#254 - Kyle Thompson // O Holy Night

We unpack the theology inside O Holy Night, moving from the Luke 2 birth narrative to the hope and freedom promised by Christ. We trace the carol’s history, define the incarnation, and connect its lyrics to Scripture and the gospel’s call to worship.

• word of God as the sword of the Spirit 
• worship as war and music beyond CCM 
• Christmas carols as theology for everyday listeners 
• origin and authorship of O Holy Night 
• the incarnation explained and affirmed 
• Luke 2 and why Bethlehem matters 
• creation groaning and the weight of sin 
• chains of sin broken by Christ’s work 
• faith response and a posture of worship

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Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_00 (00:01):
Welcome to the Daily Blade.
The word of God is described asthe sword of the spirit, the
primary spiritual weapon in theChristian's armor against the
forces of evil.
Your hosts are Joby Martin andKyle Thompson, and they stand
ready to equip men for thefight.
Let's sharpen up.

SPEAKER_01 (00:20):
Welcome to a new week of the Daily Blade.
So for the last couple ofinstallments that I've done, I
was carrying on Joby's theme ofWorship is War by exposing you
to worship songs that falloutside of the contemporary
Christian music genre.
So I did that to help you guysout.
And from the comments we'vereceived, it has.
I mean, I did those weeksbecause I know that many of you
guys don't like the sound ofcontemporary Christian music,

(00:40):
but worshiping God through songis not optional.
So I wanted to expose you tomusic from genres that you might
like that also have strongbiblical and theological themes
with them.
Now, I promise you guys thatthis isn't going to become, you
know, the spiritual musicallyric connection podcast, but
I'm actually going to keep thistheme going because it's
Christmas this week, guys.
And if you're anything like me,you grew up listening to

(01:03):
Christmas carols, and many ofyou, again, like me, sang them
without any regard for thetheological or biblical
significance being communicatedin the lyrics.
So this week, we're going tolook at five different Christmas
carols that point us to thetruth of scripture and the
incarnation of the savior of theworld.
And we're kicking off this weekwith one of the most famous
Christmas carols of all time, OHoly Night.

(01:24):
So for the record, my favoriteversion of this song is from
Josh Groben from his Christmasalbum Noel from 2007, so you
should check that out.
This song was written in 1847 inFrance by a poet named Placide
Capot, and it was set to musicby a composer named Adolph Adam.
Now, as a matter of history, itdoesn't seem like Capot was a
very devout or committedChristian, but God certainly

(01:45):
used him to write one of themost theologically rich carols
of all time, and as I alreadysaid, one of the most popular.
And as with the rest of theChristmas carols that we'll look
at this week, O holy night is ameditation on the incarnation.
So incarnation simply meansembodied in flesh or taking on
flesh.
So Jesus' incarnation is himtaking on the flesh of a human
being, thus God Nabod.

(02:07):
So he is fully God and somehow,that most of us can't explain,
also fully man.
So let's take a look at thelyrics of O holy night and dig
in.
O Holy Night, the stars arebrightly shining.
It is the night of our dearSavior's birth.
So guys, let's go to Luke 2,starting in verse 1.
In those days a decree went outfrom Caesar Augustus that all

(02:27):
the world should be registered.
This was the first registrationwhen Corinius was governor of
Syria.
And all went to be registered,each to his own town.
And Joseph also went up fromGalilee from the town of
Nazareth to Judea, to the cityof David, which is called
Bethlehem, because he was of thehouse and lineage of David, to
be registered with Mary, hisbetrothed, and who was with

(02:50):
child.
And while they were there, thetime came for her to give birth,
and she gave birth to herfirstborn son, and wrapped him
in swaddling cloths, and laidhim in a manger, because there
was no place for them in theinn.
So in that very momenteverything about everything
changed.
We see the beginning of therescue mission that God put in
place to save the souls of thosethat would give their lives over

(03:11):
to God by putting their faith inJesus.
Now back to O holy night.
Long lay the world in sin anderror pining till he appeared
and the soul felt its worth.
So this lyric is dealing withthe weight of our sin, and it's
not just the sin that we feel,it's a sin that all of creation
feels.
Let's look at Romans 8, startingin verse 22.

(03:32):
For we know that the wholecreation has been groaning
together in the pains ofchildbirth until now.
And not only the creation, butwe ourselves, who have the first
fruits of the Spirit, groaninwardly as we wait eagerly for
adoption as sons, the redemptionof our bodies.
And in addition to this carollooking at the weight of our
sin, it actually looks at therevolutionary nature of the
arrival of the Christ on theearth.

(03:53):
So back to O holy night, let'sdig into the third verse here.
Chains shall we break, for theslave is our brother, and in his
name all oppression shall cease.
Now, as has been elucidated atnauseum up to this point,
slavery has been a part of humanhistory for as long as there has
been human history, and thatincludes today.
So the ideas and feelings aroundslavery are ubiquitous to us

(04:14):
all.
Every people group knows it.
But this isn't talking about theslavery created by humans
against other humans.
This is the slavery of sin.
And we as humans are not justslaves to the commission of
sins, we are slaves to our verynature, which is to sin.
But we have hope because thechainbreaker was sent to this
earth to shatter our innateconnection to our nature to sin,

(04:37):
and that is why the gospel issuch good news.
God sent his son Jesus to theearth to be born of a virgin.
Yes, the virgin birth isimportant, and he was
predestined to live a normalexistence for thirty years
before starting his three-yearearthly ministry, which
culminated with his crucifixion,murder, burial, and
resurrection.
And his death on that Romancross paid for the sins of all

(04:58):
humanity for all time, past,present, and future.
All we have to do is put ourfaith in that reality for our
lives.
And when we do, we can look backon the arrival of Jesus on this
planet and say, A thrill ofhope, the weary world rejoices,
for yonder breaks a new andglorious morn.
Fall on your knees, O hear theangels' voices, O night divine,

(05:20):
O night when Christ was born.
O night, O holy night, O nightdivine.

SPEAKER_00 (05:27):
Thank you for listening to today's episode.
Before you go, if you want tohelp equip other men for the
fight, share this podcast aroundand leave us a five star rating
and review.
Stay sharp.