I HEARD THE BELLS ON CHRISTMAS DAY

Today, I want to talk about the song “I Heard The Bells on Christmas Day”. I'm sure you've heard the song. And you've also probably noticed that it doesn't quite have the happy tone that a lot of other songs do. 

Originally a Poem

The words for that song were written by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the famous poet.  And he actually wrote it on Christmas Day, 1863. What led him to write such a sad song? 

Well, two years before he lost his wife of 18 years in an accidental fire in which she was burned to death. This was also about the same time that the American Civil War was cranking up. And I can't imagine that that was a very happy time either.

Fast forward to 1863. His son decides to enlist in the Union Army and didn't even tell his father. Longfellow eventually finds out and of course, as a father, he was definitely worried about his son’s safety. It turns out it was with good reason. In November of 1863, his son was severely wounded in battle. But he did return home.

Christmas Day, 1863

On Christmas Day, 1863,  Longfellow is sitting there imagining those Christmas days past when you would hear the church bells ringing in celebration. He likely did not really want to hear them that day with his wife gone for two years, he son severley wounded, and the Civil War raging on. It just didn't seem to make sense.

He ultimately wrote seven verses. A couple of those, ones you don't generally hear, are very specific about the Civil War. I recommend you look it up online and read all of those verses because there's some really powerful imagery in it. 

Ultimately, he was trying to grapple with it, and reconcile the happiness typically associated with the holiday with the sadness and despair all around him.

Many Still Struggle

There are others who are dealing with this even today. You may see people who don't seem to really get into the spirit of holidays or just don't seem to be happy about things. 

One thing you don't want to do is say, “Come on, Scrooge, lighten up, enjoy the holidays!” Because you don't know what they're dealing with inside. It could be a past trauma or memory that Christmas triggers. 

What we can do is we go about and celebrate the holiday the best that we can. Show our enjoyment of it. Hopefully some of that good cheer will lift the spirits  of those who are really struggling. 

But just make sure that you don't needle or press people into enjoying the holiday.

Because, for some, it's a tough thing to do and it's best to really be supportive of people in any which way that they're coming to this holiday.

Let's not make it worse for them, let's try to make things better. 

We NEED Christmas. Have a great day.

THE PICKLE

We need Christmas. Today, I want to talk about the tradition of the pickle. You know what I'm talking about. Some people actually take a pickle ornament and it gets hidden in the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve. 

The Pickle Tradition

Then Christmas morning, the first thing people do is try to see who can be the first to find that Christmas pickle.  In some cases, they get a special present from Santa. In others, it just gives them good luck and good health for the coming year. It's a great tradition. I used to even do it myself at times. 

Is it REALLY and old German Tradition

But where did it come from? Well, you'll often hear that it was an old German tradition, and it kind of came over from that. But here's the thing. When you start researching, you find out there's really no evidence that it was an old German tradition. In fact, there's two origin stories that kind of pop. 

The Union POW

One story comes from the Civil War. It is said a Union soldier who was originally born in Germany was in a prisoner of war camp and he was starving.  So he begged the guard to give him just a single pickle to get him through the night on Christmas Eve. And he credited that pickle with saving his life. So he would then make that a part of the tradition every year at Christmas to remember that. 

A Marketing Ploy

The main story that people seem to come up with is that it actually grew out of a marketing campaign in the late 1800s.  Glass ornaments which resembled vegetables were getting really popular. So one major department store  wanted to market them. To do so, they created this story around the pickle ornament being an old German tradition.

Does it Matter?

That' last story is kind of  cynical. And even if it's true, does it matter?  Because this tradition has taken on so much more for people, right? Does it matter if it started as just a way for somebody to sell a bunch of ornaments? 

It has became part of family traditions, and what means most to those who practice it is keeping that tradition year in and year out. Keeping that tradition alive.

The Challenge

So even if you see this Christmas some traditions you don't understand, don't get, or  worse, see a cynical, negative or even evil origin of that tradition, I want you to look at it and think about it in terms of the people who celebrate it. Do they have that same opinion or that belief that you think is wrong about that? Or is it something different for them? 

If it's something different for them, then let them enjoy it for exactly what it is. 

And this is an idea that I'd like you, once we get past the "peace" of this season to keep in mind in the future on bigger issues. Because it may just help us extend the peace of Christmas.

Have a great day.

SILENT NIGHT

 We NEED Christmas! 

