(Edited to expound: When I started to blog about the events in Connecticut earlier this week, the pain was still too near, too raw, and I couldn’t get my point across the way I intended. Even in the best of times, I am challenged to compose and blog succinctly and clearly. Now that the initial shock and grief has passed, I can write with a clearer head.)
“O Come, O Come, Emmanuel/And ransom captive Israel…”
I’ve sung this carol innumerable times in my life. Yet in light of Friday’s massacre in CT, today the song holds new meaning for me. I sing it with a renewed fervor that I selfishly never associated with it before (yet should have).
For years, O Come, Emmanuel was just another Christmas carol, one I sing along with, perhaps joyfully in the car by myself, at Christmas services with my brethren in Christ, or whilst caroling door-to-door with friends.
Indeed, many different bands and singers have done this very piece justice since its origin so many centuries ago. Perhaps one of my favorites of this carol was the arrangement by Mannheim Steamroller. There is a reverence in this adaptation that few other versions hold. With its haunting Gregorian chant and hand-bells, I heard it for the first time in the early 90s and have loved its beauty since.
Today I mourn with the rest of my country in the wake of Friday’s tragedy. Like others, my faith struggles as the joy of the Season is ripped so harshly from us. How do I go back to being joyous at what should be a joyous time of year when I am grieving? How can I celebrate when I am dying inside?
I turn to the Bible to renew in my heart the promises made good by God as promised (foreseen?) by the prophets thousands of years ago. I queue up the hymn and let its beauty flow over me as I seek healing, and perhaps, answers. As I listen, I hear an aching and an anguishing in the arrangement and lyrics I never heard before. I sing along with a heavy heart, as one would during a funeral dirge. While singing, I am reminded of Eowyn’s lament during her cousin Theodred’s funeral in J.R.R. Tolkein’s “The Two Towers”.:
A song shall sing the sorrowing minstrels of Meduseld
That noble cousin, who always held me dear
Now is held in darkness, enclosed
And I am convicted to juxtapose and compare it to this ages-old Antiphon:
Thine own from Satan’s tyranny
From depths of Hell Thy people save
And give them victory o’er the grave
You may find it an odd thing to compare Eowyn’s Lament with a Christmas hymn. We think of Christmas songs as joyous compositions. But there’s no denying the hymn and the lament touch on the sadness of death. The former mourns “the noble warrior” who lost his life on the battlefield, and the latter is a lamentation about the separation from God. There is a cry for deliverance from slavery (spiritual as well as physical), sin, and death. In the hymn and in Tolkein’s composition, both view death as a very sorrowful, and final event. (And while Gandalf does mention an Afterlife to Theodred’s father, Theoden King, in an attempt to offer sympathy and consolation, Eowyn’s Lament still speaks of a finality. By the way, this is not a bash on Tolkein’s works, nor am I diminishing the importance of the hymn.)
But O Come, Emmanuel is different. As I said above, there is anguish and heartache in this hymn. Many times in the Old Testament, we read of Israel’s sacking by Assyrians and Babylonians, and others. This is Israel’s song of oppression and captivity. It is a lament of countrymen, women and children who have perished, it is an ache for God’s deliverance. It echoes David’s plea in Psalm 13, which Phil blogged about this week:
How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I wrestle with my thoughts
and day after day have sorrow in my heart?
How long will my enemy triumph over me?
Unlike the Lament, in the hymn, O Come Emmanuel, there is a message of HOPE:
Our spirits by Thine advent here
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night
And death’s dark shadows put to flight.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.
In the fulness of time, in God’s own careful planning, the Son was given to us, who bore the iniquities of us *all*, not just Jerusalem, but every human being on this earth. Through Jesus’ birth, death and resurrection, “death’s dark shadows” were “put to flight”.
Indeed, there is victory in Jesus even in the midst of sadness and tragedy.
Father, God, thank You for fulfilling Your promises to us in the form of Your Son, Jesus. It is through Him, Emmanuel (God with us), that the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us. By saving us, He has given us “victory over the grave”. I pray that those grieving in Connecticut, will have a closer walk with Thee, even if they are not already believers. I pray, Father, that you give them healing and the peace that surpasses all understanding. Oh Lord, Jesus, come, and draw Your children unto You. Give them peace, comfort and joy knowing that You are in control.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.