Sam Hardman
What exactly is Christmas joy? Maybe you haven’t used that particular phrase yourself, but you have probably heard others use it. What does it mean? The very existence of such a phrase suggests the idea that Christmas joy is somehow special, somehow distinct from other kinds of joy. Is it? And if it is, why is that so?
If you know the Christmas story as we find it in the Bible, no doubt something that comes to your mind immediately in answer to that question is the message of the angel in the second chapter of Luke’s Gospel. There, you remember, shepherds were “abiding out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.” And the angel said to them: “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.”
Precisely why the news that the angel brings is “good news of great joy” is found in the explanation he gives: “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” The angel’s news is good news and it is news of great joy because it is news about the arrival of a Savior – a Savior who is the Christ – and who is “the Lord.” The arrival of such a Savior is indeed good news.
And so, just in listening to what the angel says we have one very good answer to this question, What is Christmas joy? Christmas joy is the joy that comes with the realization that a Savior has come into the world.
But in order to understand more deeply why the message the angel brings is one of great joy, we need to see his message in a larger frame. Seven hundred years before the birth of the baby that the angel announced in the second chapter of Luke, God spoke through the prophet Isaiah of a time in the distant future. Listen to a part of what he said (Isaiah 35:5,6):
5 Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
and the ears of the deaf unstopped;
6 then shall the lame man leap like a deer,
and the tongue of the mute sing for joy.
Has anything like that ever happened in the ensuing 2,700 year of world history? Of course we know it has. In fact, the things the prophet speaks about correspond precisely to miracles that we find Jesus performing in the New Testament. In Matthew 11, when John the Baptist was in prison and beginning to wonder if Jesus really was the Christ, he sent messengers to find out.
“And Jesus answered them, ‘Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them….’” (Matt. 11:4,5)
The Gospel accounts, of which Matthew 11 is just one example, are clearly at pains to show us that the little baby Jesus, born in a manger, is indeed the One who fulfills passages like this prophetic promise in Isaiah 35:5-6. And this is not just some sort of poetic language. It’s not just metaphor. It’s not just figurative. This is literal and real and solid and true.
Now that may be intriguing, but what does it have to do with Christmas joy? Well, here’s what. It shows us that Isaiah 35 is pointing us to this Savior, Jesus. But look also at where the prophecy is going. The prophet says:
8 And a highway shall be there,
and it shall be called the Way of Holiness;
the unclean shall not pass over it.
It shall belong to those who walk on the way;
even if they are fools, they shall not go astray.[a]
9 No lion shall be there,
nor shall any ravenous beast come up on it;
they shall not be found there,
but the redeemed shall walk there.
10 And the ransomed of the Lord shall return
and come to Zion with singing;
everlasting joy shall be upon their heads;
they shall obtain gladness and joy,
and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.
That’s where this salvation – brought by this Savior – is going: everlasting joy (v. 10). Do you see how big this is? Do you see how immense – how unfathomable – this joy is that comes into the world when Jesus comes into the world? The angel in Luke 2 is not overstating the case by any means. His message is indeed “good news of great joy.”
But notice one more thing. Christmas joy is only the beginning of this joy. It is not the consummation of joy. It’s only the beginning. Christmas joy is the joy of seeing that this salvation really is real. It’s the joy of seeing that the promises really are true. It is the joy of knowing that God has not left a race of sinners – in rebellion against his rule – lost and forlorn. It’s the joy of knowing that God himself has entered human history to save us. And of course the story of the Savior and his salvation goes on through the Gospel accounts and leads to a cross – a cross on which this Savior dies. And in dying he dies taking our sins away. And then he rises from the dead – a fact which the Gospel writers also present to us as a cause for great joy – joy that can’t be taken away.
But even the resurrection of the Savior is not the fulfillment of all joy. So Christ’s birth is not the fulfillment of all joy, and his resurrection is not the fulfillment of all joy, and you have to look no further than your own life to see that this is true. There are still plenty of enemies of joy in your life every day. So here is the reality: Christmas inaugurates our joy. The resurrection assures and undergirds it. But neither one fulfills it.
We have been given a taste of joy – and it is the real thing – and yet it is not yet the full, satisfying banquet of joy that still awaits. But look at what the prophet says in the very last line of Isaiah 35: “…and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”
Even better, look at the last two lines. The prophet says:
“…they shall obtain gladness and joy,
and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”
That’s the way the ESV translates it. But Ray Ortlund says that the NIV may capture the idea even better. 1 The NIV translates like this: “…gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee away.”
In other words, the joy announced by the angel at the birth of Jesus is pursuing us – it is running after us all our lives – and it will one day overtake us – and what overtakes us in the end is unmixed joy. Joy completely unalloyed with sorrow or sighing. Joy that is all joy, only joy, always joy. Complete joy. Utterly fulfilled joy. And do you see? That is the pursuing joy set in motion at Christmas. Do we have reason to celebrate? You bet we do.
If we are seeing truly, we see that Christmas – and all that has flowed from it – shows that God does indeed love us. And he has sent everlasting joy to pursue us until it catches us, and overwhelms us, and all our sorrow, all our sighing, will flee away.
Biblical quotations are from the English Standard Version (Crossway, 2008) unless otherwise noted.
1 Ray Ortlund, Preaching the Word: Isaiah (Crossway, 2005), p. 203.