Tag: Music

Songs of the Season: Matthew 2:22-23

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“Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet: ‘See, the virgin will become pregnant and give birth to a son, and they will name him Immanuel,’ which is translated ‘God is with us.'” (CSB – Read the chapter)

The Advent season is probably my favorite time of the year with the possible exception of the first real onset of Fall. What makes the Advent season so special is its music. No other season has as much good and classic music associated with it as the season of Advent. The collection of songs it boasts isn’t necessarily all that numerous (unless you are comparing with any other season in which it dwarfs the competition), but the handful of songs are so good that everyone has done their own version of all of them. Indeed, of the making of Christmas albums there is no end. And while you can perhaps try to explain that from all sorts of different angles, without Jesus the songbook itself and a host of good recordings wouldn’t exist. He is inescapably the reason for the season. As has become our tradition around here, Fridays through the season of Advent are for celebrating this great music. We’ll start this week with a reasonably old recording of a music older song that I just recently discovered. Here is O Come, O Come, Emmanuel from the Punch Brothers.

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Songs of the Season: Luke 2:7

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”Then she gave birth to her firstborn son, and she wrapped him tightly in cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them.“ (CSB – Read the chapter)

Jesus’ birth changed history. No other birth has been of similar significance as His. It’s not even close. We literally changed how we number our years because He was born. Modern scholars try to cover up that fact by using BCE and CE instead the traditional BC and AD, by the numbers don’t change which means the event of Jesus’ birth is still the lynchpin on which everything hinges. How could a song properly capture such an ordeal in words? It couldn’t. But I heard one recently that comes pretty close. Let’s celebrate today that Jesus is alive with one last song of the season.

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Morning Musing: 1 Thessalonians 4:13

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“We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, concerning those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve like the rest, who have no hope.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Something a little different this morning. I’ve recently been reminded about how hard loss can be. Saying goodbye to loved ones when they close their eyes on this life is one of the hardest things we will face in this life. It leaves us disoriented and struggling to make sense out of…everything. Tomorrow starts to feel pointless, and hope seems nowhere to be found. And yet, if you are follower of Jesus, there’s this thing Paul said about not grieving like those who have no hope. Why? Let’s talk about it for a bit, and then I’d like to share a song with you that puts the hope Paul is talking about in a way that helps us to grasp it a little better.

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Morning Musing: Mark 10:35-37

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“James and John, the sons of Zebedee, approached him and said, ‘Teacher, we want you to do whatever we ask you.’ ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ he asked them. They answered him, ‘Allow us to sit at your right and at your left in your glory.'” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Have you ever known someone who is truly tone-deaf? Most people have at least some sort of awareness of pitch and harmony and can recognize when they are out of tune with the world around them. But there are some folks who are just clueless. You could play a C for them, ask them to sing it back to you, they’ll sing a strong G, and think they’re right on the money while you shake your head in confusion. Just as much as there are folks out there who are musically tone-deaf, though, there are folks who are socially tone-deaf. These folks manage to not pick up on social cues that would have otherwise clearly indicated to them that whatever it was they were about to do or say wasn’t appropriate to the situation they were in. They charge in like a bull in a china shop, completely oblivious to the impact of their words or actions on the people around them. What we see here is that some of Jesus’ closest followers were afflicted with this condition. We also get a reminder that we sometimes listen to the wrong things too.

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