautiful songs alone. Jesus is so, so, so much more than the subject of a pithy statement. Jesus is the true King of Israel from the line of David, the salvation of the LORD, the light to the nations, and the glory of Israel. He is the Desire of the nations, the precious One, the beloved of the LORD. And even though most of them didn’t realize it at the time, Jesus was the One whom Israel had been hoping for and desperately longing for throughout their entire history.

Great shall be the glory of this last house more than of the first,

says the Lord of hosts: and in this place I will give peace,

says the Lord of hosts.

Haggai 2:9, Douay-Rheims Bible

Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those

in whom He delights.

Luke 2:14, mine

Come, thou long-expected Jesus,

Born to set Thy people free;

From our fears and sins release us,

Let us find our rest in Thee.

Israel’s strength and consolation,

Hope of all the earth Thou art;

Dear Desire of every nation,

Joy of every longing heart.

Born Thy people to deliver,

Born a child and yet a King.

Born to reign in us forever,

Now Thy gracious kingdom bring.

By Thine own eternal Spirit

Rule in all our hearts alone;

By Thine all-sufficient merit,

Raise us to Thy glorious throne.

Lyrics by Charles Wesley