Your promises fulfilled! Hope as I suffer at Christmas!

Lord Jesus,

You came.

You condescended to earthly flesh, incarnating as a human. You, the Word made flesh, the Creator and sustainer of all things, holy and majestic God the Son…came.

We bow before You today, in awe of who You are.

Lo, within a manger lies
he who built the starry skies…

(“See, amid the winter’s snow,” Caswall, E., 1858)

You came to fulfill our faithful Father’s promises to His people, outlined in the entire Old Testament. We need to backtrack for a minute to realize how profound was Your first coming. 

Your promises fulfilled in Jesus

Father God, Your glorious love story of covenant promise multiplied Your people, powerfully leading them to Your Promised Land, rescuing them from much turmoil along the way. You saved Your people. Then, in Your faithful and steadfast love, You gave them Your good, righteous, and holy ways to live. Through Moses, You gave Your Law, the Ten Commandments, providing detailed laws of love toward You and one another. In Your reiterated promised blessings, You began to use the word “if.” Your people needed to listen to You and obey Your law. Your promises were conditional on their keeping the covenant.¹

They failed and failed and failed, deserving not blessings but curses for their disobedience.² Yet, You continually gave them opportunities to turn back to You in wholehearted obedience, with total forgiveness. Your promises, held in “if-then” statements, became inward… 

so that you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live (Deut. 30:6 ESV). Therefore, choose life…loving the LORD your God obeying his voice and holding fast to him (Deut. 30:20 ESV). 

But Father, You already knew they would turn away from You and Your old covenant law of love, bringing evil living, suffering, and death along with it.³ Yet, You kept Your covenant promise, no matter how much they rebelled: 

“I will never leave you nor forsake you” (Josh. 1:5 ESV).

Your word is not conditional here. 

It is “never.” 

Although Your people couldn’t obey Your law because they walked in their inborn sin, Your “never” highlights Your faithful promise… because You already had a plan, created from all eternity. 

She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name, Immanuel” (which means, God with us) (Is. 7:14; Mt. 1:21-23 ESV).

Your Law fulfilled in Jesus

Fully human and fully God, Jesus came to earth to live a perfectly sinless and obedient life, satisfying all of Your “if-then” requirements.⁴ No one else can ever possibly keep Your law perfectly because…

none is righteous, no, not one…no one is good, not even one (Rom. 3:10, 12 ESV).

We simply can’t, as sinners. 

But as our faithful promise-keeper, this is what You did:

Jesus paid the full penalty of death, required by the law, so that those who trust in Him for salvation will never have to. It was through His blood, not the blood of the many animals offered as needed sacrifices when Your people broke the law. By His shed blood, You have entirely and faithfully secured eternal life with You forever, because You are a faithful promise-keeper.⁵

For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ (Jn. 1:17 ESV). 

Your promised presence with me in my suffering

Jesus, You lived a perfect, holy life…of suffering. You endured every possible kind of suffering. You learned obedience to our Father, through it all, fully satisfying Your law’s requirements. You became the spotless Lamb, the final and full sacrifice. Covenant promises fulfilled, finding their yes in Christ.

And now? Now? Where are You now? When I’m struggling in my own suffering, in all of Your compassionate and merciful empathy, where are You in all of Your glorious power and might? 

He who, throned in height sublime,
sits amid the cherubim.

You are all-powerful, risen, resurrected, ascended, enthroned King of kings and Lord of lords!

And You are also Emmanuel, with me in every single moment of my pain. Providing all I need to endure my own earthly suffering with every bit of its temptations and snares, according to Your riches in glory. You are teaching me, leading me, progressively shaping me through Your Spirit’s work, into humbled Christlikeness too. 

Teach, O teach us, holy child,
by thy face so meek and mild.

teach us to resemble thee,
in thy sweet humility.

Singing Christ’s Hope as I suffer, with Your promises

For this, this is redemption’s song! It is a powerful resurrection song, borne of Your first advent and filled with hope for Your second advent, the day we see You face to face, the day when You make all things new! For today, I am being shaped into Christlikeness by Your Spirit, in my suffering…but with You, my Emmanuel, my Lord Jesus. Thank You that I am not alone and that You are loving me in this pain. As I suffer, I sing today along with all my brothers and sisters in Christ who also suffered in their earthly lives and are now enjoying the blessings of Your faithful promises to us! 

Hail, thou ever-blessed morn!
Hail, redemption’s happy dawn!
Sing through all Jerusalem,
Christ is born in Bethlehem.

In Your great, power-full, glorious, and worthy name, Jesus Christ, amen.

Material adapted from Praying God’s Promises Into Suffering: A Devotional Bible Study Prayer Journal, Lauri A. Hogle, © 2023

Resources of Singing Christ’s Hope

If any of the resources of this nonprofit ministry for suffering Christian women might bless you, here are the current offerings to walk alongside you, with love. Soli Deo Gloria.

1.  Deuteronomy 30:15-18  ↩︎
2. Galatians 3:10  ↩︎
3. Deuteronomy 31:16  ↩︎
4. Matthew 5:17-20  ↩︎
5. Hebrews 9:12  ↩︎