Each week, you may find information here about the music in the traditional worship services at First United Methodist Church in Lewisville, Texas. Some of this information is original; most of it is copied from other websites such as Wikipedia, GBOD, and hymnary.org. It is my hope that this information will enhance your understanding and enrich your worship experience.
About the Organ Music:
A Short Organ Suite on Favorite Christmas Carols - Carl Bloom
(c.1951, Gregorian Institute of America)
In dulci jubilo ("In sweet rejoicing") is a traditional Christmas carol. In its original setting, the carol is a macaronic text of German and Latin dating from the Middle Ages. Subsequent translations into English, such as J.M. Neale's arrangement "Good Christian Men, Rejoice" have increased its popularity, and Robert Pearsall's 1837 macaronic translation is a mainstay of the Christmas Nine Lessons and Carols repertoire. The original song text, a macaronic alternation of Medieval German and Latin, is thought to have been written by the German mystic Heinrich Seuse circa 1328. According to folklore, Seuse heard angels sing these words and joined them in a dance of worship. In his biography (or perhaps autobiography), it was written: “Now this same angel came up to the Servant (Suso) brightly, and said that God had sent him down to him, to bring him heavenly joys amid his sufferings; adding that he must cast off all his sorrows from his mind and bear them company, and that he must also dance with them in heavenly fashion. Then they drew the Servant by the hand into the dance, and the youth began a joyous song about the infant Jesus ...”
The tune first appears in Codex 1305, a manuscript in Leipzig University Library dating from c.1400, although it has been suggested that the melody may have existed in Europe prior to this date. In print, the tune was included in Geistliche Lieder, a 1533 Lutheran hymnal by Joseph Klug. It also appears in Michael Vehe's Gesangbuch of 1537. In 1545, another verse was added, possibly by Martin Luther. This was included in Valentin Babst's Geistliche Lieder, printed in Leipzig. The melody was also popular elsewhere in Europe, and appears in a Swedish/Latin version in the 1582 Finnish songbook Piae Cantiones, a collection of sacred and secular medieval songs. The tune appears in Michael Praetorius's Polyhymnia Caduceatrix & Panegyrica collection of 1619.
The literal translation of the text is:
In sweet rejoicing, now sing and be glad!
Our hearts' joy lies in the manger;
And it shines like the sun in the mother's lap.
You are the alpha and omega!
Over 180 years ago the carol "Stille Nacht! Heilige Nacht" was heard for the first time in a village church in Oberndorf, Austria. The congregation at that Midnight Mass in St. Nicholas Church listened as the voices of the assistant pastor, Fr. Joseph Mohr (1792-1848), and the choir director, Franz Xaver Gruber (1787-1863), rang through the church to the accompaniment of Fr. Mohr's guitar. On that Christmas Eve, a song was born that would wing its way into the hearts of people throughout the world. Now translated into hundreds of languages, it is sung by untold millions every December from small chapels in the Andes to great cathedrals in Antwerp and Rome.
Today books, films and Internet sites are filled with fanciful tales purporting to tell the history of "Silent Night." Some tell of mice eating the bellows of the organ creating the necessity for a hymn to be accompanied by a guitar. Others claim that Joseph Mohr was forced to write the words to a new carol in haste since the organ would not play. A recent film, created for Austrian television places Oberndorf in the Alps and includes evil railroad barons and a double-dealing priest, while a recent book by a German author places a zither in the hands of Franz Gruber and connects Joseph Mohr with a tragic fire engulfing the city of Salzburg. You can read claims that "Silent Night" was sung on Christmas Eve in 1818 and then forgotten by its creators. Of course, the latter are easily discounted by manuscript arrangements of the carol by both Mohr and Gruber which were produced at various times between 1820 and 1855.
