THE SONG AND THE STORY

THE SONG AND THE STORY

            No child born into a family has had or will ever have so many songs sung on its birthday as the infant Jesus. Every nation, community and culture has a song for him: the Christmas song. The songs of Christmas always make for joyful singing. They are sung not only as the lilting expression of interior gladness at the birth of the Saviour, but also as a way of radiating the spirit of good cheer, springing from the heart that wishes well to all. The happy acclamation of “Joy to the World”, the sweet sublimity of  “Silent Night”, the placid depth of “While Shepherds watched…”, the tinkling gentleness of “Sweet Chiming Bells”, and the haunting echo of “O Holy Night”, all mark the season with their message that there yet is hope for the age of peace, as foretold in the Scriptures. The songs of Christmas, with their simple words and catchy melodies, sound best when sung with voices rising from childlike hearts, no matter the age of the singer. For if the Saviour could be a child, why not the one who sings about him?  The songs of Christmas have a flavour that the passing years cannot erase. They and their flavour, like a sweet contagion, cannot be taught, only caught !  For what is sung with the lips sinks gently inwards to expand and gild the heart for the descent of the Eternal Wonder, named Emmanuel.  The songs keep alive the story, and the story gives substance to the songs, for without the story the songs would ring hollow.

            “Once upon a time.” That’s how it began. Our faith did not come to us initially as theology, but as story. “Tell me about God.” “Well, once a time, there was a beautiful garden, and in the middle of the garden there was a tree. A man and a woman lived in that garden. The owner of the garden was very friendly with them and allowed them to eat any fruit except from the tree in the centre of the garden.  And you know what they did ?”   “Tell me about Jesus.”  “Once upon a time there lived a boy in a little town of Palestine called Nazareth. His mother’s name was Mary.”  “Tell me about salvation.”  “Well, when the boy grew up, he loved people so much that the rulers began to get frightened of him. And you know what they did ?”

            Think of what it would be like if there were no Christmas story, and no one to tell it. How it began with that childless old couple, Zechariah and Elizabeth, marvellously conceiving and bearing a son, named John, who would herald the long awaited Messiah. We would miss the sense of hope in God’s goodness, in spite of appearances, which this story arouses. No one would hear of the angel’s announcement to the maid of Nazareth, the hush of the universe, sweetly punctuated by the twittering of birds, as it held its breath for an answer, and the sigh of relief when it heard her say, “I am the handmaid of the Lord…” Who would tell us the story of the Virgin Mary and Joseph who went to be enrolled in the great census, little knowing that the One in the womb would in turn enrol the whole world to himself ? Who would tell us of the Infant King on the manger throne, swathed in circumstances of utter poverty, his royal chamber a stable, his canopy the loose spread cobwebs, the reek of the beasts the incense, his courtiers two homeless human beings, and his first subjects the rough and ready shepherds ? We would not hear the story of the Child in the Temple, the carpenter’s son of Nazareth, his kindness, his strength and honesty, his single-hearted devotion to God’s kingdom and God’s people. But for the story, we would never know that the desire of the everlasting hills and the hope of ages has appeared and has surpassed all expectations. We would not know that our death has lost its sting and been swept up into the vibrant joy of the Resurrection. We might have experiences of our hearts burning within us when we meet a stranger and would not know what to make of it, were it not for the Emmaus story.

            We must recover the story, if we are to recover the faith for our day. Each of us has their story. Alongside them is the Christian story, the stories of the heroes and heroines of the faith. Could the pair of stories impact upon one another ?  Sometimes we hear another person’s story in biography, fiction or a movie, and we say, “Ah, that’s my story, too.” In hearing the story of Abraham Lincoln, Jane Adams, Frodo Baggins, of Abraham of Ur, or Deborrah or Ruth or Jesus or Peter and Paul, we say, “That’s my story too. In hearing about them, I’m learning about myself.” We are discovering that the Bible stories are not just what happened “way back then,”  but our own story as well, firmly planted in “the here and now.” In losing the story, we lose the power and the beauty in the very midst of oppression. A very simple Christmas carol invites “all poor folk and humble” to come to the Bethlehem stable. They are “not to feel afraid, for Jesus our treasure, with love past all measure, in lowly poor manger was laid.”  Poor, humble folk, crude surroundings, makeshift cribs, child of poor and oppressed people. There is the oppression side of it laid out clearly. But as the carol continues, and the poor present their gifts, there is an unexpected line: “…and Jesus in beauty, accepted their duty.” This is the beauty side of it laid out equally. The Christmas story will never be lost !

            We need people to tell us the story of Jesus and of their experiences of him to help us make sense of our own, to feed our imagination, give body to our songs, and warm our hearts for God and his peace. “How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of the messenger of good news, who proclaims salvation and says to Zion, ‘Your God is king’” (Isaiah 52.7). Without the story’s power and the teller’s feeling, we would be sadly locked in a stuffy Noah’s ark, looking out on to a bleak world. But once we have the story and are warmed by it, we become storytellers ourselves, each one becoming a piece of the Good News for those we meet. We can be hearty tellers without being compulsive, and tell an important tale without self-importance; because, after all, we are children, commuting between singsong and prose, one sliding into the other  -  the story and the song.

            And what shall we sing and tell about ? About the helpless Child among the helpless, about dispossessed infinity, naked and cold, that we may give him the universe for the stable, and for his manger our hearts and their warmth. We want to listen to him and hear that nothing greater he puts before us to achieve than that we love him, love one another for him, and bear him faithful witness always. But today let there be only the story and the song, and leave out the large talk about this “omniscient, omnipresent and immutable” God.  We have the Baby, and there is no need yet to twist ourselves into intellectual knots, figuring how to squeeze the “divine attributes” into him. After all, when babies are born, we don’t force an identity on them; we let them tell us who they are as their lives gradually unfold and their personalities, dreams and goals take shape.

Today, we have the Baby !

C H R I S T M A S