Christmas Memories 3
Today is Christmas Sunday- typically celebrated in the Christian church the Sunday before Christmas. This is usually the highest attended Sunday, along with Easter, of the year.
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(C) Allen Pearson, All Rights Reserved |
For those who attend church regularly, it is often the time to catch up with friends who have been away at college or who have parents or grandparents in town visiting. It is a time to celebrate the birth of Christ with your church friends who you may not see again before Christmas. For me, I have a few friends that I want to see before Christmas Day and its been a time to see college students that were in classes I taught at church.
There are many great memories of playing the organ for a Christmas Cantata my father directed at church. I'd rehearse with the choir and practice and practice. Not only did I work on that, but had the hymns, a prelude and postlude to learn. I wanted it all to be perfect.
One year, I had found a copy of Handel's Hallelujah Chorus. It was written in the key of "C" so I knew I could learn it if I practiced and practiced. The Sunday I played it, the audience stood. When the audience stood, which I hadn't thought about, I got nervous as to the attention given to me. I managed to play the piece without an error (according to the church members- I won't share my version).
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I remember one Christmas what seems like hundreds of years ago now, especially when you look at the development around the church, when I was a teenager. The pastor's wife Doris had me help her decorate the church. Not sure why me, but it was and maybe a few other teenagers. Anyway. we were to go out in the field behind the church and get branches with pines needles on them and return to the church. The decorations turned out to be the most beautiful I'd seen in a church. Not to mention, the beautiful smell of pine.
One of my most recent favorite Christmas memories was when we attended a Baptist church where the organist really knew how to play the organ. Tate knew all the ways to pull out the right stops, play the bass pedals loud on certain pieces- she didn't play around when she played the organ. She played it majestically giving the organ the ability to let the church hear what it was made of. The pianist, Mary, had the special touch that brought the piano to life. Christmas was a musical celebration of Christ's birth to Tate and Mary. I got to sit back and praise God through their music. The blessings are beyond any explanation.
Joy to the World
Joy to the world, the Lord is come!
Let earth receive her King;
Let every heart prepare Him room,
And Heaven and nature sing,
And Heaven and nature sing,
And Heaven, and Heaven, and nature sing.
Joy to the earth, the Savior reigns!
Let men their songs employ;
While fields and floods, rocks, hills and plains
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat, repeat, the sounding joy.
No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow
Far as the curse is found,
Far as the curse is found,
Far as, far as, the curse is found.
He rules the world with truth and grace,
And makes the nations prove
The glories of His righteousness,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders, wonders, of His love.
Author: The lyrics was written by Isaac Watts (1674-1748),
also known as the "Father of English Hymnology."
Watts wrote the lyrics in 1719.
The melody was composed by Lowell Mason (1792-1872),
a composer of church music.
May you have a
Blessed Christmas Sunday full of memories!!
Merry Christmas!!