The German words for the original six stanzas of the carol we know as "Silent Night" were written by Joseph Mohr in 1816, when he was a young priest assigned to a pilgrimage church in Mariapfarr, Austria. His grandfather lived nearby, and it is easy to imagine that he could have come up with the words while walking thorough the countryside on a visit to his elderly relative. The fact is, we have no idea if any particular event inspired Joseph Mohr to pen his poetic version of the birth of the Christchild. The world is fortunate, however, that he didn't leave it behind when he was transferred to Oberndorf the following year (1817). On December 24, 1818 Joseph Mohr journeyed to the home of musician-schoolteacher Franz Gruber who lived in an apartment over the schoolhouse in nearby Arnsdorf. He showed his friend the poem and asked him to add a melody and guitar accompaniment so that it could be sung at Midnight Mass. His reason for wanting the new carol is unknown. Some speculate that the organ would not work; others feel that the assistant pastor, who dearly loved guitar music, merely wanted a new carol for Christmas. Later that evening, as the two men, backed by the choir, stood in front of the main altar in St. Nicholas Church and sang "Stille Nacht! Heilige Nacht!" for the first time, they could hardly imagine the impact their composition would have on the world.
Karl Mauracher, a master organ builder and repairman from the Ziller Valley, traveled to Oberndorf to work on the organ, several times in subsequent years. While doing his work in St. Nicholas, he obtained a copy of the composition and took it home with him. Thus, the simple carol, began its journey around the world as a "Tyrolean Folk Song."
Two traveling families of folk singers from the Ziller Valley, similar to the Trapp Family Singers of "The Sound of Music" fame, incorporated the song into their repertoire. According to the Leipziger Tageblatt, the Strassers sang the song in a concert in Leipzig in December 1832. It was during this period, several musical notes were changed, and the carol evolved into the melody we know today. On another occasion, according to an historical plaque, the Rainer Family sang the Christmas carol before an audience which included Emperor Franz I and Tsar Alexander I. In the year 1839, the Rainers performed "Stille Nacht" for the first time in America, at the Alexander Hamilton Monument outside Trinity Church in New York City.
Joseph Bletzacher, the Court Opera singer from Hannover, reported that by the 1840s, the carol was already well known in Lower Saxony. "In Berlin," he says, "the Royal Cathedral Choir popularized it especially. It became in fact the favorite Christmas carol of the artistically appreciative King Frederick William IV of Prussia, who used to have the Cathedral Choir sing it for him during the Christmas season each year." During his lifetime, Franz Xaver Gruber produced a number of orchestral arrangements of his composition. The original guitar arrangement is missing, but five other Gruber manuscripts of the carol exist. The manuscript by Joseph Mohr (ca. 1820) is for guitar accompaniment and is probably the closest to the arrangement and melody sung at Midnight Mass in 1818.
Perhaps this is part of the miracle of "Silent Night." The words flowed from the imagination of a modest curate. The music was composed by a musician who was not known outside his village. There was no celebrity to sing at its world premiere. Yet its powerful message of heavenly peace has crossed all borders and language barriers, conquering the hearts of people everywhere.
Silent night, holy night! All is calm, all is bright.
Round yon Virgin, Mother and Child. Holy infant so tender and mild,
Sleep in heavenly peace, Sleep in heavenly peace
Silent night, holy night! Shepherds quake at the sight.
Glories stream from heaven afar Heavenly hosts sing Alleluia,
Christ the Savior is born! Christ the Savior is born
Silent night, holy night! Son of God love's pure light.
