Of the hundreds of carols composed and sung at Christmas, one has managed not only to survive for more than two centuries, but also to spread its message of hope to all corners of the world.
It was Christmas Eve 1818, and none of the churchgoers who filled the small Austrian town of Oberndorf could have imagined how far the carols they heard for the first time would travel. The past 13 years had not been easy—after 12 years of war that had devastated the country, the previous year had been disastrously cold, with snow in midsummer, many storms, and damaged crops. Historians would come to call 1817 “the year without a summer”. Poor and hungry, perhaps tired of waiting for better times, the faithful were comforted by the harmony of the carol, written by the parish priest Joseph Mohr. The melody, so simple but which was to become so beloved, was composed by Franz Gruber, a friend of Mohr’s, at his request.
Stille Nacht (Silent Night) has been declared part of Austria’s cultural heritage and has been translated into at least 300 languages. In 2014, Time magazine named it “the most popular Christmas song ever“. Over the past four decades, artists have recorded more than 730 versions of the song, twice as many as the second most popular Christmas carol, “Joy to the World”.
One of the explanations for the song’s longevity and popularity has to do with the sense of calm it brings from the very first chords, says Brian Lee, director of the music department at Moody Bible Institute in Chicago. “We seem to live in such a noisy chapter in history,” Lee pointed out, emphasising that even the title of the song is a message of peace to the weary soul. Sarah Eyerly, a professor at Florida State University and an expert on historical hymns, notes that the carol “has a message of hope in the midst of suffering that I think almost anyone can identify with, regardless of their culture”.
Few Christian hymns become as famous as Silent Night, but worship through music nourishes hope, even when its flame is barely flickering. It reconnects us with the Word that stays alive even when the good times seem to be fading, even when we see no end to our journey. The Bible itself calls us to worship through music: “Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts” (Colossians 3:16); speak “to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord,” (Ephesians 5:19).
Pastor C.J. Mahaney believes that Christian hymns are “take home theology“—easy-to-remember summaries of some of the truths that Scripture expounds. Christian hymns are a great way to impress biblical teachings on the minds of children, especially with the recent growth of children’s songs that retell Bible verses word for word.
A children’s Bible, a few games, a cooler full of food and a guitar—these were the items that were never missing from the suitcases that blogger Katie Simpson McLeod and her mother packed when she was a child, as they prepared for a new trip out of the country. Her parents worked to establish new churches in India and other countries, and Katie often sang to underprivileged children accompanied by her guitar, and learned that every child needs to be helped to choose the right music for the best spiritual formation.
Music changes a child’s life and leads to a mature relationship with God, says Katie. One of the things that stood out for her later in her training in Christian education through music was the idea that children should know enough songs to be able to use them in all the situations they will encounter. Whether they are sad, frightened, hurt, excited, happy, in need of comfort, celebrating, mourning, or enjoying the beauty of nature, singing will help them remember that God is near. And if adults truly love worship through music, this joy of singing outside the walls of the church will be noticed by children and, in most cases, become contagious.
Christian songs are a source of joy and strength in the most difficult circumstances. How else can we explain the fact that Paul and Silas were “singing hymns to God” (Acts 16:25) in the middle of the night, although they had every reason to complain and imagine gloomy scenarios? They had just been stripped naked, beaten with rods, had wounds that no one had bothered to dress, and the jailer had deemed it necessary to have their feet fastened in the stocks. Even if they had overlooked the public humiliation to which they had been subjected, the physical pain was probably impossible to ignore.
Sometimes joy leads to singing, but the reverse is also true—hymns of praise are the wellsprings of joy.
One of the pastors imprisoned for his faith in Communist dungeons tells how his torturers and those of his fellow sufferers unwittingly gave them the easiest musical instruments to handle when they chained them up. As they sang the Bible verses (“This is the day, this is the day that the Lord has made, that the Lord has made”), the believers’ voices were accompanied by the clanking of the chains on their hands and feet, and their joy was as great as if they had attended a church service of praise in their days of freedom. Perhaps, as has been suggested, there is a simple explanation for the unearthly joy that comes from song worship—when we praise Him, all our attention is captured by God. And as His majesty, love and omnipotence take over every inch of our minds and hearts, the fear, weariness and frustration that come from the harshness and uncertainty of circumstances lose their towering proportions.
I remember a time when it was painful for me even to take a breath, because of the tight grip that serious crises had on me. It was then that I decided, on the spur of the moment, to save a dried flower in its pot. No one had taken the time to throw it away. This pot had once been the source of much joy in my mornings—the Bougainvillea, or paper flower, that grew in it generously blessed my retina with a shower of purple beauty. Only later, neglected, had my flower withered completely. Not a single leaf was left, and the last stem was withered, like the bones in the vision of the prophet Ezekiel. I don’t know why I brought the pot into my room, or why I began to moisten the petrified earth. But I do know that I tended it as I had tended it in the good old days, until one day the first green bud shyly emerged from the dry stem.
Perhaps not even the rumble of the bones ready to come to life that Ezekiel witnessed could have moved me more. There, in the dryness of my heart, where there was only room for a crucified hope, I felt the first trickle of water poured at my root by two pierced hands. Hands that sealed me in an embrace that hurt all the heavens. Hands that stripped me of my fears that He who weaves the ear might not hear me.
Perhaps this is the unseen power of a song of praise or a hymn—that it brings us again and again into the presence of the One who will never allow anything to tear us from the embrace of His arms.
Carmen Lăiu is editor of Signs of the Times Romania and ST Network.
