Preparing for Worship - December 26, 2021

This Sunday is the 1st Sunday after Christmas. Here are the readings most likely to be used. The Old Testament lesson is Exodus 13:1-3a,11-15. The firstborn of the Jews were spared when the firstborn of the Egyptians died in the last plague against the Egyptians, and the Pharaoh finally set God’s people free. Future firstborn sons belonged to God, first, and were to be “redeemed.” (See Numbers 18:15-16, also.) This was to remind God’s people that they were His and always dependent on Him. This also explains some of the ceremonial laws that were followed when Jesus was “presented” in the temple in the Gospel lesson.

In that Gospel lesson, Luke 2:22-40, Joseph and Mary did everything expected for a newborn son and his mother in Jewish law. In His life, Jesus faithfully followed all of God’s will, without sin, in our place, and freed us from that ceremonial law and the curse of all sin. This passage also shows us two faithful Jewish people, Simeon and Anna, who waited for the coming Savior, and rejoiced when Jesus, that promised Savior, was brought to the temple. They also spoke of the redeeming work that Jesus would do. Finally, we hear that Jesus, as a true man, was growing and becoming stronger, physically and with the wisdom and favor of God.

The Epistle, Colossians 3:12-17, speaks of our own growth in our Christian life, as God’s chosen ones, called to faith by God’s love, and the Christlike qualities God wishes to work in us, through the Word and power of Christ, who lives in us. We are called to do everything in the name of Christ Jesus, with thanksgiving.

The Psalm is Psalm 111. The Psalmist thanks and praises God for His great works on behalf of His people and His redeeming work, above all. We, in thanksgiving to Him, are to fear Him, with awe and love and trust.

For some churches, including St. James, the readings may be those for the day of Stephen, the first martyr of the early Christian church. The Epistle lesson, from Acts 6:8-7:2, 51-60, tells of how Stephen spoke out boldly for Christ and the Christian faith and then was arrested and stoned to death, as the Jewish religious leaders were outraged at what he was saying. Stephen saw a vision of the risen Lord Jesus at the right hand of God, as he was dying, and prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit” and “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”

This is not the first time in the Bible a spokesman for the Lord was killed. In the Old Testament lesson, 2 Chronicles 24:17-22, King Joash turned against the one true God and worshipped idols and had the priest Zechariah stoned to death for criticizing him and pointing out the idolatry in the land.

In the Gospel lesson, Matthew 23:34-39, Jesus said that this rejection of God’s true prophets and leaders had been all too common in Old Testament times, from the first murder, of Abel by his brother Cain, to the last one mentioned in the Old Testament Hebrew Scriptures, this death of Zechariah. (The Hebrew Scriptures have the same content as our Old Testament, but the order is different and the last of their books is 2 Chronicles.) Jesus also called Jerusalem “the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it.” He knew of His own death, soon to come, and of the death of Stephen and so many others.

The Psalm is Psalm 119:137-144. The Psalmist speaks of how he has been “small and despised” in the eyes of others, and faced “trouble and anguish” and says, “My zeal consumes me, because my foes forget Your Words.” Jesus quoted a similar psalm, Psalm 69:9, with regard to His own zeal for God’s house and the reproach He would receive; and He predicted His own death, too, in John 2:14-22.