Radiant beams from Thy holy face With dawn of redeeming grace,
Jesus Lord, at Thy birth, Jesus Lord, at Thy birth
“O Little Town of Bethlehem” is a popular Christmas carol. The text was written by Phillips Brooks (1835–1893), an Episcopal priest, Rector of the Church of the Holy Trinity, Philadelphia. He was inspired by visiting the Palestinian city of Bethlehem in 1865. “After an early dinner, we took our horses and rode to Bethlehem,” he wrote home in Christmas week of 1865. “It was only about two hours when we came to the town, situated on an eastern ridge of a range of hills, surrounded by its terraced gardens. It is a good-looking town, better built than any other we have seen in Palestine. . . . Before dark, we rode out of town to the field where they say the shepherds saw the star. It is a fenced piece of ground with a cave in it (all the Holy Places are caves here), in which, strangely enough, they put the shepherds. The story is absurd, but somewhere in those fields we rode through the shepherds must have been. . . . As we passed, the shepherds were still “keeping watch over their flocks or leading them home to fold.” Three years later, he wrote the poem for his church and his organist, Lewis Redner, added the music.
O little town of Bethlehem How still we see thee lie
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep The silent stars go by
Yet in thy dark streets shineth The everlasting Light
The hopes and fears of all the years Are met in thee tonight
For Christ is born of Mary And gathered all above
While mortals sleep, the angels keep Their watch of wondering love
O morning stars together Proclaim the holy birth
And praises sing to God the King And Peace to men on earth
How silently, how silently The wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts The blessings of His heaven.
No ear may hear His coming, But in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive him still, The dear Christ enters in.
O holy Child of Bethlehem Descend to us, we pray
Cast out our sin and enter in Be born to us today
We hear the Christmas angels The great glad tidings tell
O come to us, abide with us Our Lord Emmanuel
The original text of “O Come, All Ye Faithful” has been from attributed to various groups and individuals, including St. Bonaventure in the 13th century or King John IV of Portugal in the 17th, though it was more commonly believed that the text was written by an order of monks, the Cistercian, German, Portuguese and Spanish orders having, at various times, been given credit.
The original text consisted of four Latin verses, and it was with these that the hymn was originally published. John Francis Wade (1711=1786) had written the music and the hymn in Latin in 1744, and was first published in 1751. The Abbé Jean-François-Étienne Borderies wrote an additional three verses in the 18th century; these are normally printed as the third to fifth of seven verses, while another, anonymous, additional Latin verse is rarely printed. The text has been translated innumerable times, but the most used version today is the English "O Come, All Ye Faithful". This is a combination of one of Frederick Oakeley's translations of the original four verses and William Thomas Brooke's of the three additional ones, which was first published in Murray's Hymnal in 1852. Oakeley originally titled the song “Ye Faithful, approach ye” when it was sung at his Margaret Church in Marylebone before it was altered to its current form.
O come, all ye faithful, Joyful and triumphant,
O Come ye, O come ye, to Bethlehem.
Come and behold Him, Born the King of angels;
Refrain
O come, let us adore Him, O come, let us adore Him,
O come, let us adore Him, Christ the Lord.
God of God, Light of Light,
Lo! he abhors not the Virgin’s womb;
Very God, Begotten not created.
Sing, choirs of angels, Sing in exultation;
Sing, all ye citizens of heaven above!
Glory to God, In the highest;
Yea, Lord, we greet Thee, Born this happy morning;
Jesu, to Thee be glory given;
Word of the Father, Now in flesh appearing.
See how the shepherds, Summoned to His cradle,
Leaving their flocks, draw nigh to gaze;
We too will thither Bend our hearts' oblations
There shall we see Him, His Eternal Father's
Everlasting Brightness now veiled under flesh;
God shall we find there, a Babe in infant clothing;
Father eternal, Thine eternal splendour
Now veiled in flesh our eyes shall see:
God as an infant, swaddling clothes about him.
Child, for us sinners Poor and in the manger,
We would embrace Thee, with love and awe;
Who would not love Thee, Loving us so dearly?
