The Rev. Evan Gaertner
The Nativity of Our Lord
Christmas Eve 5:00pm Hymn # references are to Lutheran Service Book

Today’s worship service will be filled with small devotions surrounding the hymns. Let us pray, “Heavenly Father may your love fill our hearts tonight with the good news of peace and joy as we are gathered to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Amen.”

The hymn “Of the Father’s Love Begotten” is from a poem written in Latin by Prudentius, a Spanish Poet of the early Christian Church. It is taken from a collection of 12 extended poems, one for each hour of the day. This hymn is from the ninth hour of the day and was used as an evening prayer during Christmastime.

The first translation into the rhythm of the original was done in 1852.

The melody is from the 13^th century and was married to the hymn when it was translated into English.

This hymn is a reminder of the divine mystery that our Heavenly Father’s love has been shown to us in the sending of his son Jesus to us. In the fourth verse I find a call to mission. “Let no tongue on earth be silent, Ev’ry voice in concert ring everymore and evermore.”

We live in a world of division that can be witnessed not just outside the wall of the church but inside the church as well. But during Christmas the voices of the faithful unite together to praise God and give him thanks for revealing his mysterious love in Jesus Christ.

Evermore and evermore the love of the Father revealed in Jesus Christ shapes our worship and our lives.

Of the Father’s Love Begotten      384 vv. 1, 2

Joy to the World is a very popular hymn written by Isaac Watts. It is a free paraphrase of Psalm 98:2-9. It first appeared in 1719 with the title “The Messiah’s Coming and Kingdom.”

The tune is unmistakable when heard in any shopping mall in America. It is remarkable how words and sounds are united together by this hymn. Lowell Mason introduced this tune as a match for this text in 1838, recording that he arranged a George Handel tune for this purpose.

Consider with me the title given by Isaac Watts, “The Messiah’s Coming and Kingdom.” The Joy for the World is found in the good news that the Lord is come! There is an invitation for the earth to receive her king. The gift of this king is for every heart. The Savior of the World born in Bethlehem is not the exclusive property of any person or group.

Sin has stained every relationship found in creation; the relationship between brother and sister, mother and father, husband and wife, of all people and indeed in all of nature. But with the coming of Jesus there is cause for not just us to rejoice but in fact the very ground we tread upon shakes and shouts with the good news that the king has come.

Repeat the sounding joy with me and sing Joy to the World.

Joy to the World    387 vv. 1, 2

“O Little Town of Bethlehem” seems to just fit into any Children’s Christmas program. It is no accident that this carol seems to bring the kid alive in all of us. Phillips Brooks wrote this Christmas carol for a Sunday School Christmas festival service in 1868. Brooks was likely inspired to write the words of this hymn while visiting the Holy Land in 1865. He traveled by horseback from Jerusalem to Bethlehem.

The tune is by Lewis H. Redner. Redner was the organist and Sunday school superintendent at Holy Trinity Church in Philadelphia where Phillips Brooks was the rector, the pastor.

Redner told the following story, “As Christmas of 1868 approached, Mr. Brooks told me that he has written a simple little carol for the Christmas Sunday-school service, and he asked me to write the tune to it. The simple music was written in great hast and under great pressure. We were to practice it on the following Sunday. Mr. Brooks came to me on Friday, and said, “Redner, have you ground out that music yet to ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem’? I replied, ‘No.’ but that he should have it by Sunday.”

Redner went to sleep that night confused about the tune and thinking more about the Sunday-school lesson. But he was roused from sleep late in the night with a melody whispering in his head. He jotted down the tune and later filled in the harmony.

The opening line captures the intrigue of 20/20 hindsight about that night in Bethlehem. “O little town of Bethlehem, How still we see thee lie! Above thy deep and dreamless sleep the silent stars go by.” In America now we likely consider it impossible that someone doesn’t know that Christmas coming. But still it is true that in America and throughout the world there are people that do not trust in the peace that came to world that has been chained to sin.

I want to share with a story about a waitress in Texas, and how because of an invitation from two customers, her life was changed. The two customers were members of a local Lutheran congregation. Instead of receiving service without conversing with the server, these Lutherans started a conversation with this young woman that led to them inviting her to their congregation’s Christmas Eve service. She agreed to attend. Many times the story ends without anything happening.

This story, however, had a different ending.

The young waitress did attend the Christmas Eve service and sat with the two people who had extended the invitation. The service proclaimed the story of Christmas and its meaning. It was a wonderful evening! After the service, the young visitor stayed until most of the people had left. She asked whether she could talk to the pastor. She made an astonishing statement to him. She informed the pastor that this was the first time she had ever heard the Christmas story and wanted to know more about Jesus.

Incredible as it might sound, this is a true story. This young woman was not a new immigrant to the United States. She was not a member of any other religion. She was born and raised in the United States.

On that first Christmas in that little town of Bethlehem the hopes and the fears of all the years are met. When we share the story of Jesus Christ, born to be the savior of the world from the dread dead of sin, we have the opportunity to meet fears with the hope of Jesus Christ.

