“It came upon the midnight clear, that glorious song of old.”
My favorite Christmas carol is It Came Upon the Midnight Clear. On the surface, it seems, even to me, a strange choice. There are plenty of other Christmas carols that are much more beautiful. And it sounds, at least to my ears, a little old-fashioned, which, I guess, makes sense as it was written around 1849-1850. But then, I’m a little old–fashioned (just ask my grandkids!), so it’s a good match.
I think the thing that appeals to me the most about this Christmas carol is not so much the melody as the words it uses to create a visual picture of that incredible night when Christ was born … a clear, dark night sparkling with brilliant stars and, all of a sudden, outshining even the stars, appears a choir of angels with magnificent wings and harps of gold, singing with authority and pure joy! Can you imagine the sight and the sound? What I wouldn’t give to have been a shepherd that night and to have experienced the once-in-a-lifetime-of-the-world event.
This carol doesn’t speak only of the magnificence of that night but how the echoes of His birth resonate even today, giving hope when we are weary of life’s burdens and how the angels can still sing to us today, giving strength and beauty to tired hearts and minds. It also speaks of hope for the future “When peace shall over all the earth its ancient splendors fling and the whole world send back the song which now the angels sing”.
Prayer: Holy Father, thank you for the miracle of that night and of that birth. Thank you for sending your glorious angels to declare to the world the best news ever spoken ~ that Christ your Son had been born to save us forever. May the peace of the whole world that the angels sang of not be some distant promise but be somehow near; help us to persevere until we can sing it back to you. Amen.
Christy Stephens