Christmas : 25th December

…click photo to enlarge

Psalm 96

Sing to the Lord a new song:
Sing to the Lord, all the earth.

2 Sing to the Lord and bless his holy name:
proclaim the good news of his salvation from day to day.

3 Declare his glory among the nations:
and his wonders among all peoples.

4 For great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised:
…

9 O worship the Lord in the beauty of his holiness:
let the whole earth stand in awe of him.

11 Let the fields rejoice and let the earth be glad:
then shall all the trees of the wood shout with joy before the Lord;

12 For he comes, he comes to judge the earth:
he shall judge the world with righteousness, and the peoples with his truth.

John 1:14
And the Word became flesh and pitched his tent among us.

As we have been visited by the Word incarnate, may we also "pitch our tents" in the glories of this earth and see and hear with wonder the song of praise that is sung in this place.

May this time of christmastide bring refreshment and renewal.

A new song, by Linda Anchell written for Christmas 1995:

Do the flowers know its Christmas-time?
They're blooming oh so bright
Do they know that something special
has happened on this night.
When the baby came to Bethlehem
to this sad and weary earth
Something special bloomed among us
When young Mary gave it birth.

Something special happened on that night
When the Lord became a babe
And he grew up brave and strong and true
A worried world he came to save.
When we killed him on the tree we knew
something vanished from our sight
But he won the victory over death
And the Spirit took to flight.

Do the flowers know its Christmas-time
They're blooming oh so bright
Does this sad and weary earth we know
Carry high that baby's light?
Do we know our God weeps bitter tears
For our waywardness and pain
And tries to teach us how to live
Until he comes again.

Now its Christmas-time, we know it
And the flowers bloom so bright
As they've done for all the summers
that this old earth has seen light.
and we all know of Jesus' birth,
but not much of his pain
Can we meet him now and kneel
and try to live for God again. for Christine and Jan 23rd Dec 1995
Adelong Rectory

and I have recorded a .wav file of the first verse of the song.