Lo! Star-led chieftains, Magi, Christ adoring,
Offer Him frankincense and gold and myrrh;
We to the Christ-child, Bring our hearts oblations:
"Angels We Have Heard on High" is a Christmas carol of French origin in the public domain. The song commemorates the story of the birth of Jesus Christ found in the Gospel of Luke, in which shepherds outside Bethlehem encounter a multitude of angels singing and praising the newborn child. People began to chant the phrase "Gloria in excelsis Deo" in Christmas Eve worship services as early as 130 A.D. In medieval times, French shepherds had a Christmas Eve tradition of shouting "Gloria in excelsis Deo" to each other as they watched over their sheep flocks on their respective hills in southern France. A Latin chorale version may have inspired the traditional French Christmas carol 'Les Anges dans nos Campagnes,' which Edward Shippen Barnes used in the 1800s to arrange the first version of 'Angels We Have Heard on High'. The most common English version that was translated in 1862 by James Chadwick, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Hexham and Newcastle, northeast England. 'Angels We Have Heard on High' was first published in English as part of an 1862 book called Crown of Jesus Music. But the version that has become popular worldwide was published later, in 1916, in the book Carols Old and Carols New.
GLORIA is the French noel tune traditionally associated with this text. The popularity of this carol stems from its refrain–all those cascading phrases in which human beings imitate the angels' chorus. The tune is also known as IRIS because of its association with James Montgomery's "Angels from the Realms of Glory", which was first printed in the Sheffield Iris (Montgomery, ed.). The harmonization is by Edward S. Barnes (1887-1958) and was first published in The New Church Hymnal (1937). Barnes studied at the Lawrenceville School, Yale University, and the Schola Cantorum in Paris. He was organist and choirmaster at two New York City churches – Church of the Incarnation and Rutgers Presbyterian – and in Philadelphia at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church. From 1938 to 1954 he served as organist at the First Presbyterian Church in Santa Monica, California. Barnes contributed to the Presbyterian Handbook to the Hymnal (1935) and wrote piano and vocal works as well as anthems and liturgical music.
Angels we have heard on high sweetly singing o’er the plains,
And the mountains in reply echoing their joyous strains,
Gloria, in excelsis Deo! Gloria, in excelsis Deo!
Shepherds, why this jubilee? Why your joyous strains prolong?
What the gladsome tidings be which inspire your heavenly song?
Gloria, in excelsis Deo! Gloria, in excelsis Deo!
Come to Bethlehem and see Christ whose birth the angels sing;
Come adore on bended knee, Christ the Lord, the newborn King.
Gloria, in excelsis Deo! Gloria, in excelsis Deo!
See him in a manger laid, whom the choirs of angels praise;
Mary, Joseph, lend your aid, while our hearts in love we raise.
Gloria, in excelsis Deo! Gloria, in excelsis Deo!
Carol Bloom (1903-1964) attended Yale University School of Music and Pius X School of Liturgical Music. He composed liturgical and organ music and was organist of St. Mary’s Church, Newport, Rhode Island.
Silent Night/Still, Still, Still - Sally DeFord
(c.2001, Sally DeFord)
"Still, still, still" is an Austrian Christmas carol and lullaby. In German its first line is "Still, still, still, weil's Kindlein schlafen will!" ("Hush, hush, hush, for the little child wants to sleep!") The melody is a folk tune (authorship unknown) from the State of Salzburg. The tune appeared for the first time in 1865 in a folksong collection of Maria Vinzenz Süß (1802–1868), founder of the Salzburg Museum. The words, which run to six verses in German, describe the peace of the infant Jesus and his mother as the baby is sung to sleep. They have changed slightly over the years but the modern Standard German version remains attributed to Georg Götsch (1895–1956).
Still, still, still, One can hear the falling snow.
For all is hushed, The world is sleeping, Holy Star its vigil keeping.
Still, still, still, One can hear the falling snow.
Sleep, sleep, sleep, 'Tis the eve of our Saviour's birth.
The night is peaceful all around you, Close your eyes, Let sleep surround you.
Sleep, sleep, sleep, 'Tis the eve of our Saviour's birth.
Dream, dream, dream, Of the joyous day to come.
While guardian angels without number, Watch you as you sweetly slumber.
