Come Thou Long Expected Jesus | Joy To The World

All right, well you can open up your Bibles now if you've got uh that handy and next to you on your phone or you've got uh a hard copy version.

By the way, if you don't have a copy uh of God's Word, if you don't own one, we've got uh a bunch of them at the back right now.

You can head your make your way back to the back, and Kevin will have uh we'll hook you up.

He'll give you one of those, and uh you can keep that, you can take that home as our gift uh to you.

But if you would grab that now and uh and turn to Isaiah chapter 9.

Isaiah 9 · chapter mention

Okay, we started out our our Christmas series, uh Come Thou Long Expected Jesus, last Sunday, and a kind of a mini two-part series.

We're gonna be finishing off, uh finishing off in uh verses uh four uh to seven uh here today.

Now, um as you get to know people and and listen to them talk long enough and start to hear what they value, it becomes pretty clear that what the human race wants most in life, generally speaking, I think, uh, is happiness.

Have you noticed that?

Have you noticed that that's kind of the cry of people's hearts?

And actually it comes out of their mouth as well.

I mean, we hear statements all the time like, man, I just want to be happy.

You know, or or maybe someone has said to you, hey, just just do whatever makes you happy.

Or perhaps you've heard or have even said, as long as you're happy, that's that's what matters most.

That longing runs deep in all of us.

It's it's a universal longing.

And and it's not something that we just hear from the world, it's something that we hear from the unchurched and we hear it from Christ's followers as well.

Now the Bible, the Bible describes that that inner longing really as the desire for joy.

Okay?

Which you could call, I would, I would kind of call it a joy, a more robust version of what we might think of when we think of happiness.

Because happiness depends on our circumstances.

It depends on our circumstances being good or or favorable.

So for example, if you know, if I've got money in the bank, I'm happy.

Right?

If if your dating life is good, you're happy.

If your career is on a trajectory and it's going really well, that brings happiness into your life.

And conversely, if those things aren't going so well, um, there's a lack of happiness.

Right?

Happiness is produced by external factors such as these, that you and I might deem uh positive or or or beneficial to our lives.

And if, or you might even say, when, okay, when those factors and those circumstances change for the worse, so does our happiness.

And so up and down and and round and round we go on that roller coaster, right?

Pursuing happiness, and all of it just seems, I think at times, so temporary and and certainly so elusive.

Okay, joy, on the other hand, it does last.

Because it's produced by the Holy Spirit.

Okay, God Himself, do you know this?

He forges joy within us.

Okay, and unlike happiness, our joy is not dependent on our circumstances.

Okay, all throughout the scriptures, all throughout uh human history, we see examples, maybe we've experienced this as well, examples of Christians experiencing immense joy even when external factors and our external situations are dire or unfavorable, sometimes downright awful.

Okay, so joy, if you think about it this way, it actually, it actually transcends our life experiences, our circumstances, and even transcends happiness itself.

And that, in many ways, is what Christmas delivers.

It's the news that Jesus came to bring joy to the world, right?

We just sang that.

However, you and I, as the church, as believers, oftentimes we aren't really shooting for joy.

We're aiming more for the knockoff version called happiness.

And we we get kind of mixed up about this, and we we we tend to kind of blend that that aim, that goal for happiness into our walk with the Lord, where we can begin to treat Christ as our very own like personal happiness genie, if you will.

Right, where we think, like, oh, he's good, right, and and he's God, therefore he should be giving me, granting me the happiness that I that I want.

He should be making my life better in all the different ways that we might determine that it needs to get better.

Right?

Only Jesus, he came to do infinitely more than that.

It's not to say that our our happiness and our circumstances are are unimportant to God.

That's that's not true.

It's just it's just not his ultimate goal.

Okay, and so for us, if you think about it, happiness is actually a real low bar to aim for.

Christ came to bring us joy, right?

And joy everlasting.

Just last week we looked at Isaiah chapter 9, and the last verse we looked at there was was verse 3.

Isaiah 9 · chapter mention

Take a look at that now.

If you've got your Bible open, it says this.

It says, You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its, what's the word?

Joy.

Right?

They rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil.

Okay, joy is what the what the birth of Christ ushered in to his creation.

