Monday, December 9, 2013

25 Days of Carols: It Came Upon A Midnight Clear


The Ozinga Outlook
I love Christmas music.  Old, new, it doesn't matter.  Growing up in kid choir at church meant we learned the stories behind the carols we sang.  I remember so many of these stories and have fact checked many of them over the years with the invention of the internet.  :)  Check back each day for a new carol and story!  I'll be including a video of one of my favorite versions of the carol as well.  Grab the button and share the fun with your friends!

December 9th: It Came Upon A Midnight Clear

This is a beautiful carol, but I really fell in love with it about 7 years ago when Josh Groban recorded it.  Just, yum!  He made it rich and full, and it's perfect!  In 1849, Edward Hamilton Sears wrote this poem for the Boston Christian Register.  The poem hears the angels proclaiming how someday creation will live at peace with God once again.  Amen!  This was also one of the first American written Christmas carols. 

It came upon the midnight clear, 
 that glorious song of old, 
 from angels bending near the earth 
 to touch their harps of gold: 
 "Peace on the earth, good will to men, 
 from heaven's all-gracious King." 
 The world in solemn stillness lay, 
 to hear the angels sing. 

Still through the cloven skies they come 
 with peaceful wings unfurled, 
 and still their heavenly music floats 
 o'er all the weary world; 
 above its sad and lowly plains, 
 they bend on hovering wing, 
 and ever o'er its Babel sounds 
 the blessed angels sing. 

 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! 

 For lo! the days are hastening on, 
 by prophet seen of old, 
 when with the ever-circling years 
 shall come the time foretold 
 when peace shall over all the earth 
 its ancient splendors fling, 
 and the whole world send back the song 
 which now the angels sing.


 

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