Dream, dream, dream, Of the joyous day to come
Sally Giles DeFord is a prolific composer and arranger whose choral, duet, solo, and instrumental music is given away through her website. “The Lord has placed me in circumstances that currently don't demand extra income, he has inspired the creators of technology to produce programs that I can use to publish the music without the assistance of typesetters, and he has given me a gift that I did nothing to earn. Sharing seems logical.” DeFord was born in 1959 in Eugene, Oregon. She fondly recalls that her love of music came listening to her grandmother practice the accordion and her grandfather singing her to sleep accompanied by his banjo. She wrote her first song—a ballad for a then-boyfriend—when she was sixteen, but scrapped it, as well as the next few songs she wrote. She attended Brigham Young University. Her music has been featured in Church magazines numerous times and she has received over thirty Church music awards for her compositions and arrangements. Her song, “If the Savior Stood Beside Me” was used in the 2008 Primary program and was performed in the Church’s General Young Women’s meeting in 2007.
O Come, All Ye Faithful - Mary McDonald
(c.2014, Lorenz Publishing)
Mary McDonald’s sacred music career spans over thirty-five years. More than eight hundred anthems, seasonal musicals and keyboard collections testify to her significant contribution to sacred literature. In 2000, Mary became the first ever woman President of the Southern Baptist Church Music Conference. In addition, she has served as accompanist for the Tennessee Men's Chorale since 1985. Her greatest desire is "to give God glory for the songs He has allowed me to compose. He alone, is the true Creator behind my pen." In 2011, after serving as sacred music editor for The Lorenz Corporation in Dayton, Ohio for more than twenty years, Mary answered a new call. Now she takes her tremendous passion and love for music making directly to churches as an independent artist by holding Composer Weekend workshops.
About the Choral Music:
Were You There on that Christmas Night? – Natalie Sleeth
(c. 1976, Hope Publishing)
Natalie Sleeth (1930-1992) was born in Evanston, Illinois. In 1952, she received an Academic major in music theory and a BA in music theory at Wellesley College in Massachusetts. In her later life she received an honorary doctorate from West Virginia Wesleyan College and from Nebraska Wesleyan College. She wrote over 180 works for organ for church and school. She was a member of the Highland Park United Methodist Church in Dallas, TX.
One of Sleeth's best-known anthems for choir is entitled "Joy in the Morning" and was written on the occasion of her husband's inauguration as the president of West Virginia Wesleyan College in 1977. Another favorite is "In the Bulb There is a Flower", which was composed as an anthem for the Pasadena Community Church, St. Petersburg FL It appears under the title "Hymn of Promise" in the United Methodist Hymnal and has been translated into German for the Gesangbuch der Evangelisch-methodistischen Kirche (2002). “Were You There on that Christmas Night?” was originally written for 2-part choir in 1976. It has since been published for mixed choir with piano and handbells and has been arranged as a congregational hymn and appears in Worship and Rejoice.
Were you there, were you there on that Christmas night
When the world was filled with a holy light?
Were you there to behold, when the wonder foretold came to earth?
Did you see, did you see how they hailed Him King
With the gifts so rare that they chose to bring?
Did you see how they bowed as they praised Him aloud at His birth?
Did you hear how the choirs of Angels sang at the glory of the sight?
Did you hear how the bells of Heaven rang all through the night?
Did you know, did you know it was God’s own Son,
The salvation of the world begun?
Did you know it was love that was sent from above to the earth?
Winds Through the Olive Trees - Mary Canfield
(c.1985, Mary Canfield)
Very little is known of this 16th century carol from Gascony, in the Basque region of France. In the 1880’s a poem by Katherine Parker was set to it, and the melody was harmonized by George Wilmot and published as “In Little Bethlehem.”
