Once in Royal David’s City:

“And he feeleth for our sadness, and he shareth in our gladness”

Written by Jess Piper

I don’t know about you, but for me, Christmas Day, almost feels like it’s a freeze-frame on the rest of life. For twenty-four hours, I somehow forget those things which were bothering me the day before, because everybody is happy, everybody is together, and in some small way, all seems right with the world. And that freeze-frame, picture perfect image that we have, is one which, I suspect many of us long to bottle up and take into the new year with us, and yet, is one which we find slowly dissipating a few days after the festivities are over. When our worries return, when the things we were struggling with before Christmas reappear, it’s easy for us to forget that baby, lying in a manger. And it’s even easier for us to forget who that baby would grow up to be. The part of the story which is so often unheard, is the part where everything looks like it did before the birth – where the manger is empty, the night sky is dark and silent, and the shepherds are once again on the hillside keeping watch over their flocks. Because the familiar story we tell, is just the beginning of a much bigger and broader story, which for me, is where the true power of the story lies. Since the baby lying in the manger whom we have come to celebrate this night, is Emmanuel – God with us. And that is good news for us. Because as the line of the carol we’re reflecting on today intimates, God is with us in all of life. In our joys and our sorrows.

The power of the Christmas story is the story of Emmanuel – of God who came to be with us, as one of us, so that we might know God with us every day of our lives.