Today, I want to talk about "Silent Night" and  dig a little bit deeper into it. 

Yesterday I mentioned some of the history of it, but today I want to get into the lyrics and find the spot that I think most resonates with people and makes it such a popular song.

SILENT NIGHT AND THE NAPOLEONIC WARS

I forgot to mention yesterday that when Father Joseph Mohr wrote the words as a poem a couple of years before, Europe had just emerged from the Napoleonic Wars. These ideas of silence and peace really resonated with people. Father Mohr included much of that in the poem. 

PAINTING THE SCENE

He paints the night of Jesus’s birth right from the start.

“Silent Night, holy night. All is calm” 

Already he calls to mine a certain level of peace and stillness in the night. 

 

“all is bright”

Now he adds the star and we have  starlight coming down. The beautiful background is set. 

"Round yon virgin, mother and child”. 

The mother, of course, is Mary. 

“Holy infant so tender and mild” 

The infant is obviously the Christ child.

THE PHRASE THAT PAYS

Here is the key phrase that I think means everything to everyone.It is one that is repeated for emphasis. 

“Sleep in heavenly peace. Sleep in heavenly peace.” 

A PEACE THAT PASSETH ALL UNDERSTANDING

A few days ago, we talked about "peace on earth"  and how you want to find peace in your life. But "heavenly peace", that is a peace that passes understanding. It is a level of peace on order of magnitude about what we generally consider peace.

Obviously, if you're a person of faith, "heavenly peace" really resonates with you. But even if you're not a person of faith, we oftentimes use “heavenly” as an adjective to describe something above and beyond whatever the adjective is describing. So this is a peace that is incomprehensable! 

WHO SHOULD "SLEEP IN HEAVENLY PEACE"

So, in the song, on the surface it seems like we, the singers,  are telling the Christ Child to "sleep in heavenly peace". But I think that what is also being said  to us is now that the Christ Child has arrived, we too should put our trust in Christ and enjoy "sleeping in a heavenly peace".

Think of that peace that a newborn has lying there all cuddled and snuggled into their blankets. They do not have any clue of the things they should be worried about or could potentially be worried about. A total deep sleep. 

Can you imagine how much sleep you would get tonight if you could go to bed knowing  that there was absolutely nothing for you to worry about? Do you see why this resonates? 

SILENT NIGHT AND THE CANDLELIGHT SERVICE

One of the reasons why “Silent Night!” is my favorite sacred Christmas song is because I think back to all the Christmas Eve services that I've attended, particularly in the church that I grew up in. And I know a lot of churches do this, where they will sing “Silent Night” while they have candlelight as part of the Christmas Eve service. And that's what we did. 

We would all get candles and light the candles while we'd start singing “Silent Night”. Every time we got to the end of the verse, the ushers would turn out one more light in the church. It would get darker and yet still light because we had the candles burning. That went on until we got to the last verse in which all the lights were out and we were lit entirely in candlelight.

When we would get to the end of the last verse, the pastor would say, “Let's sing the first verse again.” For this verse, the accompaniment (organist or pianist) would stop playing and hold their candle up. There we would sing in pure candlelight, in pure harmony (this was a Methodist church, we had four part harmony in our hymnal), a cappella, just our voices raised together in unison.

When we finally got to the end of that verse, the pastor would wait just a few seconds and let all the reverberations in the church fade away. In that absolute silence he would say in a hushed whisper, “Christmas has come.” 

That was just a taste of the heavenly peace. Everything felt safe. Everything felt warm. Everybody felt unified in community. 

SEEK THE HEAVENLY PEACE

I was going to talk about "Silent Night" closer to Christmas, but I decided to do it now because that heavenly peace is something that we can take advantage of today. Picture in your mind a peace where nothing bothers you, everything is taken care of. You feel  safe and secure, unified with your community. That's what we're aiming for. 

So just keep that peace in mind. And when things get stressful, envision that peace. Live that peace. Be that peace. 

Hey, guys, we NEED Christmas. Have a great day.

STILL, HE KNOCKED

We need Christmas! Today, I want to talk about an unusual song I came across called “Still, He Knocked”. 

I love and am a big fan of Christmas music. I own a bunch of Christmas music. I’m hoping to  eventually build a collection that will just blow people's minds. And so I've heard a lot of different songs sung in a lot of different ways.

UNFAMILIAR SONG?

