That mourns in lonely exile here, until the Son of God appear.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.
O come, Thou Rod of Jesse, free Thine own from Satan's tyranny;
From depths of hell Thy people save, and give them victory o'er the grave.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.
O come, Thou Dayspring, come and cheer our spirits by thine advent here.
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night, and death's dark shadows put to flight.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.
O come, Thou Key of David, come and open wide our heav'nly home;
Make safe the way that leads on high, and close the path to misery.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.
Ransom us,
free us,
save us,
give us victory,
cheer our spirits,
open the way for us,
make it safe,
and close the path to misery.
Yes, we need all that...
The verbs are poignant, full of longing like the notes of this haunting melody from centuries ago.
And why do we sing this song, in a minor key, every Christmas?
Because of the human condition. You know, broken.
Life is just as it’s described here in the text which is first documented in Latin in 1710 –
we’re captive,
we mourn,
we’re in lonely exile,
we’re in depths of hell,
we face the grave and death’s dark shadows,
we’re surrounded by gloomy clouds of night, we walk paths of misery...
Remember when we were looking for the Christmas spirit yesterday? This song doesn’t seem like a “typical” Christmas carol.
Yet listen to the wildly hopeful chorus, repeating it’s expectant, anticipative phrase after each verse:
Emmanuel. shall. come. to. thee...
if He has truly come to do all this -saving and freeing and cheering
because life is all that – mourning and lonely and more – then
YES, my dear weary friend,
we are in the Christmas spirit, all of us – because the spirit of Christmas is this:
We need Him, and He is Emmanuel – God with us!
It bears repeating:
He.
Has.
Come.
Rejoice, rejoice, Emmanuel shall come!!