Payer Call: Go Tell it On the Mountain

Good morning BFB!

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Today is the final Monday of our Advent journey which means we have reached track 6 (the last track) on our playlist. For weeks we have been listening for expectation, preparation, surrender, hope, joy, peace, and love. But Advent does not end with listening. This Advent we end by living in worship. There is a familiar song that captures the heart of this moment:

“Go tell it on the mountain,
over the hills and everywhere.
Go tell it on the mountain,
that Jesus Christ is born.”

Lean in BFB!!! Those are not just seasonal lyrics. They are our commission, reflected in Luke 2:20: “they returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen.”

I love this simple verse because it is honest. The shepherds did not stay at the manger. They did not freeze in the angelic glow. Scripture says they returned to the same fields to watch their sheep. They returned to the same responsibilities and realities of life. But their return was different. They carried a song with them. Their routine had met Jesus and everything shifted.

That is the first invitation I want you to consider this week: when you have the gift of Jesus, your life can not stay the same. Christmas is only days away and many of us will gather with friends and loved ones. Afterward we will return to our regular routines. Beulah, when we return to our lives, we cannot return the same when we carry the gift of Jesus Christ. His glory should change our posture. His presence should change our rhythm. The shepherds saw Jesus and that encounter put praise in their steps. Advent prepares us to walk back into ordinary spaces with extraordinary worship.

There is another truth in that verse. The shepherds did not return with clarity. They returned with praise. Their worship became their witness. Long before the church had pulpits, choirs, or preachers, there were shepherds telling the news. “Go tell it on the mountain” is simply the lyrical echo of Scripture. We cannot keep this good news to ourselves.

This is what Advent asks of us now. Let your worship speak. Your worship may become the sermon someone will never hear preached, but they will see it in how you live. Let praise tell the story. The story is not that everything is perfect. Life will continue to happen. As I have said before, worship may not change the situation, but it will change you inside the situation. When you worship in the middle of what you are facing, someone watching your life may quietly decide, I need to know the God they trust. Whatever keeps them steady with all they have going on, I need that too.

Finally, notice how the shepherds carried Jesus. They did not carry Him in their arms. They carried Him in their mouths. They became mobile sanctuaries. They carried His wonder and the testimony of Him. Their worship traveled, and everywhere it went, Christ became visible. Worship is how we carry the presence of Jesus into a world that has forgotten Him.

My prayer is that after the Christmas celebrations of this week, you do not return to life the same way you entered it. Worship publicly and privately, loudly and quietly, confidently and humbly, because you have seen enough to trust Him. Let your worship be your witness and let your praise carry Christ into everything you do.

From my heart yours, have a Merry Christmas. I love you, and there is nothing you can do about it.

In His Service,
FLC