Our church has a little gift shop which is open after church is over. I stopped in there to say hello today and learned that one of the ladies has made some beautiful items for sale. She paints pictures on gourds. This one has been made in to a beautiful bowl. I took this shot and then told I'd be posting it on 365 as part of my Advent series. Each Sunday in Advent a different aspect of the Christmas story is emphasized: first week- hope/expectation, second week- love/Jesus' lowly birth, third week- joy/the shepherds, and fourth week- peace/the angels' message. I write an Advent devotional for our congregation each year and this year I combined the usual Bible readings with the stories behind some of our well-known and best-loved Christmas carols. Some of you asked if I would post them here so I'm including today's portion for you. You are not obligated to read this! But if you do, thanks!!
Edmund Hamilton Sears held the pen over the tablet on his desk. Words had been forming in his mind and the thoughts were about to boil over like a pot of water on the hearth. 1849 was proving to be a tumultuous year. Thousands of people had dashed from the eastern coast to the west in search of a pot of gold. The fever for success had reached an all-time high. Many people had left their small farming communities to seek employment in the great industrial cities of the nation. But although they had left the uncertainty of farming behind, they found the cities had their own brand of uncertainty and they were just as impoverished as ever. Smoldering beneath the pursuit of wealth, the tensions over slavery were driving a wedge between the northern and southern states with no promise of a good outcome or resolution. What message could he bring this Christmastide that would soothe the troubled hearts of his parishioners? Inspiration bubbled up from his memory and he arose from the desk, collected his file of poems and pulled out the one he'd entitled "Calm on a Listening Ear". With a quick revision here and a small rewrite there, the hymn we've come to know as "It Came Upon the Midnight Clear" was born.
Published in the Christian Register that December, the poem caught the attention of Richard Storm Willis, a music critic for The New York Herald, one of the most influential newspapers of the day. Willis, a composer who had studied and trained under Felix Mendelssohn, took the poem and set it to music, simply titling his piece "Carol". Across the Atlantic Ocean in the United Kingdom a different melody took hold, "Noel", a tune adapted from an English melody by Arthur Sullivan in 1874.
Times of conflict and stress have plagued human history. Perhaps that is why a bearer of good news is often so welcome. But imagine that good news coming from an angel sent by God. Such is the circumstance of Gabriel's visit to Mary. Amazingly, Mary seems more concerned as to how God will make this miraculous promise come about than she is unnerved by the angelic being which has come to bring the news!
Is there still good news today? We often look at the headlines or listen to the news broadcasts with the same heavy heart that Edmund Sears bore as he reworked the words to his poem. Our stressful world has reframed the "no news is good news" idiom to describe the heaviness with which we face the world- there really is NO good news; it's all bad. Sear's melancholy words still ring true today:
And ye beneath life's crushing load, whose forms are bending low,
Who toil along the climbing way with painful steps and slow,
Look now! for glad and golden hours come swiftly on the wing,
O rest beside the weary road and hear the angels sing.
In a time just as unsettling as ours Gabriel brought a message of hope to Mary. "You shall bear a Son..." The promise made through the prophets and proclaimed by an angel was fulfilled on the night Jesus was born. God's message has not changed. In the midst of the clamor of today's world, and in spite of the bad news published on a daily basis, the message is still proclaimed, "Peace on the earth, good will to men, from heaven's all-gracious King". But who is listening?
If you want to read more about the story of Gabriel's visit to Mary you can find it in the Bible in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 1, verses 26-38.
Thanks so much for taking the time to read my devotional. If you have any questions or want to make a personal comment to me, please feel free to email me at Olivetreeann@yahoo.com and put 365/Advent in the subject line so I know that your email is not spam!
Anne that is one wonderful devotional and one of my favorite carols. I didn't know it had two different tunes.
The gourd bowl is very pretty too. I hope she gets to see your picture.
@pandorasecho Thank you Dixie! I'm going to email it to her- which reminds me to write a note otherwise I'll forget to do it tomorrow! And that's ok about the "e". They're both pronounced the same! (o:
The gourd bowl is very pretty too. I hope she gets to see your picture.
Thank you Carol, Timothy, Sally, Jackie, Rick, Henri, Kerri and Kathryn!
And thank you Carol and Kathryn for taking the time to read the devotional. I so appreciate that!