After yesterday’s full-throated hymn, let’s
take it down and back. “Christmas Is Now Drawing Near at Hand” is an old piece—16th
Century, at least—reportedly deployed by beggars encouraging passersby to dig
deep in honor of the season.
It’s moralizing, which might explain why you don’t
ordinarily hear it these days, when we’ve turned from stories like “The Gift of
the Magi” to every Hallmark Channel movie produced in the past decade. Some of
the admonishment is certainly timely:
“So proud and lofty do some people go
Dressing themselves like players in a show
They patch and paint and dress with idle stuff
As if God had not made ‘em fine enough”
The line about little children learning to
curse while unable to utter words of prayer—well, I’m more concerned with the
thousands upon thousands who utter empty prayers by rote, and cast cherry-picked
judgments on others, which the Jesus of the Gospels would find abhorrent. But I
can’t argue with this:
“Oh, teach them better, oh, teach them to rely
On Christ, the sinner’s friend who reigns on
high.”
Part of the preparation of this Advent period is
the quiet stock-taking; are we ready for the coming of the Messiah? If we aren’t
quite, what do we need to do to get there? How can we truly welcome the Child
in the stable? What kindnesses can we show others, where do we need to open our
eyes and hearts?
Something to consider while listening to Lel
Waterson:
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