1st Sunday in Christmas Joy to the World and Away in a Manger

Welcome this is Parson Paul on the hymns. I am a retired United Methodist pastor with a great love of church music in general and the hymns in particular. I hope to help busy church professionals, church musicians and just regular people in the pew to have a great appreciation and understanding of the music of the church.

Today I want to share a couple of hymns our first hymn is “Joy to the World” UM 246.

This version is by Pentatonix https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Xo64Q2ucQ8

Wikipedia says, The words of the hymn are by English writer Isaac Watts, based on Psalm 98, 96:11–12 and Genesis 3:17–18. It was first published in 1719 in Watts' collection The Psalms of David: Imitated in the language of the New Testament, and applied to the Christian state and worship. Watts writes of heaven and earth rejoicing at the coming of the king. An interlude that depends more on Watts' interpretation than the psalm text, stanza three speaks of Christ's blessings victory over sin and death. The cheerful repetition of the non-psalm phrase "far as the curse is found" has caused this stanza to be omitted from some hymnals. But the line makes joyful sense when understood from the New Testament eyes through which Watts interprets the psalm. Stanza four celebrates Christ's rule over the nations." The nations are called to celebrate because God's faithfulness to the house of Israel has brought salvation to the world.

The tune is from the 1848 edition by Lowell Mason for The National Psalmist (Boston, 1848) Lowell Mason was an accomplished and well-known composer and arranger.

I believe the hymns speak into our lives as well today as in the day when they were first written which may have been hundreds of years ago. Please feel free to share this blog or podcast with others you think might enjoy and drop us a line with suggestions or any comments. Be sure and check out the links and notes I have placed at the end of this blog and in the show notes of the podcast for full videos today’s hymn selection and others I found interesting.

I also believe that Worship is a dialogue. As we worship the Triune Godhead, God receives that worship and speaks to us. I believe worship should be participatory dialogue, not a one-way lecture.

It is my belief that some of our greatest and most beloved worship music can be called up from our memory at the lowest times in our lives. At the time of greatest tragedies and hardship in my life I may not be able to remember my new street address but can remember the simple words to Jesus Loves Me or This Little Light of Mine.

In times of great need the timeless words of the hymns come to us. Seldom can we remember the words to the latest pop song but the hymns and scriptures we were taught as a child come up from the deep recess of our hearts to calm and soothe us as nothing else can do.

Recently our family was gathered for what we call Cranksgiving a family occasion between Thanksgiving and Christmas. We began this tradition as seldom can our extended family gather on Thanksgiving and Christmas that we saw a need to come together, so Cranksgiving was born. We usually gather over a weekend and on Sunday we have special time of worship together. This year I went around the room asking each what their favorite Christmas Hymn and Christmas song was, and this is the list I got.

Hymns: Silent Night, God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, Away in a Manger, Joy to the World, Hark the Herald Angels Sing, We Three Kings, O Holy Night, God Tell it on the Mountain, Joy to the World, Angels We Have Heard on High

Other Carols and songs: Carol of the Bells, Mary Did you Know, Santa Claus is Coming to Town, What God Wants for Christmas, Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer, Deck the Halls, Sleigh Ride, All I Want for Christmas is My two Front Teeth, White Christmas, I Wonder as I Wander, The Christmas Shoes, Blue Christmas, Silver Bells, It's Christmas Time Again

Our second selection today is one of those hymns most of us learned as small children. I have seen this hymn sung countless times often my the youngest of children in the Sunday School. Away in a Manger, UM217.

"Away in a Manger" is a Christmas carol first published in the late nineteenth century and used widely throughout the English-speaking world. In Britain, it is one of the most beloved carols; a 1996 Gallup Poll ranked it joint second.

The popularity of the carol has led to many variants in the lyrics. The two most-common musical compositions are by William J. Kirkpatrick (1895) and James Ramsey Murray (1887).

The vast majority of early hymnals cite the words to German Protestant reformer, Martin Luther. Many go so far as to name the carol "Luther's Cradle Song" or "Luther's Cradle Hymn", to describe the English words as having been transposed from Luther. 

The claim of Luther's authorship remained to be made well into the twentieth century, but it is now discarded as false for various reasons. For instance, no text in Luther's known writings corresponds to the carol. Also, no German text for the hymn has been discovered from before 1934, more than fifty years after the first English edition. That German lyrics read awkwardly and seem to be the result of a translation from the English original. And the hymn appeared on about the 400^th Anniversary of Luther’s birth.

The tune most commonly used for this hymn was written by James R Murray, born Andover Mass, 1841. He attended Dr. George F Root’s School of Music and was associated with William Bradbury and Dr. Lowell Mason.

I have provided links to Joy to the World performed in Dublin Ireland in 2013 by Celtic Women, and a recording of Susan Boyle singing Away in a Manger in Rockefeller Plaza in 2010. Also, I have linked a of the United States Air Force Concert Band and The Singing Sergeants from 2017.

May the Christ child rekindle the spirit and wonder of Christmas for you and yours this year, until next time God Bless.

Listen as we play Away In a Manger performed by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLWnarUwamU Mormon Tabernacle Choir

Joy to the World by the Celtic Women, Dublin Ireland 2013 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VDmIddF7DfQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l05A4c0bZA Susan Boyle - Away in a Manger - Rockefeller Plaza - 2010

USAF Band Holiday Show: Sunday, Dec 10, 2017 at 3:00pm

Concert band and the Singing Sergeants the entire concert is 2 hours. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGRlNbSdqtM

Special Thanks to GodTube and Wikipedia for info used today.