The other day I came across a song that wasn't too familiar to me.The first two lines went like this: 

“Still, he knocked. 

How he knocked?” 

I was sitting there scratching my head and asking if it was Christmas song? Was it a sacred song orsecular song? Was it Jesus knocking? Santa knocking? Some neighbor you don't know knocking?

I didn't understand it. And I get it, songs speak to different people in different ways. But this one I just felt like it wasn't even speaking my language, literally. 

LIKE A FOREIGN LANGUAGE....BECAUSE IT WAS

You see, “Still, he knocked” was really “Stille Nacht!”. Which if you don't know what that is, it's “Silent Night!”  "Silent Night!” was originally written in German.

CHRISTMAS EVE 1818

Let's flashback to Christmas Eve, 1818, in the town of Oberndorf, Austria. There is a young priest named Joseph Mohr. Two years prior, Joseph had written these words in a poem. But on that Christmas Eve day he wanted it set to music. 

So he went to a nearby town to meet with composer and organist Franz Xaver Gruber. And he asks Franz if he could set it to music.

Now, I can just imagine Franz’s response, he's like, “Sure, I could set that to music. When do you want it?” Father Morh responds something life “If you could have it by tonight's Christmas Eve mass, that be great.” 

But you know what? Franz did.  “SIlent Night!” got its music and had its first public performance on the very same day. And it went on to be one of the greatest Christmas songs of all time.

WHY SO POPULAR?

Why was this song so popular? Well, I definitely have some theories on that, but we're going to get into that tomorrow. We're going to dive into the lyrics and I'm going to show you what I think is the part that most resonates with people. 

DON'T LEAVE EMPTY-HANDED!

But I don't want to leave you empty-handed. Wouldn't it be a great party trick if you could actually sing the first two lines of “Silent Night!” in the original German? It's really not that hard. Let me show you.

Take "Still, he", combine the words together and add an “sh” in the beginning. “SHtilly” 

For “knocked” instead of ending it with a “D”, end it with a hard “T” and really emphasize the word “KNOCK-T”. “SHtilly KNOCK-T” 

For  “how he knocked ”, instead of “how he” think of this  in terms of sports. "How he" becomes "high league". And then add the word “KNOCK-T” again. 

Put it all together and you get "SHtilly KNOCK-T, High League KNOCK-T" (“Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht”)

And there you have it. You can sing the first two lines of “Silent Night!” in German, which of course, you know, means.... well, you know what that translation is. 

Don't forget, we need Christmas. Have a great day!

"PEACE ON EARTH"

 

Today, I want to talk about the phrase “peace on earth”. We hear that all the time at Christmas. 

PHRASE ORIGINATES IN THE BIBLE

It comes from Luke 2:14. The angels have already told the shepherds of the coming of Christ, and now they are praising God with the multitude of hosts saying “Glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace, good will toward men!”

WHAT IS PEACE ON EARTH?

That's a great sentiment. But I think too many of us think of "peace on earth", meaning to rid ourselves of war and violence. While that would be great and there are probably very few people that wouldn't love a world without war and violence, I think we do ourselves a bit of a disservice by not thinking of peace in other ways.

STRESS HAPPENS

One of the reasons I am talking about this is because the other day I was busy doing work, trying to get these podcasts out, and trying to plan some decorations for the holidays. I was  getting really stressed out and it left me less than peaceful. I found myself losing my temper, raising my voice, and generally being grumpy.

How ironic is it that because of all the stress around the holiday, in which we want to celebrate peace, we are being far from peaceful. 

PEACE CAN BE MUCH MORE

One of the reasons I started "We Need Christmas" is because I was tired of all the people yelling at each other during the midterm election in November (2022). Peace can certainly include us not yelling at each other. There is nothing politically that will change between now and the January 1. You can yell in the new year if you want.

But, for now,  let's just be peaceful. Let's just be human. Let's just talk nicely to people. 

PEACE WITH FAMILY AND FRIENDS

It is the same thing if you have family or friends with whom you're fighting. Let's really try to have some more patience during the season and  try to be nicer and more peaceful. Just keep that word “peace” in your head. Be peaceful. That should be your goal. 

INNER "PEACE"

It's also peace within yourself. Many of us have things going on that are  stressing us out or  really making our lives difficult. 

Think through it, use some of the mindset stuff, but just try to be peaceful. 

Take a deep breath and  again, keep that word, “peace” in mind throughout this holiday season.

