How did Jesus bring joy to the world?

Go back with me in your thoughts 1,900 years in the world's history. In the village of Bethlehem a Babe was born of whom it was written centuries before: "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, the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace" (Isa. 9:6). Outside in the fields the angelic host celebrated His birth thus: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men" (Luke 2:14). He came from heaven to bring peace into a scene long distracted by sin. Judgement was not His mission. As Peter put it in Acts 10:36, God was "preaching peace by Jesus Christ." Aged Simeon, as he beheld the wondrous Babe, blessed God, saying: "Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace, according to Thy word: for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation." The sight of the Saviour dispelled from his mind all fear of death, and filled his soul with peace.

"But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son into the world." Then there was joy in heaven, and the joy was great. The midnight sky was lit with the glory of the Lord, and His angel came down and announced to the shepherds on the hills of Bethlehem, "Behold, I bring you tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord." Because the Saviour had come to turn men back to God from destruction, the joy of heaven broke all its bounds, and a multitude of the heavenly hosts proclaimed their gladness by praising God and saying, "Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, good will toward men." Then said those shepherds one to another, "Let us go even to Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord has made known to us." And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the Babe lying in a manger. That Babe was Emmanuel — God with us and the name that was given to Him was JESUS — which means Jehovah the Saviour.

But immediately after we read that these shepherds were sore afraid, we find that the angel says to them, "Fear not." The moment a sense of the presence of God works the true fear of God in the soul, that moment the gospel comes and takes away the fear. Immediately therefore the angel says, "Fear not, for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy." Here is the gospel proclaimed for the first time on the plains of Bethlehem. What are the good tidings that are going to produce great joy? Tidings of Christ. That always produces joy sooner or later. I never knew a man yet who was really converted to God who did not get great joy. I have known many a person profess, without getting any joy, but never one who really came to Christ. I remember a young lady saying to me once, "If I came to Christ, wouldn't I get great joy?" "Yes," I said; "I came, and I found great joy; have you come?" "I have been trying to come," was the reply. Ah, that is quite a different thing. The one trying to come, has not really come to Jesus.

What did it at once imply, however, for men? Has it struck the reader that the first utterance out of heaven to men after the birth of Christ was "Fear not?" (Luke 2:10). Does it not suggest that His advent as a Babe was designed to remove all fear from our hearts, to remove all suspicion from us, to enable us to understand that His disposition towards us after our four thousand years of sin was still friendly, loving, gracious? It is so hard for fallen man to believe anything but the lie that deceived him at the beginning. He cannot accredit the living God against whom he has sinned with any kindly disposition towards him, but supposes Him to be the author of his misfortune, and the vindictive executor of judgment against his sin, only opening His lips to utter wrath against the sinner. To all such ideas does God give the lie in the birth of the Babe. His language therein is one of accessibility to men. The gulf between the holy Creator and the world that has morally strayed from its orbit is so far bridged over from God's side that there suddenly appears in the midst of men One who is God's Son. But He has come, not to repel, but to attract; not to menace, but to woo; not to command, but to accept the lowliest conditions of poverty, dependence, and weakness.

First came the message of the angel, and then the praise of the angels. The great joy of the message centred in the fact that it was as Saviour that He had come. They had had the Lawgiver and the prophets, but now had arrived the Saviour, and He was so great an One as Christ the Lord. This good news was for "all the people," — not "all people" as our A.V. has it. For the moment a wider circle than all Israel is not in view. The sign of this marvellous event was one that never could have been anticipated. Men might have expected to see a mighty warrior wrapped in garments of glory and seated on a throne. The sign was a Babe, wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. But then the sign indicated the whole manner and spirit of His approach to men at this time.

Before entering upon the purpose of His advent, it may be profitable to dwell upon some of the circumstances of His birth. There was the greatest contrast imaginable at the time between heaven and earth. All heaven (and what wonder?) was astir and in movement; but the whole earth, save a few pious souls, was still and almost unexpectant. The angel of the Lord sped on his joyful way to apprise, not the governing powers, or the great of the earth, but a few godly shepherds, of the marvellous event: "Fear not," he said unto them, "for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all [the] people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord," etc. The angel of Jehovah was not alone, for as soon as he had announced the glad tidings, a multitude of the heavenly host praised God and said, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill [or "pleasure, or delight toward [in] men." As has been strikingly said, God had so manifested Himself by the birth of Jesus, that the hosts of heaven, long familiar with His power, could raise their chorus … and every voice unites in sounding forth these praises. What love like this love? and God is love. What a purely divine thought that God has become man." And yet this stupendous event had nothing in it to compel the observation of men. Busy with their own thoughts and objects, they did not even perceive it, though it took place in their midst; and so absorbed were they in their self-seeking that there was no room for the infant Saviour in the inn! Such are men, although among them were the objects of God's eternal counsels in grace, which He was about to accomplish through the One who, while the Creator of all things, was yet born into the world a homeless stranger!