There is no biographical information available for Katherine Parker. George William Wilmot (1858-1933) was a choirmaster, composer, and multi-instrumentalist whose life and work was largely centered in New Brunswick, NJ. Wilmot served as Choirmaster of Christ Church (Episcopal), New Brunswick, from 1885-1930. Wilmot also served the community as Music Supervisor of the New Brunswick Public Schools. Wilmot was a member of the American Guild of Organists and published several songs for youth in The Westminster Primary Quarterly.
Winds through the olive trees, Softly did blow.
'Round little Bethlehem, Long, long ago.
All is calm, All is bright.
Sheep on the hillsides lay Whiter than snow,
Shepherds were watching them, Long, long ago.
Silent night, Holy night,
All is calm, All is bright, radiant.
‘Round yon Virgin mother and child,
Holy infant so tender and mild, so so mild
Then from the starry skies2 Angels bent low,
Singing their songs of joy; Long, long ago.
Silent night, holy night.
For, in a manger bed Cradled we know,
Christ came to Bethlehem Long, long ago.
About the Vocal Solo Music:
Sweet Little Jesus Boy – Robert MacGimsey
(c.1934, Carl Fischer)
Robert MacGimsey (1898-1979) was born in Pineville, Louisiana. MacGimsey spent most of his formative years in the company of blacks who lived and worked for and with his family. Due to their influence he wrote in an "African American" style, and he is often mistakenly assumed to be a black composer. His most famous song was "Sweet Little Jesus Boy" (1934), a well-known Christmas carol written in the style of an African-American spiritual.
Sweet little Jesus Boy They made You be born in a manger
Sweet little Holy Child They didn't know who You were
Didn't know You'd come to save us Lord, to take our sins away.
Our eyes was blind; we could not see.
We didn't know who You were.
Long time ago, You were born.
Born in a manger, Lord, Sweet little Jesus Boy.
The world treat You mean, Lord; Treat me mean, too.
But that's how things is down here.
We didn't know ‘twas You.
You done told us how we been a-tryin'
Master, You done showed us how Even when You’s dyin'.
It just seems like we can't do right; Look how we treated You
Please, please, forgive us, Lord,
We didn't know ‘twas You.
Sweet little Jesus Boy Born a long time ago
Sweet little Holy Child
We didn't know who You were.
About the Hymns:
Joy to the World
Our Christmas season would hardly seem complete without the singing of Joy to the World, the most joyous of the carols. Yet Isaac Watts, its author, never intended it to be a Christmas carol at all. Rather, it was a part of his Psalms of David Imitated, published in 1719, which contained paraphrases of many of the Psalms in New Testament language.
The story of the hymn, Joy to the World, is the story of the author, Isaac Watts (1675-1748), who is universally acknowledged as "The Father of English Hymnody". He has earned the title, not because he was first to write English hymns, but because he gave impetus to hymnody and established its place in the worship of the English church. For over one hundred years, congregational singing had been strictly limited to the Psalms of the Old Testament in poetic form. Many of these rhymed Psalms were so unnatural that Samuel Wesley, father of the famous brothers Charles and John, called them "scandalous doggerel," and his opinion was shared by many.
The birth of Isaac Watts to a dissenting deacon and the daughter of a Huguenot refugee was followed by fourteen years of persecution and hardships for the entire family. Perhaps this suffering was responsible for Isaac Watts’ ill health, for he grew only to a height of just over five feet and was weak and sickly all his life. Though weak in body, the boy was strong in mind and spirit and early in life showed promise of poetic capability. After one Sunday morning service, Isaac, then fifteen years old, complained of the atrocious worship in song. One of the deacons challenged him: "Give us something better, young man." His answer was to write hundreds of hymns that are still sung today.
Joy to the World is the "imitation" of the last half of Psalm 98. The author transformed the old Jewish psalm of praise for some historic deliverance into a Christian song of rejoicing for the salvation of God that began to be manifested when the Babe of Bethlehem came "to make his blessing flow far as the curse is found." This is one of the most joyous hymns in all Christendom because it makes so real what Christ’s birth means to all mankind.
