Today is when all the Christmas decorations will come down at Divinity, as we follow the church-y protocol of honoring the full 12 days of the celebration and all. For some on the actual home front, it oftentimes takes a while to remove all the stockings that were hung by the chimney (or wherever else) with care, as well as the elves on the shelves or full-scale trees and random figurines, let alone however many hundreds of lights. For some, it’s not just about the time commitment to re-organize all the living room displays, but some are rather emotionally attached to all those heart-warming pieces that are meant to inspire our own little joy in the world.
For me, I’ll miss the music, and not so much the songs bursting through grocery store speakers, but the “Infant Holy, Infant Lowly”s and “Angels from the Realms of Glory”s and the like. However, one hymn from the Christmas section of our hymnal that may never get turned to (or displayed on a screen, for that matter) is “Cold December Flies Away” (ELW #299). Thankfully, our own Steve Czapor played it as a postlude for a recent Saturday evening worship, and added yet another layer of joy in the world.
I never heard this song until college. After all, it’s not a part of most congregations’ repertoires since it’s a little rhythmic-y with these sixteenth notes that require a little more attention and readiness to move onto the next note…perhaps a little similar to life, I suppose, including having to get back to the grind of semi-normalcy from the holiday chaos. Nevertheless, with the upbeat and still full-of-joy music combined with the text, it inspires the same hope that was brought to life on December 24/25.
Cold December flies away
at the rose-red splendor.
April’s crowning glory breaks
while the whole world wonders
at the holy unseen pow’r
of the tree which bears the flow’r.
On the blessed tree
blooms the reddest flow’r.
On the tree blooms the rose
here in love’s own garden,
full and strong in glory.In the hopeless time of sin
shadows deep had fallen.
All the world lay under death.
Eyes were closed in sleeping.
But, when all seemed lost in night,
came the sun whose golden light
brings unending joy,
brings the endless joy
of our hope, highest hope,
of our hope’s bright dawning,
Son belov’d of heaven.Now the bud has come to bloom,
and the world awakens.
In the lily’s purest flow’r
dwells a wondrous fragrance.
And it spreads to all the earth
from the moment of its birth;
and its beauty lives.
In the flow’r it lives,
in the flow’r, and it spreads
in its heav’nly brightness
sweet perfume delightful.
So, although the Christmas decorations will venture back to their respective dark basement or closet corners, and a certain section of our hymnal will wait until next December, the hope they, and ultimately the “Son belov’d of heaven,” brought for us all to enjoy, remains the same. No matter the times we may feel a sense of hopelessness at any point throughout the year, or any time in our life, no matter how deep the shadows seem to overtake us because of medical issues or distant relationships, no matter how much death may seem to emerge around us, Chrit is still unleashing “unending joy” and the “highest hope” that will never be tucked away. Thanks be to God, indeed!
In Christ,
Pastor Brad
To hear “Cold December Flies Away” from the Pacific Lutheran University (Tacoma, WA) Choral Union: PLU Choral Union Songs of Winter - Cold December Flies Away