The Joy of Fulfillment

Jeremiah 31:1-10; Luke 1:67-79; Ephesians 1:3-12

Rev. Chris Harbin, Rocks Baptist Church—Pamplin, VA

19 December 2004

We strive for joy that too often seems fleeting. Perhaps joy is fullest and more lasting when it comes at the end of a season of hope, expectancy, and yearning. It may seem fuller when we are wide open to appreciate joy as the fulfillment of promise and anticipation. In the fulfillment of a promise, joy comes as a release, a comfort, and a contrast to the barren land of need. It is greatest when we can best appreciate it. How do we rejoice when fulfillment that takes us by surprise?

Amid the encroaching doom of exile, Jeremiah spoke words of comfort and joy. He preached the hope that Yahweh would once again restore the nation as a flock under the care of a shepherd. Even in the threat of exile and subjugation by foreign powers, the people could count on God’s redemption. God would bring them out of captivity, establishing them once again as the people of the promise.

The nation had long ceased to appreciate Yahweh’s care for them. They had long since left off serving the God of their fathers in faithfulness and earnestness, if they had ever done so at all. As the generations since the day of Moses and Joshua had forgotten the significance of their covenant relationship with Yahweh, they had come to view their responsibilities before God as mere formalities and meaningless rituals to carry them through the days. Worship had been reduced to routines akin to the punching of a time card. The heart of the people was far from focused on the God they claimed to serve. They went through the motions with little thought or purpose in seeking God.

They worried about national security in the looming threat of Babylonian conquest. They worried about military alliances, political advantage, and personal wealth. Their thoughts were concerned with self-preservation and self-service, rather than submission to and acceptance of God’s will for their lives. Joy had long since ebbed from national life. Worry had taken the place of joy, self the place of service, and self-direction the place of submission to God. The God on their lips was on the back shelf of their hearts, all but forgotten.

Jeremiah had warned the people of the doom that approached—a doom they were bringing upon themselves. He called them to repentance, urging them to turn with a whole heart and serve Yahweh once more as their Lord. They were too wrapped up in themselves to hear the message. They were too focused on themselves to allow their lives to be refocused on God.

Regardless, Jeremiah reminded them of the joy in God’s promise, protection, care, and love. While he knew that the present generation would not heed his words, he spoke of the coming joy of God’s restoration. The day would come, when God’s promise of restoration would be fulfilled and the people would know the meaning of Yahweh’s care, blessing, and love. On that day, God would restore the oppressed to the land, granting fulfillment of the promise to those in greatest need of care. Yahweh would shower blessing upon the blind, the lame, and those in the pangs of childbirth.

Zechariah’s words echo the joy and wonder of fulfillment of God’s blessing at the birth of John the Baptist. He recalled the extent of God’s mercy and grace that were to be lavished upon those in need. As Zechariah reflected on the role of John’s life as the one to announce the coming fulfillment, he recognized God’s faithfulness to fulfill the promise to rescue the people from oppression. While Zedekiah did not understand the non-political nature of Jesus’ messianic role, he shared the joy of seeing God’s hand in rescuing the nation.

John’s role was to follow Jeremiah in preparing the people to recognize the coming fulfillment of God’s promise of redemption. To receive the blessing of redemption, they had first to recognize their need and repent, accepting God’s mercy and grace to forgive, restore, and heal. On recognizing and accepting the fulfillment of God’s promise, they would be granted to serve God without fear. The joy of Messiah’s coming entailed being enabled to serve God in holiness, righteousness, and peace. To Zechariah, this was a message of hope, of promise, of fulfillment, and of joy. God’s faithfulness would enable the people to “worship in spirit and in truth.”

Paul’s greeting to the Ephesian believers echoes the joy of awaited fulfillment. While not exactly what we expect to hear, his words speak to the joy in Zechariah’s hope, now extended to the Gentiles. It was in this unexpected, but long-awaited, Messiah that God poured out the fulfillment of the promise of the ages. Paul goes so far as to consider that this was God’s plan as far back as before the creation of the world. From the point of creation, God had designed a purpose for the redemption of humanity. Paul would have us aware that God created the world, well-knowing that in the fullness of time He would come to us in Christ Jesus.

In this promised hope, we are brought together in unity. The Creator reached down, becoming part of creation in order that we might understand the depths of God’s grace, mercy, and love. We are fashioned into a new people, not on the basis of station, wealth, power, or any such measure of human worth or merit, but out of “the good pleasure of His will, … freely bestowed on us” in Christ Jesus. There was nothing to force God to come to us in Christmas, nothing but a plan of grace that God Himself had designed at the beginning of creation.

Paul calls the Incarnation the “fullness of time.” It is not the fullness of time from any human perspective, but it is so in terms of God’s plan for redemption in human history. This is the time when God chose to bring to fulfillment the promise, hope, and plan of incarnate redemption. Reaching down into our midst, being born in a smelly stable to a young couple who would bear the shame of a birth out of wedlock, God came to share with us the depths of divine grace, mercy, love, acceptance, forgiveness, and desire for reconciliation.

It is in this fullness of time that joy becomes reality. It is here that hope takes root, for the long-awaited Messiah is very God incarnate. The Anointed Redeemer is the very God who calls us to be reconciled and joined into the family, living the blessing of being the children of God. God reached down and became as one of us in need of redemption. In the stable, time became full with the purpose of God’s redemption, designed from the foundation of the world that we might enjoy fellowship with God.

Perhaps that is not what we have been awaiting. Perhaps our hope has been fixed on finding in the manger a helpless baby that needs us and is under our control. The hope in the manger fulfills more than we would dream to receive. God’s fulfillment would bring us into a new relationship with the very God we strive to hold at bay. Can we let go of our expectations to receive the gift of God’s fulfillment in all its joy and splendor? Perhaps we need to hear the angel, “Fear not, for behold I bring you gospel which shall be great joy for all the people!” Rejoice, for God has come to us!

—©2004 Christopher B. Harbin

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