Its Christmas… again. As a preacher the celebration of Jesus’ birth and the return to the usual texts is both a burden and a delight. But Christmas and planning for a congregation has not always been so “usual” for me. In 1985 I was not even 18 yet and I was responsible for planning worship and congregational gatherings for Riverbend Baptist Church in Gainesville, GA. The Baptist hymnal provided me with the standard mix of some strange and some wonderful songs to sing as a congregation. And no doubt, the best and most enthusiastically sung carol of all was Isaac Watts’ poem Joy to the World.
Even in 1985, with the advent of Advent in a few baptist churches, I was vaguely aware that Christmas is a high context event. That mix of candles and a four-week celebration with a wreath was deemed too catholic for many, but we dove right in. We were celebrating not only the birth of Jesus as the Messiah but also anticipating the return of Jesus to reign in the new heaven and earth.
Joy to the World is literally down to earth. The hymn shouts out, “Joy to the world, the Lord has come, let earth receive her King.” With those words, Isaac Watts pulls together both the historical entrance of Jesus through the womb of Mary and the anticipated return of Jesus as a reigning King through the heavens. Jesus has come to “earth” to the “ground.” Jesus will come to “earth” to the “ground” again. Jesus is the divine seed that will inhabit Mary’s womb and reverse the fortune of adam, but He is also the seed that will transform all Creation.
Somehow our vision of loving God and loving people has not included the stewardship of earth.
The carol is full of imagery and of meaning rooted in Genesis 1-3, the imagery of the Psalmist, the incarnation and birth of Jesus, and Revelation.
Imagery of the earth, the ground and nature.
Both heaven and nature can sing.
People can sing for the reigning King.
Rocks, hills, floods and plains can repeat (echo) the sounds of joy.
Sin and sorrows grow.
Thorns infest the ground but will be displaced by the blessings of the Saviour.
The curse infecting the ground is to be removed.
The nations occupying the land display the King’s righteousness.
Imagery of Jesus, the King, the Messiah, the Saviour.
He is the Lord, the King.
People may prepare the hearts for Him, making room for Him.
He is the Saviour who reigns.
He has blessings that infiltrate every space.
He rules with truth and grace.
He causes the nations to prove His righteousness.
His love is wonder-full.
I’m so glad Christmas comes every year. Without Christmas and the week of Jesus’ passion (Easter) the church would succeed in divesting itself of responsibility for how we steward the stuff of earth. There’s nothing like Christmas to draw the church out of a sanitized vision of life with God. Jesus comes from the communion of God and takes on flesh. He takes on the form of adam, a dirt creature. Perhaps we forget that Jesus is not born in Bethlehem just to be “born in your heart.” Jesus declared His presence and ushered in the Kingdom of God on earth. He is going to accomplish it with His life, His death, and His resurrection. He is going to accomplish it through a people he builds who will pray not just with their words, but with their very lives, “Your Kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
But when we sing Joy to the World, we are invited back to the Eden Garden and forward into the new creation redeemed by Jesus. All who sing this song are invited into the grace and truth of Jesus for the stewardship of the ground and the stuff of earth as we anticipate His return and glorious reign.
Watts presents a vision of the earth and of Jesus that is continuous. By that I mean there is no interruption between us and the new heaven and earth. Those who now live with Jesus as King and Saviour are to live in all their relationships in the anticipation and joy of Jesus’ full reign as Lord. All who confess Jesus and Lord and sing this song are actually commanding nature to sing, and to acknowledge Jesus as Lord of all Creation.
Jesus calls to us in “Christ’s Mass” to pursue a fully formed discipleship in which the Gospel has implications for all our relationships: with God, with self, with people, and with the stuff of earth. I’m afraid that our relationships are malformed just as our sense of the Gospel may be malformed. Somehow our vision of loving God and loving people has not included the stewardship of earth. But when we sing Joy to the World, we are invited back to the Eden Garden and forward into the new creation redeemed by Jesus. All who sing this song are invited into the grace and truth of Jesus for the stewardship of the ground and the stuff of earth as we anticipate His return and glorious reign. As followers of Jesus the Lord of the Earth we cannot help but become environmentalists or at least sympathetic to those who are occupied with the wise stewardship of the ground.
Is it possible that everyone who sings Joy to the World has been invited, even commanded, into a life formed by the Kingdom of Jesus and His Cross? Then are we not compelled to consider the ground we walk on with redemptive and holy wonder? Can we keep ourselves from getting dirty in the science, politics, and policies of the ground for His glory?! Can we love the earth with Jesus?
Joy to the World!
Joy to the world! The Lord is come; Let earth receive her King.
Let ev’ry heart prepare Him room, And heaven and nature sing,
And heaven and nature sing,
And heaven and heaven and nature sing.
Joy to the world! The Savior reigns; Let men their songs employ;
While fields and floods, rocks, hills and plains Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat, repeat the sounding joy.
No more let sins and sorrows grow, Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow Far as the curse is found,
Far as the curse is found,
Far as, far as the curse is found.
He rules the world with truth and grace, And makes the nations prove
The glories of His righteousness, And wonders of His love,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders, wonders of His love.
Written by Isaac Watts and first published in 1719 in his collection The Psalms of David: Imitated in the language of the New Testament, and applied to the Christian state and worship.