Christmas Hymn: The Morning After Jesus' Birth
Here is a hymn for this Christmas season. If you download the graphic, it should be large enough to reproduce well. The morning after Jesus’ birth no angels hovered near the earth; the shepherds left to tend their sheep and Bethlehem awoke from sleep. The world was changed when Jesus came, and yet, too much remains the same as evil seems to keep its hold, despite what prophet songs foretold. We sing the angels’ song of peace and wait for rage and war to cease. And wait, with faith the world finds odd, to greet the promised reign of God. That reign is here, but upside-down, for Jesus claimed no earthly crown and shunned the use of hate and might to turn the world from wrong to right. At times that reign is hard to see, and not where we would have it be. It grows among the poor and weak in places most refuse to seek. As seeds take root in barren ground so can the reign of God be found, for Love has come and blossoms sti...