The Government that is on His Shoulders and Hymns

Jake McCandless, with Stand Firm Ministries, continues celebrating the Christmas season in this episode as he visits one of the most quoted “Christmas” passages, Isaiah 9:6-7. This is the “unto us a child is born” verse, but strangely in this perfect Christmas greeting card passage, there’s a seemingly strange mention of this child having the government on His shoulders. This seems to “mess up” the perfect Christmas passage, but Jake argues that is because in modern Christianity we present just a sliver of the complete Biblical narrative. This sliver causes us to miss the importance of prophecy, the return of Jesus, the Millennial Kingdom, and God’s continued plan for Israel. The seemingly odd phrase in Isaiah 9 bridges all of these things. Jake takes the opportunity of Christmas to point to the larger narrative of the Gospel. He reveals also how many popular Christmas hymns touch on the larger narrative as well.