Living Because the Light Has Come
Isaiah 63:7–9 | First Sunday of Christmas
Christmas comes with a build-up, and then it passes in a moment. The candles are lit, the services are finished, the waiting is over, and we find ourselves asking the quieter question: what now?
In Isaiah 63:7–9, the prophet speaks to a people who know what it is to be unsettled. They have been through turmoil and displacement, and in the middle of it all they wrestle with the same question we often carry: Where is God in our distress?
Isaiah’s answer is not a scheme, a strategy, or a five-year plan. It is a call to remember. He deliberately brings the people back to the character of God: His kindness, His compassion, and the many good things He has done for His people. Our present circumstances do not get to rewrite who God is. He is unchanging, faithful, and good.
Isaiah then takes us deeper into the heart of hope: God’s covenant commitment. “Surely they are my people,” God says. Even when His people have wandered, even when their hearts have hollowed out into mere routine, the Lord does not discard those He has set His love upon. Salvation flows from relationship, not reaction.
And then comes the most striking comfort of all: God is not distant. “In all their distress he too was distressed.” The Lord enters in. He sees. He shares the burden. He saves. He redeems. He lifts His people up and carries them. This is not only Israel’s story; it is fulfilled for us in Jesus Christ, who stepped into our darkness and, in love and mercy, redeemed us.
So what do we do when the waiting is over? We live because the Light has come. Hopeful waiting is not passive. Because Christ has come, and because He will come again, we step into the days ahead not anxiously but faithfully, trusting the God who carries His people and finishes what He starts.
As we look ahead to 2026, and toward a year of celebration as we mark 175 years of worship and witness, we do so by looking back first, not merely to our own story, but to God’s faithfulness. The same Lord who sustained His people then is with His church now. And He is not finished with us yet.
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