12.24.09

Bowing to the mystery..

Posted in church calendar, pilgrimage, poetry/prose at 1:00 pm by len

Some of the most beautiful songs in the last few centuries have been written around the theme of the Incarnation. Reflection on this turning point in history.. this “still point” (Eliot) .. seems to provoke a beautiful interweave of theological depth and profound wonder. I love the way head and heart come together in these songs – to me they model the best of Christian praise. And part of the miracle is that the whole of Christian theology .. the whole gospel story from creation to redemption and new creation.. is spun out in these nativity songs.

I’m thinking right now of an old song, and a recent song. The old song is 5th century, written by Aurelius Prudentius, and was orginally titled Corde Natis ex Parentis. If you know it, the 19th century title assigned by the translators is “Of the Father’s Love Begotten.” It begins like this..

Of the Father’s love begotten, ere the worlds began to be,
He is Alpha and Omega, He the source, the ending He,
Of the things that are, that have been,
And that future years shall see, evermore and evermore!

The last time I sang this song I was part of a troop of men entering a sanctuary in a small MB church in Chilliwack. We carried candles in a dark room, and we entered singing. A good memory.

The recent song I have in mind is The Promise by Michael Card. I love some of the phrases, like this one:

For a thousand years the dreamers dreamt
And hoped to see his love;
But the Promise showed their wildest dreams
Had simply not been wild enough..

I also love Card’s Vicit Agnus Noster (”Our Lamb Has Conquered”). The power of this song is in weaving the story right back to the beginning. The promise.. the covenant we inherit.. is thousands of years old. That we tend to see a disconnect between old and new testaments impoverishes us and results in some of the distortions that Frost and Hirsch try to correct in ReJesus. Here is how this old song runs..

Vicit Agnus
Vicit Agnus
Noster eum sequamur

Did Abraham himself not say
God would provide a lamb
To take instead the punishment
That should belong to man.

And so to humble shepherds
Was His glory first revealed
And with his birth a covenant
Made long ago was sealed

Out of his dark obscurity
The Light of God has shone
And through the meekness of the Lamb
God’s strength would be made known

The just and gentle Promised One
Would triumph o’er the fall
And conquer by his own defeat
And win by losing all…

And while not a Christmas song, Bruce Cockburn has song more than a few songs about mystery over the years. One I recently rediscovered is on the now ancient album “Dart to the Heart.” The title is “Closer to the Light,” and it’s a beautiful picture of the paradox that moving deeper into Christ is a journey into light so bright it is like darkness to us.. we are approaching the heart of a mystery so great our knowing is humbled and brought to its knees. Cockburn sings,

Gone from mystery into mystery
Gone from daylight into night
Another step deeper into darkness
Closer to the light

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