It's what you and I, it's what the church celebrates at Christmas, and certainly what we're gonna celebrate here this morning.

And so we're gonna read this, but uh, as we do that, I'm gonna have you actually stand for the reading of God's word.

It's been a little while uh since we've done that.

So I join you to, or I ask you to join me in stand, and I'm gonna read this here, Isaiah uh chapter nine, starting in verse four.

It says, For the yoke of his burden and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken, as on the day of Midian.

For every boot of the trampling warrior in battle tumult, and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire.

For unto us a child is born.

To us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Of the increase of his government and of peace, there will be no end on the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore.

The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

Lord, as we just read and as we you know start to wrap our minds and our hearts around this, God, it is so clear as to your incredible love for your creation.

Lord, it's just so amazing as we think about how these words were written seven centuries before Jesus Christ was born in the manger, Lord.

We see your plan to come and rescue.

We see your plan was to come and bring joy to the world, and Lord, in that we rejoice.

Lord, I pray as we work our way through these verses, Lord, it would not simply be this academic study, Lord.

I pray that it would not uh merely be just the same old thing we do every single Christmas, Lord.

I pray that our joy would be stirred up because we see that you have come.

And Lord, you have come to bring us great joy.

God, I pray that as we end 2019 here in the next week or so, I pray that as we get set to launch a brand new year, Lord, I pray that our joy would grow like never before.

Lord, I pray again that we would not get this confused with mere happiness, Lord.

I pray that that we would not just look to earthly circumstances to get better so that I can feel better about things.

Lord, I pray that our joy would be anchored and our Savior would be anchored in the one mighty true God.

Lord, I pray that in that we would see our joy transcend our experiences.

Lord, only you can create this, Lord.

We are not we are not strong enough to to forge this within ourselves.

We so we look to you.

And God, we ask that in all of it, uh Jesus Christ would be glorified.

God, we want it to be about you.

Lord, we struggle in this.

And so, God, have mercy on us today, Lord.

I pray that you would tune our hearts uh to be uh filled uh with the joy of our Savior.

We pray all this in Christ's name.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, you can take a seat, and uh as you're doing that, here's the first thing here today.

If you're a note taker, and we're gonna have it on the screen, of course.

It's this Jesus brings joy to the world, assuring me of his absolute victory, as unlikely as that sometimes seems.

Now, again, you might remember uh just last week when we looked at uh Isaiah, we we talked a little bit about where uh Israel was as a nation at the time that this was written.

You remember they were they were very much uh divided.

Okay, so you had you had Israel as the northern kingdom, you had Judah and Jerusalem.

They were they were the the southern kingdom, and and there were some unholy alliances going on.

Israel was kind of teaming up with the Syrians to you know wage civil war on Judah, and Judah was looking to the Assyrians to come and rescue them, and so you know that was kind of uh a mess on a political level, but mixed in with all of this was just this deep, long-standing disobedience of God.

They were not following him, they were not looking to him as their leader and as their ruler, they were looking for uh earthly kings to provide them with what only God could provide them.

And so things were not good, let's put it that way.

But God's heart was not at all to leave them in that state, leave them struggling and leave them suffering, but rather to bring them his people and and and really all mankind.

We looked at three different things, didn't we?

We looked at how he brought them uh hope.

Right?

He came to bring them and shed light on their situation, and and of course, also to bring them joy, which is of course what we'll continue to see today in the verses that we're looking at.

Now, all of this was to come through the promised Messiah.

Now, the specifics of what this joy was gonna look like all get fleshed out here, uh, starting in verse 4.

Take a look at that again.

It says, For the yoke of his burden, okay, so this is talking about Israel's burden now, because of the kind of the mess that they put themselves in.

For the yoke of his burden and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you, now talking about God, you God, have broken as on the day of Midian.

I'll come back to that.

For every boot of the trampling warrior in battle tumult, and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire.

Yeah, that sounds kind of heavy, doesn't it?

Well, this is speaking, first of all, to the immediate context that Israel found themselves in.

The need for relief from political enemies.

It says there that God will break that yoke of burden.

That staff used to strike Israel's shoulder, the the rod of their oppressor.

It says again, the the every boot of the trampling warrior in battle tumult, talking about their enemies, right?

