Links for today’s readings:
Dec 24 Read: 2 Chronicles 29 Listen: (6:49) Read: Psalms 139 Listen: (2:26)
Links for tomorrow’s readings:
Dec 25 Read: 2 Chronicles 30 Listen: (4:56) Read: Psalms 140-141 Listen: (2:44)
Scripture Focus: Psalm 139:7-12
7 Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
10 even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
11 If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,”
12 even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.
14 “Glory to God in the highest heaven,
and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”
Reflection: O Holy Night — Carols of Advent Love
By Jon Polk
In the small town of Roquemaure in southern France, renovations on the city parish were nearing completion. The parish priest sought out local poet and wine merchant, Placide Cappeau, with a request to compose a new song to celebrate the occasion.
Although he was apparently an irregular church attender, Cappeau agreed and while riding in a stagecoach on a business trip to Paris, he composed the poem, “Minuit, Chrétiens” (“Midnight, Christians”).
Cappeau had a connection with famous composer Adolphe Adam, who had recently completed his most well-known opera, Giselle. Adam completed music for Cappeau’s poem within a few days and the finished piece, now known as “Cantique de Noël,” debuted at a Midnight Mass in 1847.
Cappeau’s original poem eloquently captures the profound truth of the incarnation in its opening verse:
Midnight, Christians, it’s the solemn hour,
When God-man descended to us
To erase the stain of original sin
And to end the wrath of His Father.
The entire world thrills with hope
On this night that gives it a Savior.
Equally profound is the final stanza which describes the radical results of Christ’s salvific work:
The Redeemer has overcome every obstacle:
The Earth is free, and Heaven is open.
He sees a brother where there was only a slave,
Love unites those that iron had chained.
French author and statesman Alphonse de Lamartine and others began to refer to the piece as “the religious Marseillaise” (“La Marseillaise” is the French national anthem, written in 1792 during the French Revolution).
The English version known as “O Holy Night” was translated by an American writer, John Sullivan Dwight, who discovered the song in 1855.
O holy night, the stars are brightly shining;
it is the night of the dear Savior’s birth.
Long lay the world in sin and error pining,
till He appeared and the soul felt its worth.
Tensions were high in the years prior to the American Civil War, and Dwight, a former minister and himself an abolitionist, was moved by Cappeau’s final verse. Dwight’s translation gives us one of the most compelling lyrics in the entire corpus of Christmas carols.
Truly He taught us to love one another;
His law is love and His gospel is peace.
Chains shall He break, for the slave is our brother,
and in His name all oppression shall cease.
Indeed, the long-awaited coming of the Messiah brought hope to a weary world. As we continue to wait for the Second Advent of the King’s return, May we live our lives as examples of the powerful message of hope, joy, love, and peace that Jesus brings.
A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices,
for yonder breaks a new and glorious morn!
Fall on your knees! O hear the angel voices!
O night divine! O night when Christ was born!
Divine Hours Prayer: A Reading
Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke this prophecy: “Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, for he has visited his people, he has set them free, and he has established for us a saving power in the house of his servant David, just as he proclaimed, by the mouth of his holy prophets from ancient times, that he would save us from our enemies and from the hands of all those who hate us, and show faithful love to our ancestors, and so keep in mind his holy covenant. This was the oath he swore to our father Abraham, that he would grant us, free from fear, to be delivered from the hands of our enemies, to serve him in holiness and uprightness in his presence, all our days.” — Luke 1.67-75
– From The Divine Hours: Prayers for Autumn and Wintertime by Phyllis Tickle.
Read more: Christmas and Kaiju — Love of Advent
“But Jesus’ second advent will be different,” someone may say. True. But even then, Jesus is not our Godzilla.
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