The Christmas Worm and our Hope
As I read and studied these past few weeks there were three references to a worm that touched me deeply. They filled me with hope, the hope of the Christmas worm. These references also speak of this time of year where we wait in anticipation and celebration of the birth of Christ. An interesting video can be seen below.
While I do not claim to know how a worm might feel, there are times when I feel lowly, insignificant and in need of help and hope, perhaps even times of anguish and despair. Feeling as if I could get no lower than a worm. A worm who in relation to his circumstances knows he has virtually no strength of his own to affect any change.
The first reference is in Psalm 22 written by David as he suffered deep anguish and felt forsaken by His God. David begins the psalm by crying out “My God, my God why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?” David goes on in verse 22:6 to say, “But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people.”
Psalm 22 is said to be the foreshadowing of Christ and His crucifixion. In addition, Jesus Himself quoted psalm 22:1 when He cries out to the Father, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” As David describes himself and his despair in saying he is a worm, he also is describing to us Christ’s despair; “a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people.”
What is significant is the word used for worm in the Hebrew is tola’ath, describing a special kind of worm called the crimson worm. To understand the connection between this worm and Jesus we must look at the life cycle of the crimson worm along with scripture from Isaiah 1:18.
The crimson worm gives birth towards the end of her life. She will attach herself to a tree and lay her eggs under the protection of her body. When the larvae hatch, they stay there and feed on her body for three days before she dies. At this time her body becomes filled with a crimson scarlet color fluid which stains the tree. On day four her tail pulls up to her head and her body appears to have a heart shape. It then turns from crimson to a snow-white color and looks like wool and begins to flake and fall to the ground like snow. Isaiah 1:18 says: “Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow, though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.”
Christ was attached to a tree, He bled crimson scarlet when the nails entered His body, and His blood stained the wooden cross. The mother worm dies giving birth and covers her young with her body. With her body, just as Christ did, she gives new life.
All of us at times can feel forsaken in our trials and anguish just as David and just as Christ. Christ who echoed David’s cries to the Father, understands our cries and knows our sufferings. He also knows our feelings of such deep anguish that we can feel abandoned. Yet David and Christ never gave up their faith in their God, their true and unwavering hope. And we know we have a God who came to us as Christ, to give us this unwavering hope, to tell us, I know, and I have come to save you, to redeem you, to take your sins so you can have relationship and be with the Father and with Me for all eternity.
Our God, our Christ came to us for times such as this, He came to rescue us from our darkness and suffering. He knows what we go through. He knows the times we feel forsaken even by Him without help or hope. We were a people without hope, living in darkness, waiting for a light. Our Christ bore our sins and died for us in agony. This is our God and Lord Jesus Christ who we celebrate at Christmas.
The third reference to a worm is a story that sounds forth the hope of Christ. The hope and love found in Christ for a worm. Bishop Ryle in his book, Holiness, tells a story about an Englishman traveling in America who meets an Indian who talks of Jesus all the time and asks why. In response the Indian knelt and gathered leaves and twigs and some moss and placed them in a circle on the ground and placed a worm in the middle. He then lit the leaves. The flames rose and every way the worm moved he only got nearer to the flames. The worm then curled up to die. The Indian reached into the flames and picked up the worm and held it to his heart and said I was the worm and Jesus saved me. He took me from the fire and into His heart. https://www.theopedia.com/john-charles-ryle
This Christmas and every day let us remember all the ways we are the worm and all how our Lord comes to us to save us, give us hope and hold us close to His heart. Let us remember the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and be filled with the unshakable hope and joy it brings.
