God's answer to anxiety
Notes
Transcript
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was an American poet and educator whose works include "Paul Revere's Ride", The Song of Hiawatha, and Evangeline. He was the first American to translate Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy.
Longfellow was born in Portland, Maine, . He was a man who felt and loved deeply. And his poems breathed that passion into the lives of those who read them.
He had two great loves of his life.
His first wife Mary Potter died in 1835 after a miscarriage. He and his second wife but first love, Fanny Appleton had six children together He lost her too 1861 after sustaining burns when her dress caught fire. After her death, Longfellow had difficulty writing poetry for a time and focused on translating works from foreign languages.
Two years later, Longfellow’s son Charley A young man barely old enough to fight- who ran away to enlist as a Union soldier – suffered serious wounds in a skirmish during the Mine Run Campaign in Virginia. Longfellow heard the news on December 1 and rushed to Washington to be with his son as he recovered from his wounds.
It’s against that backdrop, in the midst of a great war that claimed more than 600,000 American lives, that Longfellow wrote his poem. I heard the Bells on Christmas Day- A poem that would become the Christmas carol that we sing together And love.
It starts off as we know.. but there is a verse in his poem that is frequently unsung. and to know it is to understand the depth of his sorrow and the reason for his despair.
I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old, familiar carols play,
and wild and sweet The words repeat
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along The unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
Then from each black, accursed mouth
The cannon thundered in the South,
And with the sound The carols drowned
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
It was as if an earthquake rent
The hearth-stones of a continent,
And made forlorn The households born
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
And in despair I bowed my head;
"There is no peace on earth," I said;
"For hate is strong, And mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!"
Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
"God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The Wrong shall fail, The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men."
These words feel as true and powerful to me today as the day they were written. They are words that speak to the loss of our age. of the past year.. To our mourning to our weeping and to our fears.
And the wonder of this song is I echoes as well the feeling of those we have met on our Christmas journey.
Zecheraiah a priest waiting his whole life to hear God speak. Elizabeth barren her whole life.
Joseph and Mary made to be Refugees by an idle edict of a foreign tyrant.
And even those shepherd out that night keeping watch over their flocks.
It was the shepherds who heard the angelic blessing.
“Peace on earth good will to men!”
It was the shepherds who brought that good word to mary and joseph on that weary wonderful night.
And Jesus the son of Mary and Joseph the son of God who would bring that word to life for a weary world.
It was he who would say
Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the earth.
It would be Jesus the hope of angels and healer of the hopeless who would declare that the kingdom of God had come!
Who would call the meek and the weary to repent and find hope a kingdom not of this world but coming soon.
It was Jesus who shamed the wicked and humbled the proud.
It was Jesus of whom the Prophet Isaiah Spoke when he said.
Isaiah 9:6-7
English Standard Version Chapter 9
For to 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, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
7 Of the increase of his government and of peace
there will be no end,
And Jesus accomplished this not with the sword. not with the plague, but he made peace through his own body.
It was his death that brought us life.
A sacrifice that reminds me of the courageous and sacrificial heart of Longfellow’s son Charley
in 1863 snuck out of his home and traveled to Washington D.C. and joined the Union army. Charley informed his father of his decision in a letter mailed from Portland, Maine by an accomplice:
Dear Papa
You know for how long a time I have been wanting to go to the war I have tried hard to resist the temptation of going without your leave but I cannot any longer, I feel it to be my first duty to do what I can for my country and I would willingly lay down my life for it if it would be of any good God Bless you all.
Yours affectionately
Charley.
Charley made his way to Washington, D.C. where he attached himself to an artillery regiment, Battery A of the 1st Massachusetts Artillery.
While he was in the army Charley was nearly killed when he caught Malaria and then then again when a bullet cut across his back nearly severing his spinal cord.
It was while he was in Washington that his father who hurried down to be with him as he recovered wrote “I heard the Bells.”
Charley was willing to die for others.
Christ chose to die for us all. and his death and resurrection broke the back of death and fulfilled the promises of Isaiah and the message of the angel.
But still today we are waiting for the fullness of the kingdom.
And like Longfellow we can grow discouraged by the onslaught of the cannons and the mourning echoes across our hearts, our newspapers and our tv screens.
But the answer is joyfully the same as well.
"God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The Wrong shall fail, The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men."
And thus we are reminded what is echoed through the pages of scripture till the very end.
The story Continues.. God is in Control
He is victorious and full of love.
And his promise is...
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
If this promise is true than we need not fear the cannons that resound but boldly face them looking not at their terrible faces but beyond to the face of God who watches over his own.
Jesus said to his disciples John 16:33
“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
All of this invites us to trust in the midst of the storm. To build our foundation on a rock that is stronger than the affairs of men and goverments than principalites and powers.
For the call of scripture is not to face these storms alone but to walk through them with God as our shield and our guide.
As david said
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.
And God with us is the answer to the agony of the world and the quaking of our own hearts.
He is the peace that outlasts the storm and because he is with us we can like Longfellow declare even on our darkest days.
"God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The Wrong shall fail, The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men."
Let us Pray.