christmas-carols

Advent’s songs tell the story

Posted on by Grace Day

I punch the buttons on my car radio as I drive, not satisfied with any of the musical offerings that come into my car with each change of the radio station. I have already grown weary of Jingle Bell Rock, Chestnuts Roasting over an open fire, Rudolf the red-nosed reindeer, Winter Wonderland, White Christmas, Santa Claus is coming to town, It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, Frosty the Snowman, Let it snow, Santa Baby, Rockin’ around the Christmas Tree – well, you get the idea. These “songs of the season” don’t really give me any clue as to who or what we are actually celebrating. 

But there is music that runs through my mind today, filling the silence with it’s almost forgotten words from the past. The song is “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” But as usual I only mostly recall the first verse, so I look up the words to the other three verses to satisfy my curiosity or maybe my longing to bring back those childhood years of singing this and other carols as we celebrated the Advent season. These carols always made so real to me the miracle of Jesus coming here to earth as a baby, the miracle that is Immanuel – God with us. I couldn’t sing the words without reliving the age old story once again. That is still true to this day.

After four hundred years of God’s silence, His people were desperate for His presence. Had they given up hope? Had they stopped watching for His appearance? Seems as if the arrival of the Messiah took them by surprise. Maybe that’s because Jesus wasn’t born in a big, important city such as Jerusalem. He chose instead to be born in a small, out of the way, little known town called Bethlehem. The story is told beautifully in the carol, “O Little Town of Bethlehem”, which as I said, is the song in my head today. It begins -  

“O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie! . . . Yet in the dark street shineth, the everlasting Light, the hopes and fears of all the years, are met in thee tonight. For Christ is born of Mary, . . . O morning stars together proclaim the holy birth, and praises sing to God, the King, and peace to men on earth.” 

How true the words and how wondrous! Into our darkness comes the Light. All the hopes of mankind are realized in the person of Jesus Christ, and all the fears of man are conquered with His appearance on our behalf. 

“In Him was life, and that life was the light of men.” (John 1:4)

“Jesus said, ‘I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.’ “ (John 8:12) The third verse of the song continues –

“How silently, how silently, the wondrous Gift is given! So God imparts to human hearts the blessings of His heaven. No ear may hear His coming, but in this world of sin, where meek souls will receive Him still, the dear Christ enters in.”

This song acknowledges Jesus as “the wondrous Gift given” to us by God and further tells us that we can receive this gift and Jesus will “enter in” if we have prepared a place for Him in our hearts and in our lives, if we have, as another song says – “prepared Him room.”

The fourth verse echoes the yearning of every human heart for redemption from this broken world and for reconciliation with our holy Creator. The carol continues –

“O holy Child of Bethlehem, descend to us we pray. Cast out our sin and enter in, be born in us today. We hear the Christmas angels, the great glad tidings tell, O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Immanuel!”

God did descend to us when Jesus was born in Bethlehem that first Christmas. He did come to cast out our sin, making room, so that He could enter into our lives and we could be born again. He came to abide with us. Jesus is Immanuel!

“The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14)

The words of the carol tell the story that we celebrate every year. We celebrate the birth of God’s only Son, the birth of the promised Messiah, the birth of the Savior, the birth of the sacrificial Lamb of God, the birth of the Prince of Peace, the birth of the King of kings and the Lord of lords. Jesus is all these things and so much more. He brings light into our darkness and hope into our despair. How can we not celebrate that He was born, fulfilling the promise of God to redeem us for Himself? 

When I feel like Christmas is getting lost in the celebrating of the event itself, I find that singing the old songs, songs that tell the story of Christmas, shifts my focus from what surrounds me to the event we say we are celebrating, the event which tore time in two, an event that took place over two thousand years ago, but continues to this day to be the event that changed human history irrevocably, for now and for eternity.

The King has come! The King is coming! Time to celebrate the former while preparing for the latter. The time is now. Advent is here. ”Let every heart prepare Him room!”

“Lift up your heads, O you gates; be lifted up, you ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O you gates; lift them up, you ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is he, this King of glory? The Lord Almighty – He is the King of glory.” (Psalm 24:7-10) 

Lord, King of glory, may my heart not be closed to You this Advent season. 

sincerely,  Grace Day 

 

advent advances

Posted on by Grace Day

As Advent advances, my anxiety rises as I wonder if I will be ready when the time comes. Will I be ready to receive this baby in a manger, this King of kings and Lord of lords? There is still so much to be done. How did my life become so cluttered with other things in the year since I last celebrated Advent – the arrival of the promised Messiah of all mankind? Seems like this important event would take precedence over everything else going on in the world today. Or does Christ’s birth simply get buried beneath the commercialism and the chaos we bring to this Advent season?

I ponder this question as I arrange the figures of the nativity. This particular nativity is unique as it is from Zambia and connects me to the people I met when I was there a few years ago. As I position lambs and shepherds and such, inspiration strikes and I add a few Santa figurines and a Christmas pixie from my childhood to the mix of wise men and shepherds coming to worship the newborn King. It seems only fitting. After all, we know –

“that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” (Philippians 2:10-11)

The song playing in my head today as I prepare to celebrate Jesus’s birth keeps me company as I go about my tasks. ”O come, all ye faithful, joyful and triumphant! O come ye, O come ye to Bethlehem. Come and behold Him, born the King of angels. O come, let us adore Him . . . “ 

So many Christmas carols refer to Jesus as the King that He is. (“Let earth receive her King!”/”Glory to the newborn King!”) I got curious and looked up the words to the other, lesser known verses of this song. I was surprised at what I’ve forgotten and at how beautiful the words are to this carol as they tell the story of Advent. We don’t seem to sing these older songs anymore which truly reflect what it is we are celebrating, when we celebrate Christmas. The carol continues- 

“God of God, Light of Light, Lo He abhors not the virgin’s womb. Very God, begotten, not created, O come let us adore Him, . . . sing choirs of angels, sing in exultation, sing all ye citizens of heaven above! Glory to God, all glory in the highest. O come, let us adore Him . . . Christ the Lord!” 

