Carol Three: O Come All Ye Faithful

Listen to this acapella version of O Come All Ye Faithful version.

I include this version for a few reasons.  First, I am always amazed what the human voice is able to do.  The sounds we can produce are vast and varied.  The longing to communicate with another person is powerful and profound.  When we have something we want to express, so often we rely on words.  But poems, paintings, photography, cave drawings, even a grunt or glance can sometimes communicate volumes.  Words might be our the preferred or prevalent means by which we try to express ourselves.  But sometimes, it is good to step outside our comfort zone and communicate in another way.  For example, I can talk or tell you about grace.  Or I can make you my grandmother's homemade sugar cookies that, for me, communicated grace, joy, and love in ways I can never fully explain.  So, when we come, we don't need eloquent speeches as if God only desires a dissertation from us.  Or as Brian McLaren once quipped, "God isn't sitting around all week anxiously waiting for our Call to Worship."  But what God longs for is a connection that is life-giving and life-changing.  When we come, with faith spilling forth from our lips, that is what we are joining.

 Second, there is a joy-filled-ness to this version that beckons me and draws me close.  When the group sings about "coming joyful and triumphant," it is more than words, they become a lived reality. When you consider that the Word/Wisdom is becoming flesh, as John 1 says, I hear that/experience that promise in this version.  Words are more than simply vehicles that convey an idea.  Words (as Rabbi Heschel said) do create worlds.  Sometimes those worlds are ones where we want to dwell.  Other times, I would rather put up a for sale sign and move out of the world a person's words created.  Sometimes are words are exciting, other times boring, lulling us to sleep.  Sometimes words open up possibilities and other times they slam shut the door.

If you had to describe the world that this particular Carol created, what would it be?  Not just this version, all three together.  Would it be a colorful world or one of gray serious somberness?  Would it be a world where you would want to live or excuse yourself?  Would it be whimsical or cause weariness?  And, as always, why?  Why that reaction?

The world these words create for me has Dr. Suess like shapes and playfulness.  I come not as a command or demand, but dancing joyfully (even though I can't dance).  I come for the fun and because my soul suggests that such an invitation doesn't always come my way, so I'd better make good on this one.  The world these words create as me to do more than observe, I am pulled into singing out at the top of my lungs.  It is a world where I want to linger and live.  And while the world that the words of the news and headlines create might sing another song, it isn't as though one is true and the other false.  Both/and might help us sense God's word made flesh here and now.  So, come on, play the video again and join me in singing.

Prayer: Beckoning God who creates and crafts music that sets our souls soaring, thank you for the constant invitation to sing along.  Amen.