Thread by @SandmanGrant

"Behold the Bridegroom comes..."

An image that especially arrested my attention from the opening chorus from Bach's #Advent Cantata, "Sleepers Wake", sung yesterday as part of the mid-morning service at @SydneyCathedral. Enjoy listening here...

A little later, our lead tenor at the Cathedral, Ben Oxley, sings, "He comes! He comes! The bridegroom comes..." And the rest of the cantata celebrates our longing and the groom's royal and tender love, and the everlasting bliss that awaits...

Later in the service, Bishop @MStead11 preached from Math 24, and noted that it's "coming (advent) of the Son of Man" went with readiness "to meet the bridegroom" parable of chapter 25. This is what Bach's cantata riffs off. biblegateway.com/passage/?searc…

2 weeks ago, Remembrance Sunday, our NT reading, with Psalm 46's God as strength & refuge in the city, was Rev 21:1-8… "I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed *for her husband*."
biblegateway.com/passage/?searc…

5 weeks ago, on our baptism Sunday for three adult converts to Christ, I chose John 3:16-36 to unpack. To help explain why he was relaxed about everyone going to Jesus for baptism, John the Baptist said, "The bride belongs *to the bridegroom*…" (v29a)
biblegateway.com/passage/?searc…

"The friend who attends the bridegroom waits and listens for him, and is full of joy when he hears the bridegroom’s voice. That joy is mine, and it is now complete. He must become greater; I must become less." (vv29b-30)

John the Baptist says he's what we'd today call the Best Man. Can you imagine the Minister at a wedding asking the Best Man to pass the rings over? And the Best Man says, “Actually I’d like the keep one of these rings In fact, I’d like the make the vows myself…” It’d be a riot.

It’s inconceivable that a Best Man would try to take over the wedding of his good mate, the Groom. And John says it'd be just as stupid for him to try and compete against Jesus. Now Jesus has arrived, it’s his time; and John is glad to step back. This is what he was waiting for.

In my personal 'quiet time' Bible reading, two days back I read Mark 2:19... Jesus answered, ‘How can the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? They cannot, so long as they have him with them...

biblegateway.com/passage/?searc…

Here's what's impacting me: John chooses to describe Jesus as the Bridegroom. And so Jesus also self-identifies! But any Old Testament student would know that many times there, God himself was pictured as the Bridegroom, with God’s Old Testament people, Israel, called the bride.

So by calling Jesus the Bridegroom, John pictures him like God. By his parables, Jesus claims that 'divine bridegroom' role personally. Something far greater than any prophet (as John knew). It's no modest claim. He's our Lord. And he's our Lover.

"Behold the Bridegroom comes"

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