Evangelists and Canticles

Reading and hearing the biblical narratives leading up to the birth of Christ seems countercultural these days. Commercial establishments begin celebrating an “instant” Christmas the day after Halloween. But when there’s no room for Advent celebration, there’s no “prepare the way of the Lord,” no waiting and working for Christ’s kingdom.

When Christmas does arrive, seasonal carols tend to surround Christ’s birth with the coziness of “See amid the winter’s snow,” even though that weather pattern would be unlikely in Bethlehem. The well-known Christmas lullaby suggests “no crying he makes” (which, if it weren’t so silly, might signal an outright denial of Christ’s humanity). Christmas cards and crèches confuse or conflate the appearance of the shepherds with the appearance of the Magi (as does “The First Noel.”) And few remember the slaughter of innocent baby boys in Bethlehem at all.

In sharp contrast to these phenomena, the biblical story of awaiting Christ’s birth and the actual birth narratives of the New Testament evangelists are sober, objective, and without sentimentality.

In this service, worshipers are invited to hear the Scripture passages from four evangelists, surrounded by four canticles, and to join in the hymns and carols for Advent and Christmas. But let’s not forget that Christ’s “being born as a human” was an “emptying of himself,” which ultimately led to his humiliating death, and beyond that to his exaltation, as the early church confessed in its credo quoted by Paul in Philippians 2:6-11.

Program Cover Idea

When this festival of lessons and carols was performed by Calvin College choirs, we used an image from the Book of Kells on the cover of the program. It shows the traditional symbols for the four evangelists, which come from the prophecies of Ezekiel (1:4) and Revelation (4:2) and have been identified with them throughout church history. Matthew is portrayed as a man (upper left), Mark as a lion (upper right), Luke as a calf (lower left), and John as an eagle (lower right).

Gregory the Great explained the symbols as the four stages of the life of Christ: Christ was a man at birth, a sacrificial ox at death, a lion in his resurrection, and an eagle at his ascension. Others have connected these directly to characteristics of the gospels. Matthew, a man, since his gospel traced Christ’s genealogy; Mark, a lion, with his emphasis on Christ’s royal dignity; Luke, the ox, related to his emphasis on the atonement of Christ; John, the eagle, which reflects his contemplation on the divinity of Christ