BEAR MUSIC

This black bear that visited our backyard one summer looked pretty content once he pulled down two bird feeders and then sprawled out to partake of the goodies. How he must have sang thanks for such bounty!

ETERNAL PERSPECTIVES by Sally Bair

A Song in the Air

At Jesus’ birth, angels visited shepherds, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men!” (Luke 2: 14) Their music must have been a balm to the weary souls of those shepherds, knowing God was sending His promised deliverer to the world.

Music was a balm to Paul and Silas too while imprisoned and in shacked. Their songs of praise to God surely were like salve to their physical and emotional wounds and to the other prisoners. Music is soothing to our souls, also, when we are troubled.

God provides us with many kinds of music and joyful noise. Did you know that animals sing? Whales make inaudible, ultra-sensitive “music” while moving through the water. Bears and other mammals “sing” to their young and to their mates. Even rocks cry out! Jesus told the Pharisees after they told Him to rebuke His followers who shouted hosannas to Him, “I tell you that if these should keep silent, the stones would immediately cry out.” (Luke 19:40) Imagine! If we don’t “sing” hosannas to Christ, the very rocks in the fields will. Even a donkey “talked.” Check out Numbers 22. And the book of Job tells of how God spoke to him about “the morning stars singing together.”

We can also hear God’s praises in the form of rustling leaves on a breezy day, in the hissing and crackling songs of the aurora borealis, and through the kind words of a friend or loved one. It even comes through God’s still, small voice as He speaks to our hurting hearts—and through the songs of Christmas.

Who doesn’t feel happy hearing the hymn, “Joy to the World, the Lord is come”? Heaven and nature surely do sing at such Good News. What heart cannot help but leap at the sound of Handel’s oratorio, The Messiah, as it tells of the prophecies and their fulfillment of Christ’s birth?

Yet, earthly music is drowned out by the sounds of “tens thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands (of angels) saying with a loud voice: worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom, and strength and honor and glory and blessing!” (Revelation 5:9)

Lord, we celebrate Your birth with joyful music in anticipation of hearing the sounds of Your heavenly choirs. May we not forget to share the Good News of Jesus’ salvation, as the shepherds shared on that first Christmas night. In Jesus’ name, amen.