‘Til He Appeared
By Jasmine Wilson
Whether Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year for you or a season that brings much gloom, gather a blanket around you on this wintry day and settle into a cozy spot for a few moments and let‘s consider your worth.
Music is a big part of the Christmas season, and I am sure you could rattle off a multitude of Christmas lyrics or at least hum a tune of your favorites. Over the years, my choices for Christmas playlists have changed and I have found myself moved by lyrics of particular verses which I had often heard, but to which I never really paid attention.
Take “O’Holy Night” for instance. You can probably recall the famous first line, “O’Holy night the stars are brightly shining…” or the crescendo of the exhortation “Fall on your knees…”, but maybe you can't quote the second line of the song.
That second line has been the life-breath of Christmas for me and a centering thought in the craziness of life, especially during the Christmas season. The lyrics are this: “Long lay the world in sin and error pining, til He appeared and the soul felt its worth.”
Did you catch that? With the arrival of Jesus, the world felt its worth. This declaration is for you. His coming was not just for the world then, his coming was for you. And in that arrival, you are presented with a clear picture of your worth. Every Christmas scent or scene, every gathering to celebrate and every quiet moment in front of a Christmas tree, every sparkle of a Christmas light or tune that gets stuck in your head; these all point to something more.
Before Jesus came, this was a world that pushed through its long days of toil without a realized hope. Some were aware of the promise of a savior, but that savior had yet to appear. And so they carried on in their days wondering if it could really be true that the God of all they could see would really come.
Maybe you are stuck in your own brand of hopelessness and need a reminder of your worth. You may look at the contours of your face that reflect a life filled with sadness and many errors. You wonder why he would come for you. But he did. He appeared. And in that appearance, the worth of your soul was realized. Nothing could declare your worth more than the God of all, coming to earth as a baby for the purpose of showing you how much He loves you.
And if this declaration of love for you is not enough to convince you of your worth, 1 John 4:9 announces the message of Christmas and shows us further evidence of your worth in the coming of Jesus:
“In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only son into the world so that we might live through him.”
Because he deemed you worthy, not only of his coming, but of his death as well, you can live with hope. You are not stuck in sin if his death was for you. You are not bogged down by the darkness of this world, without a glint of hope, if his death was for you. Living through him is life as it was intended to be lived; like the sparkle of Christmas lights on a dark wintry night. Your worth, declared on Christmas morning, is to be felt for all your days.