The tune most widely associated with Watts’ text is ANTIOCH, often poorly attributed in hymnals to either George Frideric Handel or Lowell Mason, neither of which is the proper author. This tune appeared at least four times in short succession around the same date, 1832–1833. Since three of the collections were published without dates, the exact succession is difficult to determine. Possibly the earliest is Charles Rider’s Psalmodia Britannica, vol. 4,, where the tune was called COMFORT (c.1831) with the curious ascription, “Partly from J. Leach.” Another of these early appearances was in Thomas Hawkes’ Collection of Tunes (Watchet: Thomas Whitehorn, 1833, where it was also called COMFORT. The attribution to “Author unknown” suggests that the tune had appeared earlier in another collection or through some other resource yet to be determined. Hawkes’ collection was keyed to A Collection of Hymns for the Use of the People Called Methodists, with a Supplement (London: John Mason, 1831), where the tune appears with Charles Wesley’s “O joyful sound of gospel grace” and Wesley’s “How large the promise, how divine.” Around the same time Hawkes’ collection was published, this tune appeared in Thomas Clark’s Congregational Harmonist, vol. 3 (London: W. Blackman, n.d.), also dubbed COMFORT and paired with Wesley’s “O joyful sound,” without attribution. In this printing, the tunes are associated with the same Methodist collection published by John Mason that Hawkes’ had used for his tunebook.
In William Holford’s Voce di Melodia, ca. 1833–1834, 3rd ed., like the others, this tune was called COMFORT. Here the associated text was “O the delights, the heav’nly joys” by Isaac Watts. Holford seems to be the first to connect this tune with Handel. This tune has never been found among the works of Handel, but it does bear a resemblance to various strains from Messiah. The opening phrase, especially in these early British versions, recalls “Glory to God” and/or “Lift up your heads”, while the third phrase recalls the opening strains of “Comfort ye”. This latter association may very well be why the tune was called COMFORT, but the tune as a whole should not be credited to Handel, except perhaps as the tune’s inspiration.
Shortly thereafter, the tune crossed the Atlantic and was adapted by Lowell Mason (1792–1872) for his collection Occasional Psalm and Hymn Tunes, No. 3 (Boston, 1836). Mason credited the tune as “arranged from Handel” and he initiated its famed pairing with “Joy to the world.”
Joy to the world, the Lord is come! Let earth receive her King;
let ev’ry heart prepare him room and heav’n and nature sing,
and heav’n and nature sing, and heav’n, and heav’n and nature sing.
Joy to the earth, the Savior reigns! Let men their songs employ,
while fields and floods, rocks, hills, and plains, repeat the sounding joy,
repeat the sounding joy, repeat, repeat the sounding joy.
No more let sins and sorrows grow nor thorns infest the ground;
he comes to make his blessings flow far as the curse is found,
far as the curse is found, far as, far as the curse is found.
He rules the world with truth and grace and makes the nations prove
the glories of his righteousness and wonders of his love,
and wonders of his love, and wonders, wonders of his love.
Silent Night
One of the earliest records of candles being used at Christmas is from the middle ages, where a large candle was used to represent the star of Bethlehem. Jesus is sometimes called 'the Light of the World' by Christians. The tradition of a candlelight service has become a common practice in many churches on Christmas Eve.
Silent night, holy night! All is calm, all is bright.
Round yon Virgin, Mother and Child. Holy infant so tender and mild,
Sleep in heavenly peace, Sleep in heavenly peace
Silent night, holy night! Shepherds quake at the sight.
Glories stream from heaven afar Heavenly hosts sing Alleluia,
Christ the Savior is born! Christ the Savior is born
Silent night, holy night! Son of God love's pure light.
Radiant beams from Thy holy face With dawn of redeeming grace,
Jesus Lord, at Thy birth, Jesus Lord, at Thy birth
First United Methodist Church, Lewisville, Texas
A Community of Everyday People Learning to Love Like Jesus
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