And every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire.

This is a, I would say, a very dramatic picture of God sweeping in to do nothing less than absolutely demolish Israel's enemies in triumphant and ultimate victory.

Okay, the intended reaction here, as the people are hearing this prophecy from the lips of Isaiah, would be like, wow! I can't wait for that.

Like, bring it on, Lord.

This is what we want, this is what we need.

Now, there's that reference in there.

I said we would come back to it in verse 4 of this happening, you see it?

As on the day of Midian.

Okay, this is uh it's an important detail because it's a reference to Judges chapter 6 and chapter 7.

Judges 6 · chapter mention

If you want to write that down, I encourage you to read it at some point, and it's it's the story of Gideon.

You remember that guy?

And the story of Gideon.

So, so at the time, uh Israel was in a kind of a similar situation uh as they were uh now in this time, as we're reading it in in Israel.

They were being heavily oppressed by the Midianites.

They would come in, they would swoop in, they would take the best of their of their grains and their livestock, and it says that they were hard, they were hard-pressed.

It was it was dark days.

And then, you know, this this man Gideon enters the scene, and I don't know if you know much about him, but uh he's kind of a wuss.

Right?

He he's just he's just not he's like not the ultimate leader at all.

He's got he's got he's got big time fear, he he kind of doubts the Lord, he keeps testing him and all that, but it's kind of interesting all throughout that.

The Lord just he just works with them and he shows so much patience and he says, I'm gonna come and I'm gonna use you to rescue uh God's people and to deliver you from the hand of the Midianites.

And so he he gets him to gather the troops and thousands and thousands of men, and and God says, Yeah, that's not that's not really what I'm looking for.

And so remember, he like whittles them down, down and down and down until they got 300 uh men.

And sometimes this has been, I believe, wrongly taught that these were like the best of the best, and God didn't, you know, God didn't want certain men, he wanted these specific type men.

That's that's not what it's talking about.

The point of that story is not to be like, wow, look how awesome these 300 guys are.

The point is to show how amazing the Lord is, and how he doesn't need us, he doesn't need some mighty army to wreak havoc on the enemy.

And so that's exactly what God does.

And he used these three hundred uh these 300 men and in a very unique way um creates this victory, wins the day for Israel as unlikely as it all seemed in that moment.

Well, hey, as unlikely as all that would have seemed for Gideon and and for Israel back uh back then, it would have seemed the exact same for Israel here in the passage that we're that we're reading today, right?

Their their circumstances were like less than ideal.

Can we put it that way?

We've said it a lot already.

Okay, but here in this we see the promise of joyful victory that that God would accomplish.

Okay, not because of them, not because of their strength, certainly, not because, not certainly not because of anything that they that they deserved.

If anything, it was it was despite their their foolishness, despite their clear and obvious failures.

This victory that God promises is is a it's a gift of grace.

And this prophecy through through Isaiah was to assure them and cause them to cling to their God, regardless uh of what things look like on the national and political landscape.

Now, of course, we know this, that this isn't just talking about national victory for for Israel at this moment in history.

Right?

This promise was to point ahead, right, to the to the ultimate assurance of of a savior who would come and bring bring victory for all humanity, all mankind, okay, spiritual victory over the devastating, I mean I'll just use the words here in the verse, uh the the burden, right, the the oppression, the the trampling boot of not just worldly earthly enemies, but but our sin, right?

That causes spiritual separation from from God and and spiritual death.

Hey, through Christ's birth, victory over sin and and over Satan, it's it's assured, right?

It's guaranteed.

Take it to the bank.

Hey, relief is is coming.

And what God is saying through all this is it's it's going to be absolute.

It's going to be complete, it's going to be total.

And because you and I, we read this on this side of history, we have the the privilege and the benefit of knowing that, hey, that it actually all happened.

Right?

That the promise has been fulfilled.

Joy to the world, the Lord has come.

Right?

It's it's done.

The unlikely, from a human perspective, anyways, actually came to be.

Now here's the thing, church.

If you don't have your eyes on Christ, and you aren't being refreshed by the by the truth and the the astounding reality of our of our salvation and and the joy of the gospel and what Christ has done and what what he continues to do in your own personal relationship with him.

