Advent Reflection 21 December

Once in royal David’s city

Pause for a moment

This is the traditional start to the service of Nine Lessons and Carols. What makes you think ‘Christmas is really here’?

Listen to the music

Once in Royal David’s city
Stood a lowly cattle shed.
Where a mother laid her baby
In a manger for His bed.
Mary was that mother mild,
Jesus Christ her little child.

He came down to earth from Heaven,
Who is God and Lord of all.
And his shelter was a stable,
And his cradle was a stall.
With the poor and mean and lowly,
Lived on earth our Saviour Holy.

And through' all his wondrous childhood
he would honour and obey,
love and watch the lowly maiden
in whose gentle arms he lay:
Christian children all must be
mild, obedient, good as he.

And our eyes at last shall see Him
Through His own redeeming love,
For that child so dear and gentle
Is our Lord in Heaven above;
And He leads His children on
To the place where He is gone.

Not in that poor, lowly stable,

With the oxen standing by,

We shall see Him; but in Heaven,

Set at God’s right hand on high,

Where, like stars, His children crowned

All in white, shall wait around.

Learn about the carol

To help children understand the Apostles' Creed words "who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary," Cecil F. Alexander (an Irish poet: 1818-1895) wrote this text and published it in her Hymns for Little Children (1848).

A good mingling of the biblical story and Christian theology, the text sets the nativity of Christ into a much larger framework-the history of salvation. Alexander's words enable us to look back and to look forward from this historic event. Verses 1 and 2 recall Christ's humble birth. Verse 3 focuses on Christ's childhood and identity with humanity. Verses 4 and 5 look forward to the sharing of Christ's glory with his children.

Time for reflection

Every time you read these words, it's hard not to imagine the opening of ‘Nine Lessons and Carols’ and a child's pure voice singing the opening verse as a solo. All in a rushed, hushed stillness we’re transported again—through the gentle pictures of the lyrics and the sweet fragility of that pure sound—to the wonder of Mary stooping down to lay her tiny son in the Manger for his bed

The carol charts Jesus’ development from helpless baby through his wondrous childhood, not just to adulthood but to the time when his whole redeeming work is finished and we are united with him in Eternity.

Mary didn't just have a role of carrying Jesus through pregnancy and nurturing him in infancy. She was there offering support throughout his childhood, it is what all good mothers hope to do.

There are many people whose childhoods did not receive this kind of mothering, but there is always the possibility of comfort and nurture being offered by others.

Jesus said true mothers and brothers can be found throughout the family of God, they are those who hear the word of God and put it into action.

Time for Action

Each time you see children playing, pray for the people who nurture them, and for those children for whom that care is not naturally there.