.png)
How many of you, by show of hands, got excited last Tuesday when it was finally December 17th and we entered the season of the “O Antiphons”? (Besides our music director.) Or did you even know that during the last seven days of Advent, each day is a commemoration of one of the titles of Jesus Christ, as designated by ancient prophecies, many from the book of Isaiah?
The word “antiphon” just means something that is sung aloud, and when capitalized along with the letter O as a means of formal address—like “O Lord” or “O Queen”—“O Antiphons” are addresses sung to God during daily prayers by Christians in the Western part of the world, since at least the eighth century.
This ancient tradition could easily die, but we keep singing these as part of this beloved Advent hymn. Besides, it doesn’t hurt to take a moment to consider how we’re addressing God and what that says about our expectations of God. Sometimes we call on God when we need hope for the future, or when we’re fearful about an upcoming test, or a big decision is looming and we don’t know what to do about it, or we’re praying for peace, or we’re running late and needing a parking space—any of these events could warrant an address to God.
Emmanuel means “God with us,” so singing this song is a testimony of our trust in God’s enduring presence. Let us sing verse one.
O come, O come, Emmanuel,
And ransom captive Israel,
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to you, O Israel.
How many of you have made a Christmas wish list? Did you sit on the lap of Santa Claus and ask for these things as gifts? This may be a helpful practice for kids of all ages. Perhaps the image of a child sharing their wish list with Santa is actually not a bad image for trusting God in prayer. I believe we shouldn’t hold back from telling God what we want.
God is big enough to respond to all of our requests—whether for toys or clothes or salvation from financial debt or salvation from eternal death. If we pray for something and trust God’s answer, we may not ultimately get the exact thing we want, but we can seek wisdom and discern God’s will. God does more than grant our wishes. If we commit ourselves to wisdom, our desires may have important things to teach us. This isn’t just about providing for our needs, but building relationship with God. This is why we address God as “O Wisdom.” Let us sing verse two.
O come, O Wisdom from on high,
Embracing all things far and nigh:
In strength and beauty come and stay;
Teach us your will and guide our way.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to you, O Israel.
In times of great vulnerability, what we want is a powerful protector, God on our side. The first reading today comes from the prophet Micah, speaking about Bethlehem, a small and possibly insignificant place.
God has a habit of surprising humanity by lifting up the lowly. The same God who sustained the people of Israel as we read in the Hebrew Bible, or the Old Testament, is the same God who arrived on earth not as a powerful warrior but as a powerless human infant. When we read about Elizabeth and Mary celebrating their unlikely pregnancies, we see them as faithful Jewish women claiming their own places in the work God has always done and still continues to do.
Let us sing verse three.
O come, O come, O Lord of might,
As to your tribes on Sinai’s height
In ancient times you gave the law
In cloud and majesty and awe.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to you, O Israel.
Some titles for God, like “O Branch of Jesse,” mean little to us if we don’t know who Jesse is or we can’t imagine why we would refer to God as a “branch.”
There is an old story of the prophet Samuel who follows God’s direction to anoint the next king. Samuel is directed to enter the house of Jesse, where Samuel asks to see each of Jesse’s sons. Now this is strange, because Jesse is not royalty, and everyone knows that royalty births royalty. Jesse is the grandson of Ruth and Boaz, the same Ruth whose story gets it own entire book in the Hebrew Bible. Ruth was a foreigner from Moab, so Jesse can’t even claim a “pure” bloodline as a man of Israel. It’s as though pure bloodlines are not things that matter to God.
So there’s Samuel, in Jesse’s house, and Jesse faithfully brings forward each of his sons, who all have their own nice traits, but Samuel determines of each one that he is not the future king. Finally someone mentions the youngest son, David, who is out in the fields with the sheep, the smallest of all the brothers, so young and insignificant that he couldn’t possibly be the one? But Samuel anoints that son, David, to be king of Israel.
David, the son of Jesse, or branch of Jesse, would start the new royal line of Israel. Generations down that line comes Jesus, fulfilling the prophecy of Micah that the Messiah would come from the house and lineage of David, and would be born in Bethlehem. The Gospel of Matthew recalls these details at the very beginning of his gospel, listing the generations from Abraham to Joseph, the father of Jesus—or should we say “stepfather?” Not all of these people was perfect, and even some of the kings in that list were not good kings! But Jesus, descended from Jesse, knows where he comes from, and he comes with the power to save. Let us sing verse four.
O come, O Branch of Jesse, free
Your own from Satan’s tyranny;
From depths of hell your people save,
And give them vict’ry o’er the grave.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to you, O Israel.
Among the many things Isaiah prophesied are these things: in the ninth chapter, that “there shall be endless peace for the throne of David and his kingdom. He will establish and uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time onwards and forevermore. (9:7)”
And in the twenty-second chapter, about the future king, Isaiah writes, “I will place on his shoulder the key of the house of David; he shall open, and no one shall shut; he shall shut, and no one shall open. (22:22)”
If you have ever been locked out of your vehicle or stuck on the outside a locked door, then you know that the person with the keys is the person with the power. Keys aren’t mentioned a whole lot in the Bible, but in Matthew’s gospel, Jesus gives to Peter what he calls “the keys of the kingdom,” which is the authority to bind and to loose, and whatever he binds on earth will be bound in heaven and whatever he would loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. It is Jesus, descended from David, who has the power to do this. We sing verse five.
O come, O Key of David, come,
And open wide our heav’nly home;
Make safe the way that leads on high,
And close the path to misery.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to you, O Israel.
December 21 is the day appointed for singing the praise, “O Dayspring” or “O Morning Star.” December 21, yesterday, was the winter solstice, the day with the shortest span of daylight and the longest night of the year. Tradition says that nature and all her creatures stop and hold their breath to see if the sun will turn back from its wanderings, if the days will lengthen and the earth will once again feel the sun’s warmth.
Indeed, today, we are now past the longest night, and today the earth turns so that each day grows a little bit longer; there is more light coming into our world. This fact of our placement on the globe intersects with the truth of God’s coming into the earth, bringing light, as Isaiah prophesied: “Those who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness, on them light has shined. (9:2)” We sing verse six.
O come, O Dayspring, come and cheer;
O Sun of justice, now draw near
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night,
And death’s dark shadows put to flight.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to you, O Israel.
As the “O Antiphons” reference the ancient prophecies that have sustained the people of Israel for generations and will sustain us and those who come after us, we recognize our place in a world without end. God, the ruler of nations, the power over anything that would harm us, God comes with the power to save.
We still need this saving God. God’s children are crying out for salvation in Ukraine, in Sudan, in Gaza and the Occupied Territories of Palestine.
We join our voices with the voices of the faithful throughout time and with the faithful all over the world, testifying to the God who meets us where we are, Immanuel, God with us. Let us stand as we finish singing this hymn of the day, singing verses seven and eight.
O come, O King of nations, come,
O Cornerstone that binds in one:
Refresh the hearts that long for you;
Restore the broken, make us new.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to you, O Israel.
O come, O come, Emmanuel,
And ransom captive Israel,
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to you, O Israel.
Comments