And instead, you've got your eyes kind of locked on the world or or on your your your circumstances or just on yourself kind of turned inwards.

Listen, all of this talk of joy and absolute victory and all of that that we're talking about here today, it's all gonna seem kind of foreign to your experience.

Because in your heart and and in your mind, you've neglected focusing on the right things.

Other things have captured your attention, other things have captured your admiration.

And as a result, when we do that, you lose the joy of the gospel, which is like so critical for us, it's a massive need for every Christ follower in this crazy life, right?

We need that joy.

When our attention and and when our affections, which come from the heart, right, when when they shift away from the the joy of God's victory through Jesus, and our eyes lock onto other things, anything you know, other than Him.

That joy and that sense of victory that you and I are supposed to carry with us throughout daily life, it just kind of evaporates.

Have you noticed this in your life?

Pretty quickly we forget about it and we don't care.

And optically, from a human perspective, victory in Christ can become a you know a pretty ho-hum thing to our hearts.

We we don't really care.

Maybe for you, it even kind of feels kind of unlikely.

You know, as as the doubts have crept into your into your mind as as to what God's done and what he continues to do and what he promises to yet do.

Listen, if you get your eyes off of Jesus, don't be surprised when victorious joy just feels out of reach.

That's just what happens.

And your your mentality and and your attitude and all of it just begins maybe to start to reflect more the doom and gloom of uh of the world and everything that you see and read on the news or or you see online.

If your eyes are more on your particular life situation, maybe it's your your goals and and your dreams, and you know you're really living for today and and you're living for now instead of eternity, instead of for the Lord.

Don't don't be shocked when when that ends in emptiness.

Don't be shocked when there's an absence of joy in your life and you're looking for it's just not there.

You're never gonna find it in those things.

That's why celebrating the birth of Jesus and and understanding what that means for us and what it's all about at this time of year is just it's so critical.

It's so important for us.

Because it provides you and I, which is this golden opportunity, even right here now, as we're working through these verses, just to just get ourselves refocused.

To hit the reset button, to kind of zero in on what it all means for us.

Joy.

Because our victory is secured.

It's accomplished through the actualization of God's plan to save through this baby born in a manger.

And as that soaks into our hearts and it soaks into our minds, it brings us the right perspective.

The right perspective to our to our circumstances.

It's not to say that you'll never feel pain.

It's not to say that you'll never be affected by that.

But you'll realize those circumstances working out is not the be-all and end all of what of what life is.

It's about glorifying Christ.

It's about Him.

And I can do that whether or not my situation is good or bad.

No longer does victory seem unlikely because we've got our eyes on Christ and we know that the victory has already been secured.

And it will it will culminate epically at Christ's second coming, which we look forward to.

Right?

Victory is here.

The birth of Jesus tells us that.

And we've got even more coming.

Right?

That's joy.

Here's the second thing.

Jesus brings joy to the world, assuring me of his loving rule.

The security that I desperately long for.

Verse 6, take a peek at that now.

Follow along.

Verse 6 says, For to us a child is born.

To us a son is given.

And the government, literally that means rule or dominion, the government shall be upon his shoulder.

And his name shall be called.

We're so familiar with this, we hear it this time of year so many times.

Wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Now this great verse reveals, I think I think, kind of two core things.

Okay, first of all, first of all, that Jesus has and possesses ultimate rule and dominion over all.

If you tend to, I don't know, think of Jesus as merely an accessory to your life, you know, if in your mind and in your relationship with God, you, you know, you think that he simply functions as a as a consultant, you know, uh to go to from time to time as needs arise, or or if he really exists to smooth out all the bumps of your life so that you can better establish your own rule.

Well, listen, if that's if that's your mentality, if that's your your overall attitude towards your relationship with Christ, then listen, you don't understand the gospel and you don't understand the Bible.

Jesus isn't some kind of like bolt-on attachment that you add to your life to you know slightly or largely modify it or or upgrade it in you know in the different ways that you want.

Like, like you know, you might like add a you know an external battery pack to your phone to improve its battery life.

No.

Jesus came with with all the rights and the responsibilities of total and universal rule and and dominion upon, what does it say?

His shoulder.

It's on his shoulder, it's not on ours.

Jesus isn't some butler that we summon as needed.

