Christmas Carols and the Value of Remembrance

Of all the Christmas traditions I love, my favorite by far is the re-telling of Charles Dickens’ classic work A Christmas Carol. I do my best to read this story every year but also try equally hard to watch as many of the film adaptations as possible. I never grow tired of the Victorian setting, the miserly Scrooge, the foreboding, ghostly visitations, or the final, radical conversion and thawing of a cold heart—and just in time for Christmas morning.

Did you know that Dickens named his masterpiece a carol because he intended it to be like so many of those songs of the Christmas season? In fact, each chapter is called a stave (a musical term) to press home that theme even further. Dickens wanted this story to function as a genuine Christmas carol—as a song to be repeated each year, carrying a reminder of the truths that it contains. So, the story of Ebenezer was one he believed should be retold every year, a helpful reminder to all mankind at Christmas of its true spirit and meaning.

This theme of remembrance is key to Dickens’ story. The name he chose for his main character, Ebenezer Scrooge, is taken from the Bible, where Ebenezer is the unique name given to a stone monument (1 Samuel 7:12). It’s no surprise then, given his familiarity with the Bible, that Dickens would choose this name for the one he would describe in his story as one who was ‘hard and sharp as flint.’ Dickens would have us look to Ebenezer and remember the spirit(s) of Christmas—of peace on earth and goodwill to men.

As they were in Dickens’ day, Christmas carols can be an invaluable act of remembrance for our churches during the Christmas season. They are the holiday hymns of our faith, reminding us of the same story, year after year. The story of Christ’s birth is wondrous and wondrous to tell, but it also asks us to consider our part in the narrative. Who is this child, and why was he sent to us? As one carol puts it, “What can I give Him, poor as I am?”

Fellow pastor, I encourage you to consider the following four qualities of Christmas carols as you plan worship in the coming weeks and take note of a few carol suggestions along the way.

Christmas Carols Are a Rich Source of Biblical Theology

Christmas carols provide the church with a rich source of theology. Most churches spend the better part of each December dedicated to the story of Christ’s first coming. Explaining the profound truths of the incarnation—that God became a man—certainly deserves extra time to digest! But that is where Christmas carols truly shine.

Most carols rehearse the birth narrative, taking us back in time to the scene in Bethlehem. Even those who have never picked up a Bible can likely repeat the story of Jesus’ birth

simply from the musical memory they’ve unconsciously absorbed from Christmas radio stations, film soundtracks, and department store ‘muzak.’

Even though shepherds, angels, wise men from the east, and a newborn baby laid in a manger are the themes that proliferate this holiday season, Christmas carols also offer us a chance to peel back the theological layers of this significant gospel event. The reality of human suffering, the condescension of God in love, the requirement of sacrificial atonement for the forgiveness of sins, the fulfillment of ancient prophecies— these are just a few of the profound themes that Christmas carols can communicate with astonishing clarity.

So, while pastors may be wringing their hands in winter months straining for the topic of their next Christmas sermon series, might I suggest referencing a classic Christmas carol for some fresh perspective on this ancient story?

Carols to Consider: Hark the Herald Angels Sing, Joy to the World, Of the Father’s Love Begotten

Christmas Carols are a God-Honoring Use of Music and Poetry

Music and poetry in the form of song play a significant role in God’s design for His glory and our good. God is delighted to receive His praise not simply from the words of our lips, but in songs—in words set to poetic form, and that to a melody. The beauty of God’s hand in the creation around us and in the creations borne from our own “Imago Dei” hands are meant to point us to our Maker. Songs are an eternal gift from God for our use and an ongoing testament to a God of order, beauty, and purpose.

Most often, Christmas carols are associated with traditional Christmas hymns, and rightly so. That’s because excellent music and poetry have a lasting effect that transcends time and space. We are the inheritors and caretakers of excellent craftsmanship in the many Christmas carols that have come down to us since Christ’s birth. The gospel story has inspired faithful Christian men and women to pour their best musical and poetic skills into songs that Christians have been able to sing together for centuries.

Christmas carols provide us with joyful anthems, triumphant marches, simple lullabies, and haunting ponderings on the birth of the Savior of the world. If our churches are only singing the most recent compositions set in the style of pop-Christmas, then we are the lesser for it. This is not an appeal to sing only old songs, but songs of quality. It’s simply a reality that Christmas carols of yesteryear have proven themselves to be built of quality materials that stand the test of time (which includes popular appeal).

The Church can claim as its own some of the most beautiful songs ever written. Why not gladly preserve and participate in this heritage with joy every Christmas season?

Carols to Consider: Angels We Have Heard on High, O Holy Night, In the Bleak Midwinter, Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence

Christmas Carols are an Opportunity for Greater Unity in Worship

I believe that every church’s ministry of music should pursue congregational singing in truth, beauty, and unity. If all our efforts to provide a ministry of song for the church are aligned with these three priorities, then certainly those same three tests will inform our song choices as well. As we have already seen, Christmas carols are vessels for truth and beauty, but they also provide us an almost effortless opportunity to bring unity where division normally exists.

Visit one church from every denomination in the city where you live and you will likely find yourself singing a few songs you know, but many you don’t. However, if it were possible for you to visit all those same churches for their Christmas Eve services this year, you would likely feel right at home. Why, you might even say that it’s a Christmas miracle that so many churches, otherwise divided in their worship practices, could be so united on one night of the year! Christmas carols, these old hymns, are still the common tongue in many churches.

Where Christians can agree on the main things (truth) and pursue helpful, meaningful, and memorable forms of worship (beauty), then can unity (John 17) begin to take root in our churches. But this sort of unity will require church leaders to come to terms with the lessons that Christmas carols are teaching us—lessons about our history, about the value of singing theological truth, about singing songs that are simple to learn and to remember by most everyone in our particular church, and about singing songs that have lasted over centuries and across borders—instead of kitsch that wears out in a season or two.

Carols to Consider: Silent Night, The First Noel, O Come, O Come Emmanuel, O Little Town of Bethlehem

Christmas Carols Can Teach Us the Proper Use of Tradition

The idea of tradition is often misunderstood. When I use it, I am referring to those practices that serve as acts of remembrance and formation. For example, it is tradition to give gifts to others at Christmas. This tradition is meant to remind us of God’s freely given, unearned gift to mankind in Jesus Christ. We also give gifts to form us into gracious givers ourselves, hopefully teaching us over time to think of others before ourselves, to breed in us a shared responsibility to care for those less fortunate than ourselves, and to see all mankind as one people with the same problem (sin) and only one hope (the Savior who is Christ the Lord).

Most importantly, this tradition of giving gifts at Christmas makes us a part of the story as we receive the gift of God by faith and take it to the world, giving it to others as we preach (and sing!) the tiding of joy that is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. That is the proper use of tradition—one that has meaning and purpose, and that welcomes everyone to participate. Improper use of tradition removes all meaning and leaves our words and actions empty and vain, all the while sanctifying them as the truest form of devotion.

Jesus condemned this kind of tradition (Mark 7:1-13) and so should we.

Avoiding the other ditch, let us not jettison tradition simply because it came before our time, before our tastes, or before our temperaments. This is more akin to the spirit of the age—of cancel culture, chronological snobbery, ageism, ignorance—than of the Spirit of God in His church, a church that transcends both nations and generations.

Like a true Ebenezer, Christmas carols show us the best use of tradition: the preservation of truth through the act of remembrance. I hope and pray that every one of our churches might make great use of these carols to honor the spirit and purpose of this Christmas season, to come together to remember and adore Christ the Lord.

©2024 Jon Gilmore. Used with permission.