O Little Town of Bethlehem  361 vv 1, 4

The lullaby “Away in a Manger” was first found in the “Little Children’s Book for Schools and Families” published in 1885. Two years later it was produced with an alternate tune in the book “Dainty Songs for Little Lads and Lasses.” It was in this second printing that the following note was included: “Luther’s Cradle Hymn, Composed by Martin Luther for his children, and still sung by German mothers to their little ones.”

Unfortunately this little charming history has turned out to be false. Researchers have found no record in Luther’s Works and moreover the hymn appears in no German book nor was it translated into German until 1934.

But while the history of this hymn may be false the truth of the Gospel it brings to our hearts is very true. Mary and Joseph traveled to Bethlehem because of the wild world around them. The Emperor of Rome had called for a census to be taken. So each person went to their home town to be counted. In the middle of a world where their lives appear to be controlled by the whim of Rome and the passing stranger, God is at work. The time came for Mary to give birth, but there was no room for them in the inn. The shepherds came that same night to share with Mary and Joseph all that the angel had told them. Mary pondered these things in her heart. Her heart would later be wrenched with pain as she witnessed her son die on the cross. Her heart and all of our hearts though find a new blood flowing through our lives by the sacrifice of Jesus on that cross.

Away in a Manger          364

I remember when I was younger singing “What Child Is This?” and imagining myself as some guitar playing, ballad singing fool going through the wood with Robin Hood. The tune Greensleaves has an unmistakable joy to it. The popularity of the tune is evidenced by it being licensed to several printers in 1580. Shakespeare’s “The Merry Wives of Windsor” includes two references to the ballad tune. Just twelve days after the first printing license was granted, the melody was adapted for a religious use.

The words that we now know as this Christmas hymn were joined to the ballad tune around 1865. William Dix said he wrote the words for this three-stanza carol on the Epiphany, taking his cue from that day’s Gospel reading from Matthew 2:1-12, the reading of the magi from the east that come to worship the newborn king.

Imagine the wise men from the East coming to find the child that was born. They had been led by a star and now find themselves witnesses to the savior of the world. Shepherds guarded, angels sang, Mary comforted. The second verse contains an interruption to the images of Christmas. Good Christians remember the silent world is pleading. “Nails, spear shall pierce him through, The cross be bourne for me, for you; Hail, Hail the Word made flesh, the babe, son of Mary!”

We need this child borne of Mary. Without Jesus Christ our story ends. Without the child comforted in Mary’s lap we find no comfort from our sins, no hope for our future, no trust in who God is.

What child is this? The child born of Mary is the savior of the world. Give thanks and joy with me and join in singing…

What Child Is This?       370

Hark! The Herald Angels Sing was original written as 10 four line stanzas. First published in 1739 in Charles Wesley’s book Hymns and Sacred Poems.

This hymn was revised by Wesley himself and subsequently by many others as well. George Whitefield, the found of Calvinistic Methodism, gave them hymn its more common form in 1753. The popular refrain was not included until 1782.

The tune which now probably feels to you like a requirement to successfully celebrating Christmas was not even born when the hymn was first written. Felix Mendelssohn wrote the music in 1840 for a festival celebrating four hundred years of the invention of the printing press. William H. Cummings, an organist, later thought the tune would serve as a good match to the hymn. This union of tune and text became a well known match when published in a collection of hymns in 1861.

God and sinners are reconciled in the person and work of Jesus, the newborn King we celebrate this Christmas.

Many of the Christmas carols and hymns include a call for mission and indeed so does “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing.” The first verse includes the phrase,

Joyful, all ye nations rise,

Join the triumph of the skies;

with the angelic host proclaim,

“Christ is born in Bethlehem!”

The celebration of Christmas is a wonderful evangelism opportunity for the church. The hymns that we sing remind us that the wonderful joy of Jesus’ birth is a reason to celebrate and an event to proclaim. The sharing of the good news of Jesus birth does not need to be left up to the angels in the sky. Their song can be your song as well. “Glory to the newborn King!”

Hark! The Herald Angels Sing      380 vs. 1, 3

The angels are messengers of God’s Word throughout the Scriptures. We sing in the hymn “Angels We Have Heard on High,” the joy of the angels. What wonderful good news they had to share.

Gloria in excelsis Deo means Glory to God in the highest.

Christ the Lord is the newborn king. God’s promise is born into the world. Our faith is not rooted in something that we read about in history books like it happened to someone else…someplace else. The promise of God’s mercy and forgiveness is a promise made flesh and blood for us to come adore on bended knee. Join with me in echoing the joyous strains of the angels. I pray that this Christmas you will find in your heart a deep and abiding trust in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. Jesus is the one, the only one that saves you from your sin. Repent of your sin and have faith in him and you find in your life an echoing of the joyous strains of the angels.

Angels We Have Heard on High   368 vs 1, 3