Okay, he is the preeminent sovereign king.

He happened to come as a child.

He came as a son to rescue and put on display the authority and the rule that that he's always possessed.

It's amazing how often we need that reminder that we submit to his rule, and not the other way around.

And that's the first thing that we see here.

We see that he came to rule.

The government is upon his shoulder.

Secondly, we see what kind of ruler Jesus is.

Will he be an oppressive dictator?

Right?

Will he be a bumbling fool in this leadership role?

Will will he will he let us down?

Like what kind of leader, what kind of ruler is is Jesus gonna be?

Or or is he?

I mean, those are the kinds of things that describe the kind of leaders that we're familiar with, human leaders throughout history and today.

But again, look at how this describes him.

It starts off by calling him wonderful counselor.

This is the picture, or the picture that comes to mind here is a ruler with infinite, endless wisdom.

Right?

A God who who we can come to when we don't know what's up from what's down.

It's a God, a counselor who who loves us, who cares deeply for us, uh a ruler that we can trust and is approachable through through prayer and through study of God's word, a counselor who knows uh what's best for us and and will give that to us.

He's the wonderful counselor.

It also describes him as mighty God.

Now, we've talked about this before at our church, but but Jesus uh had two natures.

Okay, he had a human nature and a divine nature together.

And and we actually see both of these reflected in this very verse.

Right?

The first part it says, for to us uh a child is born.

So we know there that he was physically in human form born of the Virgin Mary.

Right, so there's his humanity, now right there in the verse.

And then just a few words later, he's being called mighty God.

So there's his divine nature.

And obviously, within this title here, there's a there's a clear sense as to his strength.

Is he weak?

Is he unable?

No, he's he's mighty, right?

Mighty God, meaning that he is he's able, he he's strong enough to bring the joy that he promises.

Right?

He's strong enough to save, he's he's strong enough to make all things new.

He's he's he's strong enough to to transform this world and and do what he wants.

He's he's not powerless to accomplish any of these things.

He doesn't he doesn't need our help.

He doesn't need our brilliant advice to help him out along uh along the way.

He's got this, right?

He's in control, he's he's mighty God.

Next up there it says that he's everlasting Father.

Now let's just be real clear here.

This isn't a reference to the first member of the Trinity.

I think sometimes we can be a little bit confused here.

You know, you got uh God the Father, right?

God the Son, uh God the Holy Spirit.

Okay, so remember, Jesus is Jesus is Jesus, right?

He's God the Son.

So he's not also at the same time somehow uh God the Father.

That's that's not what this is referring to here.

When it calls him the everlasting Father in this case, it's revealing what he's like.

All right, so he is the he's the ideal or or prototypical father figure that you and I, we all need and we desire.

He's the type of father who who protects his children, right?

Who gathers them around and keeps them safe.

He's he's the kind of father who knows what's best for his children, provides for them.

He deals fairly, he deals, he deals justly with us.

He's one with whom intimacy is shared.

Jesus is a is a father to his church, to to those he saved.

It says there that he's described as as everlasting, meaning that he he doesn't wear out.

How cool is that, right?

He doesn't grow tired.

He doesn't change ever in any way.

His nature, his his character, it's perfectly consistent throughout all of time and beyond that.

You and I, we can we can rest knowing that he is absolutely rock solid in every single way imaginable.

He's never gonna like you know deal with us fairly one moment and then you know later on deal with us unfairly.

Okay, when he when he promises something, we can believe that he's telling the truth.

And he will deliver every single time, right?

He's everlasting.

Lastly, what is he called?

It says Jesus is the is the Prince of Peace.

Love that.

He's come to bring to bring peace, bring harmony, not only to the Jews and and with their you know their enemies there, the Assyrians and all of it, but but to the world.

And again, not mere national security, but but spiritual peace between God and man.

Right?

The war that that exists between God and man that our sin has created, there's now a truce through Jesus Christ.

Peace has come.

And it was through his birth, and it was through his ultimate death and resurrection.

Clearly we see here that the joy we have in our Savior lies not only in what he'd come to do, which was to rule, but but in the kind of ruler that he is.

Loving.

You look at all this, you're you can't help but come away with the fact that God loves me.