GO IN PEACE

So the next time you hear “peace on earth”, remember, it's not just getting rid of war and violence. But it's also getting rid of all the turmoil and stress that we bring upon us during this time. 

Go in peace, my friends. 

JINGLE BELLS

We need Christmas. Today, I want to talk about the Christmas song, Jingle Bells. I don't know about you, but it has been my favorite non-religous song my entire life. I absolutely love it! There are a couple of facts you may not have known about it. 

THE FIRST RECORDING

Jingle Bells was first recorded in 1889, and it was recorded on one of Edison's cylinders, actually making it the first holiday song ever recorded.

BROADCAST FROM SPACE

Fast forward to 1965 on the Gemini VI rocket up in space, middle of December. Two of the astronauts decided to have a little bit of fun. They radioed Mission Control and reported an unidentified object orbiting the Earth around the North Pole and working its way south. They then told Mission Control they were going to try to capture some data from it.

What they actually did was pull out a small harmonica and some bells they had smuggled on board and proceeded to play Jingle Bells for Mission Control, making it not only the first holiday song, but the first song period ever broadcast from space. 

IS IT A CHRISTMAS SONG?

The funny thing is, Jingle Bells really isn't a Christmas song. When it was originally written, it was written about just being a sleigh ride. A bunch of people getting together, having a ride through the countryside and the snow and the bells. It really had nothing to do with Christmas. 

PLAGIARIZED?

In fact, some musicologists have looked at the original, which was written by James Pierpoint, who, as it turns out, was ultimately the uncle to J.P. Morgan. The musicologists think that what he did was take lyrics from other popular songs of the day, mashed them together, added a melody to it and sold  and published it quickly so he could get a bunch of cash.

That my be cynical, and whether it's true or not, it really doesn't matter. 

THE SONG RESONATES

Because, out of all the songs that were in circulation  back then, something resonated in this song and made it popular. By the 1870s and 1880s, it was a regular staple in people's holiday songs, and it went on to be the number one most popular secular Christian song of all time.

SO WHY "JINGLE BELLS"?

Why am I talking about Jingle Bells besides the fact that I really like it? Well, late last week, my mother-in-law sent me a video clip, a social media clip, and it was a video from 2009 from a PBS Christmas special done by Andrea Bocelli. He is an Italian tenor who sings both opera and pop songs.  He had just put out a Christmas album and this special was helping him promote that album. 

ENTER THE MUPPETS

Well, at one point they introduced the Muppets to come sing with him. When they introduced the name of the song as Jingle Bell, the Muppets were all excited. “Oh, Jingle Bells. I know that song. I love that song.That's my favorite song.” 

ANDREA SINGS...SLOW

Well Andrea starts singing "Jingle Bells" he does a slow operatic version. The Muppets look at each other like, “Is this the same song? It's not right. This isn't right.” They eventually figure out that he's singing the right song, but way too slow in their mind. 

MUPPETS TRY TO HURRY HIM UP

So Kermit the Frog stops him and says, “Andrea, no, no. It's supposed to be faster like this.” And the Muppets start singing it upbeat. 

Andrea listens for a little bit, and then he resumes singing in his slow pace. But he's modified it ever so slightly so that it's actually falling within the quiet spaces of their upbeat version, giving a nice syncopation and putting together a really beautiful version. 

It was awesome! It was great. And it got me thinking kind of traditions. 

DIFFERING TRADITIONS

See,  to the Muppets, the tradition was to sing "Jingle Bells" fast. To Andrea, the tradition was to sing it slow. But what they did is blend the two traditions together to make something even greater. 

THE CHALLENGE

That's my challenge to you. This holiday season, you're going to run across hundreds, if not thousands of different traditions, things that may seem foreign to you. But they are traditions that are important to others. Everybody's got traditions they really love and hold on to. 

I want you to open your mind and learn about those traditions, appreciate those traditions and expand your knowledge of Christmas. It's great to learn about people's traditions. 

BE READY TO BLEND

Now, if you find yourself in a household or a new relationship or even a workplace where there's a couple of traditions that seem to be butting heads, see if you can find a way to blend the two traditions in such a way that you make something even greater. Because that would be in the spirit of Christmas!

TOMORROW....TREES

Tomorrow I'm going to talk about Christmas trees. I know that took me a real long time to get to that. 

Hey, guys, don't forget, we NEED Christmas and have a great day.