The inclusion of the word “ye” in this Christmas carol might be a clue as to how old this song is. I found a release date of 1841 which would explain the old English language of the hymn. But the truth of the words is timeless, a truth that does not change with the passing of the centuries. Today, this old Christmas carol pointed me back to that first Christmas, that first appearance of Immanuel – God with us.

“The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel- which means, ‘God with us.’ “ (Matthew 1:23) 

Advent is the anticipation of and the celebration of the coming of the King. Let every heart prepare Him room – He is coming! Let my heart prepare Him room!

“Lift up your heads, O you gates; be lifted up, you ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O you gates; lift them up, you ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is he, this King of glory? The Lord Almighty – He is the King of glory.” (Psalm 24:7-10)

I pray that the gates that guard my heart will indeed be lifted up to let my Savior, the King of glory enter in fully and completely. 

sincerely,  Grace Day     

songs of the season

Posted on by Grace Day

They are inescapable in this advent season, these Christmas songs. No matter what radio station I turn on while driving in my car, Christmas tunes are playing nonstop. Stores and even my church have Christmas music playing in the background continuously during these days. It’s no wonder my thoughts are filled with the words to these songs, causing me to hum and sing various versions of these songs randomly throughout my day.

Today’s tune has been “Hark the Herald Angels Sing!” You know the one, right? “Hark the herald angels sing, ‘Glory to the newborn king! Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled.’ Joyful, all ye nations rise, join the triumph of the skies. With the angelic host proclaim: ‘Christ is born in Bethlehem.’ ”

I’ve sung this old Christmas carol for many years, which may be why I find myself today singing this song without really being aware of the words that I am singing and of their deep meaning in telling the true story of Christmas. From the very first line truth is proclaimed. The angels are singing “Glory to the newborn king” – which is the baby Jesus. This song proclaims Jesus identity as King, even though the world would not recognize nor receive Him as such at that time.

The song continues “God and sinners reconciled.” That’s the reason why we celebrate Jesus’s birth. Jesus came to live among us in order to reconcile us to God. He did this by taking on our human form, walking miles in our shoes and then dying in our place, for our sins so that we could be reconciled to our Creator, God. God is holy, we are sinners. We needed someone to bridge that unbridgeable gap between us. We couldn’t do it. But God could and He did. He came here in the person of Jesus Christ to make reconciliation possible! That’s why we celebrate His birth.

Something else occurs to me as I hum these tunes and sing these songs of the season. I only seem to know the first verse of these carols. But the words of the third verse are just as inspiring and truth filled as the first verse. This carol continues – “Hail the heaven born Prince of Peace!”

“For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, . . . And He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” (Isaiah 9:6)

The song continues, “Hail the Son of Righteousness! Light and life to all He brings, risen with healing in His wings.” The words of this song confirm what we read in God’s word about Jesus being the light of the world.

“In Him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not overcome it.” (John 1:4-5)

“When Jesus spoke again to the people, He said, ‘I am the light of the world. Whoever follows Me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.’ ” (John 8:12)

The next words of this old Christmas carol are truly extraordinary – “risen with healing in His wings”. This is a song celebrating Jesus’s birth and yet here are words referring to His death and resurrection – the reason He came, to die and to rise again leaving an empty tomb behind and the promise of eternal life before each one of us who believe in His name. This Christmas carol celebrates the whole story, from Jesus’s birth to His sacrificial death to His miraculous resurrection. The third verse continues with these words –

“Mild He lays His glory by, born that man no more may die, born to raise the sons of earth, born to give them second birth, Hark the herald angels sing, ‘Glory to the newborn King!’ ”

This Christmas carol, in these words, gives us the reason for Jesus’s birth – “born that man no more may die” – no wonder we celebrate Christmas! No wonder we sing! That’s really good news – no more death! In just a few years, Jesus would explain this to Martha saying –

“I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in Me will never die.” (John 11:25-26)

When I sing the words “Mild He lays His glory by “, I am reminded of the cost to Jesus, an extraordinary, unfathomable cost, a price Jesus willingly paid in order to come here, to take on our human form in order to rescue and to redeem each one of us. Philippians explains it this way –

“Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted Him to the highest place and gave Him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” (Philippians 2:6-11)

When I sing “Mild He lays His glory by”, I am reminded that when He laid down His glory, He took up something much heavier and much harder in its place.

“Surely He took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, . . . He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His wounds we are healed.” (Isaiah 53:4-5)

Sound familiar? “Risen with healing in His wings.” Jesus came to heal us, to heal our broken relationship with God, our Creator. Sing it with me – “God and sinners reconciled!” This Christmas carol ends with the words – “Hark! The herald angels sing, ‘Glory to the newborn King!’ ” The carol recalls the night of Jesus’s birth, when the angels did indeed sing, proclaiming the good news of Jesus’s birth to the shepherds in the fields and to the waiting world. The angels knew this newborn baby Jesus was indeed the King who had just left His home in glory to come and make His home among us for a little while. The time has come for us to make room for Him, to receive Him, to let Him in.

“Lift up your heads, O you gates; be lifted up, you ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O you gates; lift them up, you ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is He, this King of glory? The Lord Almighty – He is the King of glory.” (Psalm 24:7-10)

sincerely, Grace Day