Come Thou Long Expected Jesus: Part II

“Israel’s strength and consolation, hope of all the earth thou art; dear desire of every nation, joy of every longing heart.”

That first phrase, “Israel’s strength and consolation” has roughly 3900 (+/-) years of history rolled into four words. I cannot adequately describe to you in a blog-post how God has been their strength and consolation, but let’s briefly take the two words separately. He has been their strong tower. He has been the one who was mighty in battle – when they did not have the strength to fight. He defeated the Egyptians, Canaanites, Philistines, Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Seleucids, and Greeks – for his people. He rescued them time and time again, even in recent history if you think about the fighting in 1948 or 1967. Even when they rejected Christ as their Messiah, he has continued to be their strength in so many cases. He will never cease to be their strength. When all seems lost at the end, that is actually when the Long Expected One will return.

Yet he is also their consolation. This is such a marvelous word. It has the idea of comfort and is sometimes even associated with the Holy Spirit in Scripture. He is the great Comforter. We have cheapened this word on some levels by naming some trophies, “consolation prizes” or “consolation games.” That is not the idea at all. When Paul wrote, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort,” (2 Corinthians 1:3) – that is consolation. Mercy, grace, comfort, being held in our pain, being ministered to in our soul’s dark days. He has been their consolation when loss has seemed insurmountable, when they looked at destroyed temples, faced deportation, and watched army after army march through their land. We now have the great Consoler living in us. What a marvelous thought.

Because we have the Comforter, we have hope. He is the “guarantee of our inheritance” (Ephesians 1:14). He is the promise of what is yet to come. We desperately search for hope and joy. Depression, anxiety, pressure, uncertainty, hurt, loss – hope is needed to combat those encroaching terrors. He offers hope to all the earth. He made a way on a cross 2,000 years ago and has promised to return. He has been faithful to his word, fulfilled prophecy, and works in our lives today. He is our hope. I’m not talking about a vague feeling that comes and goes. Rather, I’m talking about the rock-solid assurance that he will keep his promises. See, we aren’t “hoping for the best.” No, we are waiting on “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1). There is no room for maybe in that verse. It is about placing our faith and trust in the one who is powerful enough to keep his word. He has never failed, and this will not be the moment he starts. It is so easy to get caught up in our problems that seem so urgent and so large. How self-focused we become when we imagine we need to solve our problems or believe that God can’t intervene on our behalf. Why do we think we are so special that God cannot meet our needs? He is our hope, but we must place our trust and faith in that hope. We can say we have hope that a chair will bear our weight. However, real hope, the assurance the Bible speaks of actually sits in the chair. Hope is intricately linked with trust. It is what is produced as a result of trusting that God will keep his promises.

Dear desire of every nation – all around the world, people are looking for purpose. They are looking for acceptance, love, and power to validate them. They are worshipping thousands of gods or no gods at all. They are looking for the fulfillment of eternity in the temporal. God created mankind to desire him. He “Put eternity into man’s heart” (Ecclesiastes 3:11). The gods of this world (literal idols or the one’s we set up in our heart) will not satisfy the desire for eternity. He is the only eternal being. He literally designed man to want something that only he can provide. He could have set love, joy, hope, peace… you think of a wonderful attribute that he could have used. Those are things that are intrinsic to the nature of God, but they are also things that can be found temporarily on earth. God chose to put the desire for a character trait that can only ever be found in himself. This should also be encouraging to us as we share the good news. While there are certainly many who do not believe and are opposed to God, there are also many who want to know truth. They want to have their questions answered. They desire to find the answer to the longings of their heart.

And he is our joy – not a temporary feeling of happiness that is based on our circumstances. This is the “joy” that Christ anticipated when he endured the cross (Hebrews 12:2). This is the rejoicing that comes after weeping (Psalm 30:5). This is the abiding joy rooted in Christ’s completed work that cannot be taken away (John 16:22). This is the outflow and overflow of a heart that is at peace and at rest in Christ’s sufficiency. So, if you’re feeling a little worse for wear, sit in the chair. Trust that God will do what he says. Find your joy in the eternal source who is the Comforter of our souls.