Christmas Carol paradoxes 5 – It Came Upon a Midnight Clear

My goodness, Christmas carols are loaded with contrasts and paradoxes. And so am I. Good and bad. Deserved and undeserved. Earned and unearned. Beautiful and ugly.

Wishing we could be quiet enough, and have “ears to hear” above the din of judgmental self-talk, let alone the judgmentalism of open warfare…

“Yet with the woes of sin and strife
The world hath suffered long;
Beneath the angel-strain have rolled
Two thousand years of wrong;
And man, at war with man, hears not
The love song which they bring:
O hush the noise, ye men of strife,
And hear the angels sing.”

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Wiki on this carol
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Share your favorite carol lyrics and the paradoxical mysteries they raise inside you, below, please!

Brushing snow off car

Like her, Kathy’s snowbrush is small & cute, so using it felt like swabbing a gym floor with a Q-tip.

Humming Christmas music the whole *long* while…what a wonderful early Christmas gift!

Frolicking in the tranquil stillness of nature’s own blanket — greeting passers-by only whispering at the wonder, so as not to disturb the serene scene’s quiet beauty.
…blessings & curses…

…blessings & curses…

What were you thinking and feeling as you disrupted the perfect covering? Tell me below…

Christmas Carol paradoxes 4 – Hark! The Herald Angels Sing

My goodness, Christmas carols are loaded with contrasts and paradoxes. And so am I. Good and bad. Deserved and undeserved. Earned and unearned. Beautiful and ugly.

“Pleased, as man, with men to dwell,
Jesus, our Emmanuel!”

God, pleased to be a man, and dwell with men?
This Incarnation signaled that a human person is worthy of being divine, and that the divine knows our experiences of joys and sorrows and deep suffering, for it is that to which Yeshua submitted freely. We cannot claim Abba doesn’t understand what we go through. He opted in–into our humanity and excruciating suffering to death.

YHWH came to us the same way each of us came to the world. A baby in absolute need for survival.

God chooses us, despite our blindness to that. Not because we deserve to be divine, but exclusively because God loves us with no conditions. Just because God is goodness.

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Wiki on this carol

Share your favorite carol lyrics and the paradoxical mysteries they raise inside you, below, please!

Christmas Carol paradoxes 3 – Do you hear what I hear

My goodness, Christmas carols are loaded with contrasts and paradoxes. And so am I. Good and bad. Deserved and undeserved. Earned and unearned. Beautiful and ugly.

Composed amidst the Cuban Missle Crisis (another background explanation)

“Said the shepherd boy … In your palace warm, mighty king,…
A Child, a Child shivers in the cold
Let us bring Him silver and gold…”

A boy petitions a king to bring kingly gifts to a child so lowly he lies outside warm shelter.

“Said the king to the people everywhere,
listen to what I say…”

A royal proclamation. What does he say? Bow down in homage, join me in conquest of other kingdoms? Of sorts:

“Pray for peace, people everywhere!”

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Share your favorite carol lyrics and the paradoxical mysteries they raise inside you, below, please!

Christmas Carol paradoxes 2 – Cantique de Noël

My goodness, Christmas carols are loaded with contrasts and paradoxes. And so am I. Good and bad. Deserved and undeserved. Earned and unearned. Beautiful and ugly.

“Fall on your knees…
O night when Christ was born.”

Fall on your knees, as you would to revere a king? Or in exhaustion, like a “weary world rejoicing”? As “the world in sin and error pining”? The same Carol continues:

“The King of Kings lay thus in lowly manger,…”

The King? Rich, powerful, feared? Or lowly? Both? Lowliness is royal? Powerful?

“In all our trials born to be our friend;
He knows our need, To our weakness no stranger!
Behold your King! Before Him lowly bend!”

Our friend? No stranger to weakness? Seems unlikely for a god-man…

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Share your favorite carol lyrics and the paradoxical mysteries they raise inside you, below, please!

Christmas Carol paradoxes 1 – Adeste Fideles

My goodness, Christmas carols are loaded with contrasts and paradoxes. And so am I. Good and bad. Deserved and undeserved. Earned and unearned. Beautiful and ugly.

“Born the king of angels.
Come let us adore him.”

Adore? As when we smile at a baby’s sweet face? That is not bowing down to a king.

How did the Lord of all come to us? By lording over us? Or by being born as a defenseless baby in desperate need of the same loving care every single one of us needed as a baby?

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More on “O come, come, all ye faithful…”:
(poem) Advent prequel to Footprints

Share your favorite carol lyrics and the paradoxical mysteries they raise inside you, below, please!