That's amazing, right?

He's a loving ruler, which should fill you and I with what?

Joy.

Right?

That that's that's what we should be feeling.

We should be feeling voy and joy, and even specifically inner security.

Right?

The inner security that we all long for desperately.

On a fundamental and very basic human level, it's what we all crave.

Right?

And it's what we all look to in our idols.

Don't have you realized that?

You know, some of us we have the idols, uh, you know, the idol of having a certain body type, right?

If only I could you know lose the weight.

If only I could get chiseled in the gym.

And maybe you haven't really, you know, fleshed it out in your mind, but what your heart is looking for there is security.

Right?

Then I can walk out in public, then I can you know wear a bathing suit in the summer and feel secure.

Right?

It's that security that we're longing for there.

And so a certain body type can become an idol.

It's for you, maybe it's your financial portfolio.

It's like blood, sweat, and tears.

I've poured it into this because I want to feel secure.

I want my family to be secure.

Maybe it's your spouse in some ultimate rock, you know, bedrock sense, you're looking for security through your spouse.

They need to fill me with that longing and that desire.

And you experience the disappointment when that's not the case.

Listen, in all of these, these are just a couple of examples here, but in all of these, our hearts are screaming, security! Gimme, gimme, gimme, right?

We just want more and more.

Revealing the deep insecurity that we all have, that we all feel deep down, apart from God fulfilling that need through Himself.

So, hey, as we're all now neck deep in the Christmas season and as the various insecurities that you and I all have that, you know, as they come bubbling to the surface, you know, in the myriad of ways that they do this time of year, focus on the incredible inner security that Christ's loving rule brings you.

Learn to tune your heart to this.

To love him as a response, to be grateful for the fact that he is your wonderful counselor, he is your mighty God, he's everlasting Father, He's Prince of Peace.

Right?

He is those things is intended to heal our insecurities, to make us joyfully, wonderfully, amazingly secure in him.

That's something to celebrate.

Here's the last thing Jesus brings joy to the world, assuring me of his eternal promise, his kingdom established forever.

Verse 7, take a look at that now.

It says, and of the increase of his government, again, rule, his dominion, of the increase of his government and of peace, there will be no end.

It's eternal.

You see that?

On the throne of David and over his kingdom to establish it and to uphold it, like keep it together and with uh with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore.

The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

The birth of Jesus, uh, you know, it's such an amazingly joyful event because God, you know, it's it's God giving us a major puzzle piece into his plan, which was to establish his kingdom forever and ever.

Right?

And man, I love how it says there in that verse.

Look at it, it says, the the increase of his government or or or his rule.

That's not to say that you know he's got you know a little bit of rule and dominion now, but don't worry, guys, it's gonna grow.

Right?

It's not saying that.

It's to say that the the abundance and and and the prosperity of his rule and and of peace, it says there will be no end.

Right?

That's the kingdom of God.

That's what he's building.

It never depletes, it never runs out, it it never loses steam.

He himself in his perfection, the word there is he upholds it, he sustains it.

And then that last part, look at this, it's so good.

Right?

The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

Right there, there right there is the promise of his kinglish kingdom being established forever.

Right?

Notice how it's his zeal that makes his hap, uh, makes this happen.

Right?

Amazing to think that the joy that God gives us and and and produces in us by his spirit, he himself has, right?

He himself has has towards you.

He has that towards me, towards his entire mission uh uh of redeeming humanity.

It's it's the picture of a God who never becomes disinterested in us, right?

He never mentally or emotionally checks out from the entire thing, from his promise to save.

He's fired up about it.

He's like, he's like, man, I'm I'm coming for you people, and and I could not be more pumped about you, about about the mission, about about the kingdom, you know, that I'm gathering you to, and that you're gonna be able to experience with me for forever.

Right?

There's nothing, there's nothing mechanical, there's nothing robotic about God's God's heart here uh towards us.

Right?

The joy that he brings the world, he himself possesses and and he experiences, and it's just this is just him sharing it with us.

And it's never gonna end, ever.

It'll just become more and more wonderful to us all throughout eternity as we glory in these things.

That's what the birth of Jesus Christ in the manger accomplishes.

That's what it's about.

Joy to the world, joy to you, joy to me.