The name Jesus was given in connection with His work, "for," it was added, "He shall save His people from their sins." The term "His people" will, in this gospel, undoubtedly mean Israel; and indeed, in the angelic announcement to the shepherds in Luke, it says that the good tidings of great joy were for all the people; i.e. for the Jews. Not that the object of the Lord's coming into the world is in either case to be limited to the chosen people, but in these scriptures they only are in view. The wider aspect is stated by John when, in allusion to the prophecy of Caiaphas that "Jesus should die for that nation," he adds, "And not for that nation only, but that also He should gather together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad." This makes it plain, moreover, that the death of Christ — His finished work, which He accomplished in, and through, His death — is the alone foundation on which He will save His people from their sins. We thus read in Leviticus 16, after the details given concerning the rites and sacrifices, together with the confession of the people's sins by the high priest on the great day of atonement, "For on that day shall the priest make an atonement for you, to cleanse you, that ye may be clean from all your sins before the Lord." (v. 30) Nor can this foundation truth be too constantly insisted upon; for as it is written concerning sins in the old dispensation, "Without shedding of blood is no remission," so now it is equally true that the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, alone cleanseth from all sin.

He inaugurated the day of glad tidings. He sounded the joyful news on the mountain side and in the city street; by the shore of the lake and in the synagogue of the Jews; to the lonely sinner at the well and to the crushing crowd along the way; to the fallen and low, to the publicans and sinners, to the poor, to the meek, He made known the glad tidings of good things; and the common people heard Him gladly as He told of the grace and goodness of the heart of God, of forgiveness and salvation and blessing. It is still the day of salvation. The acceptable time has not yet run its course. The day of vengeance is not yet here. Grant to us then, O Lord, more grace and strength to spread abroad the tidings which first began to be spoken by Thyself, Thou divinely appointed and anointed Preacher of glad tidings to the poor.

Some poor men who were faithfully performing their toilsome labours, afar from the restless activity of an ambitious and sinful world, receive the first tidings of the Lord's presence on earth. The God of Israel did not seek for the great among His people, but had respect to the poor of the flock. Two things here present themselves. The angel who comes to the shepherds of Judea announces to them the fulfilment of the promises of God to Israel. The choir of angels celebrate in their heavenly chorus of praise all the real import of this wondrous event. "Unto you," says the heavenly messenger who visits the poor shepherds, "is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord." This was proclaiming good tidings to them and to all the people.

But in the birth of the Son of man, God manifest in the flesh, the accomplishment of the incarnation had far deeper importance than this. The fact that this poor infant was there, disallowed and left (humanly speaking) to its fate by the world, was (as understood by the heavenly intelligences, the multitude of the heavenly host, whose praises resounded at the angel's message to the shepherds) "Glory to God in the highest, peace on earth, good pleasure [of God] in men." These few words embrace such widely extended thoughts, that it is difficult to speak suitably of them in a work like this; but some remarks are necessary. First, it is deeply blessed to see that the thought of Jesus excludes all that could oppress the heart in the scene which surrounded His presence on earth. Sin, alas! was there. It was manifested by the position in which this wondrous infant was found. But if sin had placed Him there, grace had placed Him there. Grace superabounds; and in thinking of Him, blessing, grace, the mind of God respecting sin, that which God is, as manifested by the presence of Christ, absorb the mind and possess the heart, and are the heart's true relief in a world like this. We see grace alone; and sin does but magnify the fulness, the sovereignty, the perfection of that grace. God, in His glorious dealings, blots out the sin with respect to which He acts, and which He thus exhibits in all its deformity; but there is that which "much more aboundeth." Jesus, come in grace, fills the heart. It is the same thing in all the details of christian life. It is the true source of moral power, of sanctification, and of joy.

The heavenly hosts were set agog! The far reaching effects of this marvellous and gracious condescension were anticipated and celebrated by them in praise. The first, Righteousness — for God was to be glorified. Second, Peace — for earth was to be freed from the thraldom and misery of the curse. The third, Joy — for God was to find His pleasure where once all had opposed Him. Of all this, so the heavenly host intimated, the Birth of Christ was the Pledge. But the Cross of Christ was the Basis!

Believers, is there nothing in this to quicken your joy in meeting Jesus? Is there nothing in this to throw contempt upon the world, and its unmeaning joys? The soul that loves Jesus loves one who has conquered all his enemies; "He that ascended far above all heavens, that he might fill all things." In this is the Son of God's love manifested, in that He humbled Himself to descend to the children of men, to bear their iniquity, to carry their sorrows and troubles, to minister to their joys and comforts, and to bear away sin from them for ever! And their joy and confidence is, that the same Lord has ascended on high, having "led captivity captive" - having destroyed His and their enemy: "Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."