Today we want to celebrate the gift of music.  I wanted to talk about it last week for the music extravaganza we enjoyed, but thought that I’d like more than a few minutes to do it, and would save it for today.

Friedrich Nietzsche said, “Without music life would be a mistake.” He’s right!

Our Old Testament lesson from Zephaniah begins like this: Sing, “O Daughter of Zion; shout aloud, O Israel! Be glad and rejoice with all your heart, O Daughter of Jerusalem! . . . The LORD, the King of Israel, is with you; never again will you fear any harm.”

This third Sunday of Advent is a day of singing. The LORD, the King of Israel, is with us. Sing, “O Daughter of Zion; shout aloud, O Israel! Be glad and rejoice with all your heart . . .

Verse 17 says something even more interesting. “The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing.”

Did you get that? God takes such delight in us that God sings over us. I visualize a mother hovering over a crib singing quietly to her newborn infant. Can you imagine God singing over us? Can you hear God singing?

There’s a carol that comes to mind when I think of God singing.  Written in 1962, it’s relatively new at only forty-seven years old. It’s the carol, “Do You See What I see?”

It begins like this: “Do see what I see, said the night wind to the little lamb?”

The story of the song is very simple. It begins with the night wind, and the night wind sees what Christmas is all about. So the night wind tells the little lamb, and then the little lamb sees what Christmas is all about, and goes to the shepherd boy.

The shepherd boy sees the meaning of Christmas, and he goes to the mighty king and he says to the mighty king, “Do you know what I know?”  And then the mighty king says to everyone, everywhere, in a deep, gruff voice, “Listen to what I say.” Then the king makes this announcement to his kingdom: “A child, a child, will bring you goodness and light.”

Do you see what I see? Do you hear what I hear?   Do you know why we sing at Christmas time? It begins with love. Love always makes the heart sing. It begins with God’s love for us. This, in turn, results in our love for God. This, in turn, leads to love for one another.

In the midst of the Great Depression when a family of three‑‑Mom, Dad, and little six‑year old Peter‑‑had absolutely no money for store‑bought presents. Nevertheless, they were very inventive in celebrating Christmas.

They decided to make pictures of the presents they would like to give one another if money were no object. So they drew or cut out pictures from catalogs and magazines. They put the pictures into boxes, stuck some old bows on them, and put them under a scraggly Christmas tree.

On Christmas morning the tree was heaped with riches. The gifts were only pictures, to be sure, but they were symbols of Christmas giving. There was a shiny new car for Dad and a red motor boat, some golf clubs, a new suit, some sweaters, and an all‑weather coat. Mom found her dream house and a diamond necklace, dresses, coats, and a vacation cruise.

Most of the make‑believe presents were for little Pete. There were pictures of a camping tent, a new bicycle, a pedal car, and all kinds of toys and games.

Now, of course, Mom and Dad didn’t expect anything from little Pete.

But Pete, with a squeal of delight, crawled under the tree and pulled out a gift he had prepared all by himself. He handed his present to his parents with a smile and they opened it. They found a picture-gift more precious than all the others.

It was drawn with first‑grade crayons, a picture of three people standing together with big smiles on their faces. They had their arms around each other. And under the picture, little Pete had printed a single word‑‑“us.”

The light dawned and tears of joy filled the eyes of the parents because they realized that, in years to come, they may be able to give some of those Christmas presents they had only imagined, but they could never give a present more precious than the one they had received that year‑‑the gift of love they had for each other.

That is a story that must be told at Christmas. If that doesn’t make you heart sing, nothing will. Our lives are filled with love. God sings over us. And we sing of the wonders of Christmas. It begins with love.

And it reaches its zenith in a manger of Bethlehem . Here’s what happened in that manger God took on human flesh. God came and dwelled among us. Very few recognized him, but God was there in a lowly stable, reconciling the world to Himself. I know it’s an outrageous thing to say, but that’s what happened there. And people have been singing about it ever since.

David Devine told a revealing story in the Washington Post sometime back about a youngish white man in jeans, a long-sleeved tee shirt and a baseball cap.  He got out of the subway station in Washington one Friday evening, positioned himself against a wall beside a trash basket and, from a small case he had carried, removed a violin.

Placing the open case at his feet, he threw in a few dollars and pocket change as seed money. Then he swiveled his case to face the people who passed by, and began to play. “In the next 43 minutes, as the violinist performed 6 great classical pieces, 1097 people passed by, almost all of them on their way to work in mid-level Government jobs.

What they didn’t know was that the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the world’s leading classical musicians, an acclaimed virtuoso, who fills concert halls. Said one composer of Bell : ‘He plays like a god.’”  

On this Friday evening Bell played a Stradivari, valued at $3.5 million. The train station provided good acoustics for Bell ’s performance, and his beautiful music filled the morning air.

“A reporter stood observing and recording the event. In the first 3 minutes, 63 people walked past without seeming to notice the virtuoso. Then a man stopped, looked and quickly walked on.

In the 45 minutes Joshua Bell played, 7 people stopped to listen for at least a minute. 27 people gave money. Usually, in concert, Bell gets paid $1000 per minute. This day, in total, he received $32.17. At the end of each piece, there was no applause just silent indifference. The master musician was ignored. People walked past musical glory without giving it a second glance.

“Except for two people. A postal worker named John described as a ‘smallish man with a baldish head.’ John had learned the violin as a youth. He recognized the quality of Joshua Bell’s performance and stood enjoying it from the distance.

And then there was a demographer named Stacy. Stacy had seen Bell in concert 3 weeks before. She recognized him. And here he was, the international virtuoso, sawing away, begging for money. She had no idea what was going on, but whatever it was, she wasn’t about to miss it. Stacy positioned herself 3 meters away from Bell , front row, center. She had a huge grin on her face.

The grin, and Stacy, remained planted in that spot until the end. Stacy told the reporter: ‘It was the most astonishing thing I’ve ever seen in Washington . Joshua Bell was standing there playing in rush hour, and people were not stopping, not even looking, and some were flipping quarters at him! Quarters! I was thinking, Omigosh, what kind of a city do I live in that this could happen?’"  1

One of the world’s great musicians playing on the street for coins, and only a few recognized him. It sounds somewhat familiar.

Only a few recognized Christ in the stable of Bethlehem . Some star-struck shepherds; some magi from the East; a humble carpenter and his bride-to-be.  A few recognized him, but not many.

And yet that event turned the world upside down. It was enough to start the whole world singing. And why shouldn’t it? After all, the God of all creation -  the God of the moon and the stars and the wind and the waves - sings over us. Can you hear it?

It’s the song of everlasting love, hope, peace, and joy. It’s the song of Christ.

1.  © John Mark Ministries . http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/20684.htm.