The First Songs of ChristmasSample

CHRISTMAS IS SORT OF AN ANNUAL MARKER. Arriving at the end of the year as it does, it causes us to look back and take stock, even as it causes us to look ahead and wonder. To hope. To imagine. Or perhaps, at times, to worry. To fear.

Whatever you’re feeling as you draw deeper into the Christmas season this year, particularly if your joy seems muted by some loss or crisis or disappointment, I pray that this line in Mary’s song will encourage your heart today.

It speaks to me of the unchanging character of God. The big theological word for it is immutability. He is “the same yesterday, and today, and forever” (Heb. 13:8). Or, as Mary put it, “from generation to generation.”

This unchangeable aspect of God’s nature is something we need to be reminded of frequently. For even though Christmas can be highly predictable in its repeated traditions and interactions, each return of the season still finds us a year older, perhaps in a different context, in a different stage of life. And if we’re not particularly pleased with our circumstances this Christmas, it’s easy to conclude that it’s too late for God to change the ones that could be changed or to give us what we need for getting through the others.

Since I was a little girl, I have always loved reading books on the lives of great men and women of God from past generations. The autobiography of George Müller is one of those books that has left an impact on me.

Müller established a number of orphanages in England during the 1800s, funding them entirely through prayer and faith and unwavering confidence in God’s provision. His personal journals—included in his autobiography—provide a close-up view of what his life was like in those days. In them you’ll often come across a passage that reads something like this: “We had nothing to eat and no money to buy food. We prayed and told God our needs, and God provided supernaturally.” A day or two later you’ll find a similar account. And the next day or the next, again—the same thing. “We had nothing . . . we had no money . . . we prayed . . .God provided.” Over and over again, Müller recounted, God was unfailingly faithful in caring for thousands of orphans.

As you read this, behold your God. Behold Him more than a hundred years ago meeting the needs of His children who feared and trusted Him. Behold Him, because one of those children today is you. The times have changed, the names have changed, but God has not changed. As He has provided for past generations, so will He provide for you and me in this generation . . . and to every generation.