O come let us adore him

Today churches up and down the land as also in many other parts of the world will be singing that famous Latin 17^th century hymn, ‘O come all you faithful, joyful and triumphant….’ with its refrain ‘O come, let us adore him, Christ the Lord’.  It is a wonderfully joyful hymn, and so appropriate for Jesus when he came into our world brought great joy to our world. This joy features in Luke’s account of the birth of Jesus found in Luke 2.1-14, which for those who use the lectionary  is always one of the set readings on Christmas Day.

In the first instance, Jesus must have brought great joy to Mary and Joseph, for he was their firstborn. What’s more, Mary knew that their child was very special, for the angel Gabriel had told her that she would bear a son who would be called “the Son of God” (Luke 1.32). Similarly Joseph knew that their child was very special, for he had been told by an angel that Mary’s Son would be named “Emmanuel, which means ‘God is with us’” (Matthew 1.23). Neither could have guessed that their son would die on a cross for the sins of the world nor that God would raise him from the dead three days later. But they knew enough to be overjoyed by the arrival of their son.

But they were not the only people who experienced joy the night that Jesus was born.  The shepherds also experienced great joy as they were watching their sheep in the fields around Bethlehem. The angel of the Lord came to them with a message of good news: “I am bringing you news of great joy… to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is the Messiah. The Lord” (Luke 2.10b-11). The message, and not just the medium of the message, must have amazed them. Nobody had ever brought good news before. Indeed, they themselves were regarded by most people as ‘bad news’.  To be singled out by God in this way was beyond belief. Socially and religiously they were at the bottom of the heap. Cold-shouldered by all God-fearing people because of their lifestyle, they were on nobody’s guest list. The doors of the synagogue may have been closed to them, but not the doors of the kingdom of God. To them a Saviour was born. Here is “good news of great joy”. Nobody is beyond the pale, as far as God is concerned. God’s love is not restricted to a particular class or type of person. The ordinary as well as the important, the non-churchgoing as well as the churchgoing, all are encouraged by the love of God. It doesn’t matter what we have done. Nobody is too far gone for God. He has provided a Saviour for us all. No wonder, after visiting Mary and Jospeh and their baby. The shepherds returned “glorifying and praising God”.  There was much to celebrate.

It is in the light of this good news, that at Christmas we encourage one another by singing “O come let us adore him”. We too are filled with great joy. God came to people like us by sending his Son to be our Saviour. He is worthy of all our praise.  So, as at many an Anglican celebration of the Lord’s Supper, we sing “Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia”. God has loved us beyond our deserving.

But we do not just adore him.  We want our friends and neighbours, and everybody in our vicinity, to know what God has also done for them.  Advent and Christmas are a time for us to share the Good News of Jesus, born of a Virgin, crucified on Good Friday, and raised by God on the third day, and is now the ascended Lord, who sits at God’s right, and before whom every knee will bow and every tongue confess that “Jesus Christ is Lord” (Philippians 2.9-11). And so sing and urge all who we know and meet to come together and sing with us, “O come let us adore him”.