A Christmas Carol

I mentioned to you that we will be looking at a children’s hymn, but what I did not say was that it was a Christmas Carol. Let me explain how it all came about.

As I am awakened and given the privilege of seeing another new morn, I can’t but hear that silver-tongued bird as he or she joyfully rolls off those graceful double notes. That bird just stays in that one spot and sings its heart out without hindrance. How thankful is that bird to its Creator as, without company, in fact while my immediate neighbourhood is still asleep and it is still pitch black outside, the bird is giving loud praises to Creator God.

While I'm listening to that very early morning bird and thinking about how faithful he is to come and sit on the wire very nearby and have its morning worship, while many of us humans are still asleep, I’m made conscious that I am humming a Christmas Carol and to crown it all it’s a Children’s hymn. Believe me, I only became fully conscious and astutely aware of what was taking place in me, when I exclaimed, A Christmas Carol in May! It was, Away In A Manger. My first thought, in my fully conscious state was to put it aside saying, O Well!

As I got down to pray, thanking God for the morning, for life and more, I was hushed. I was not allowed to go my path of prayer, nor allowed to continue in my thoughts. I was held by that Children’s hymn. Since it is one which I and most of you, if not all of you, know as the backs of our hands, one which we have known from a little child, I simply repeated the words before our Lord. It was while I slowly spoke them that I suddenly exclaimed, Ascension! I was tumbled over in utter marvel and amazement. Ascension in Christmas! Ascension in a Children’s Carol! I mean, I was so excited and curious, I felt like a Moses, looking at a bush on fire, yet the fire was not destroying the bush. I was looking at a Christmas Carol, written, filed and tagged, Christmas, yet all over it I was seeing the fire of Ascension, while remaining a Christmas hymn.

What did I see in this brightly burning hymn? What did the Holy Spirit illuminate before my unsuspecting eyes? What is He bringing to your enlightened eyes also? In deep humility and ever curious mind and heart, we bow in this holy ground of learning, to receive more, discover more and live more of Ascension in our very beings.

Here are the words to this very-loved hymn. Do you get pictures of Jesus' Ascension in it?