Christmas and Longing

My favorite Christmas carol is “O Come, O Come Emmanuel”. It’s my favorite because it captures the longing inherent in the celebration of Christmas. I remember several Christmases where I would sit at the piano and play that song over and over again. At the time, I had my own unmet longings and the words to the song resonated with my broken little heart.

O come, O come, Emmanuel,

and random captive Israel

that mourns in lonely exile here

until the Son of God appear.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel

shall come to you, O Israel

“O Come O Come Emmanuel”

The idea of an exiled Israel waiting for someone to come and free her resonated with me. She hoped someone was coming, but he wasn’t there yet. The promise of fulfillment was there, but it hadn’t happened yet. Make no mistake about it, Christmas is about unmet longing.

The Original Unmet Longing of Christmas

What is this song talking about? What unmet longing did the people of Israel have? Well, there were a couple, actually. First and foremost, there was the promise made in the book of Genesis, in chapter 3. God promised He would send someone who would ultimately reverse the curse that had been placed on humanity as a result of sin. He would undo the work that the crafty serpent in the garden had accomplished. The relationship between God and man would be reconciled.

There were other promises too. The biggest one being for someone who would come and restore the nation of Israel to her intended glory. Israel had once been a mighty nation full of wealth, might, and the favor of God. Then, because of the people’s rejection of Him, God allowed them to be defeated and captured, exiled and scattered to foreign lands. Still, God promised in the prophets that someone would come who would restore Israel to her former glory.

More than that, he would make Israel what she had been meant to be but never was. She would be a light to the Gentile nations around her. She would be the greatest nation, God’s chosen people who would rule the world. No longer would the Jewish people be defeated and enslaved by her enemies. They would be put to shame and she would remain, victorious.

Partially Fulfilled Longings

Those two promises were the original unmet longings that Jesus came to fulfill. Jesus does fulfill these longings, but only partially. Jesus has started the process of redemption. Now, we can be restored to a right relationship with God, but we still live in this broken world.

Some of the promises made to the nation of Israel were fulfilled even before Jesus’ birth. The exiles returned from captivity. The temple was rebuilt. But they were never restored to their former glory. The nation never became the glorious nation that God talked about, a light to the Gentiles. That promise awaited fulfillment. Many people thought Jesus was going to do that, but he didn’t and he even explicitly said that he didn’t come to fulfill that part of the promise, at least not yet.

Jesus sets up the fulfillment of these promises. We know the promises will be fulfilled fully when he comes a second time. However, in the meantime, we are in the same place the Israelites were. We are waiting for something we don’t yet have. We’ve been promised that a happy ending is coming, but it’s not here yet. Meanwhile, we’re stuck in the messy middle.

What Do You Do in the Messy Middle?

What do you do in the messy middle? You wait. Sadly, waiting is not fun. It’s not comforting. It seems like it will never end. You also rejoice. That’s the message of “O Come, O Come Emmanuel”. Rejoice in the midst of the waiting because Jesus is coming, your Savior is coming.

That might seem impossible. How can you rejoice when you’re sitting here with that unmet desire? Maybe you’re waiting for love or a baby or a job or healing. There are so many things you could be waiting for.

It doesn’t matter what the thing is though. Christmas reminds you to rejoice in the messy middle. You rejoice because God is faithful. You rejoice because he provides. We can give thanks for what God will do, even before he does it, because the Bible shows us that God always fulfills his promises. That’s not an easy thing to do, but somehow, it makes the waiting easier. Maybe that’s because in order to rejoice in the midst of waiting, we have to remind ourselves of all the ways God has been faithful in the past (more on this in a past post).

Jesus did come to redeem captive Israel and all the rest of us who were captives too (even if we didn’t know it). He is coming again to restore the world to how it should be. When he returns, there will be no more unmet longings. God will wipe every tear from our eyes and we’ll no longer want for anything. That’s something we can rejoice about.

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