If you’d like a preview of what songs are likely to pop up in this series, you could always check the titles from my Christmas album – Whistlewonder: The Carols of Christmas. I mean, if I recorded it on there, there’s a good chance that I love it enough to have the lyrics show up here…

Or will they?? Bwaaa haaa haaa haaa.

Ok – they probably totally will. Some of them, at least. Like, “O Sing a Song of Bethlehem.” It was first on the album, because the words are the way I almost always start thinking about this season – the whole story of  redemption, instead of focusing on Advent now, but leaving all the messy stuff off until Lent rolls around. I like seeing the whole picture in one place, to understand just how wide and deep and high the Father’s love will reach to catch us as we fall. And Christ, our Lord, by heav’n adored, is mighty now to save.

O Sing A Song Of Bethlehem
O sing a song of Bethlehem,
Of shepherds watching there,
And of the news that came to them
From angels in the air:
The light that shone on Bethlehem
Fills all the world today;
Of Jesus’ birth and peace on earth
The angels sing alway.

O sing a song of Nazareth,
Of sunny days of joy,
O sing of fragrant flowers’ breath,
And of the sinless boy:
For now the flow’rs of Nazareth
In ev’ry heart may grow;
Now spreads the fame of his dear name
On all the winds that blow.

O sing a song of Galilee,
Of lake and woods and hill,
Of him who walked upon the sea
And bade the waves be still:
For though, like waves on Galilee,
Dark seas of trouble roll,
When faith has heard the Master’s word,
Falls peace upon the soul.

O sing a song of Calvary,
Its glory and dismay;
Of him who hung upon the tree,
And took our sins away:
For he who died on Calvary
Is risen from the grave,
And Christ, our Lord, by heav’n adored,
Is mighty now to save.
– Louis F. Benson