Hey Church! The first few newsletters of the year will feature reflections from members of the COTC community. There is much to lament about 2020, but because God is faithful and all God’s dealings with us are for our good, we can enter 2021 with gratitude and hope. I pray this reflection by Ellyn Steidl on the power of music to elicit gratitude and sustain hope is as heartening for you as it was for me. Nick

Music is a deep-seated part of Christmas for me. Growing up our family often celebrated Christmas Eve with a Christmas carol jam session that my Aunt and Uncle - both church musicians - would host. My high school choir performed an annual sacred music concert at a local Catholic church. I can still remember the exclamation of the orchestra during “Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silent,” as the choir crescendoed to “Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia, Lord Most High!” I am so grateful for the power of music to comfort and inspire, and the way Christian hymnody makes the gospel real for me.

In college I participated in the St. Olaf Christmas Festival, a sacred music concert held annually at my school since 1912 (pictured above). The concert always ended with the song, “Beautiful Savior,” and it was a holy moment as hundreds of singers encircled the auditorium and sang a cappella.

This year, it’s been so comforting to rehearse God’s truth contained in the Christmas carols and other sacred music pieces I sang in these concerts. It has felt easier for me to process the painful year we’ve been through when I sing about Christ’s incarnation to share in our suffering, and the hope of glory for which we all long.

In the hymn “Once in Royal David’s City”, for example, we remember that Jesus ‘feels for all our sadness and shares in all our gladness.’ As I look back over the last year, I am grateful for Jesus’ presence in my moments of quiet gladness: my husband’s faithful teamwork and encouragement, my daughter’s pure glee from the summer sprinkler, my son’s first words, and this new little one’s steady heartbeat.

One of my favorite Advent hymns is “E’en So, Lord Jesus, Quickly Come”. It speaks to my hope for the year ahead:

E’en so, Lord Jesus, quickly come,

And night shall be no more;

They need no light nor lamp nor sun,

For Christ will be their All!

It’s been challenging to live through this pandemic with no clear end date on the horizon. Personally, I’ve had to resist placing my hope in subjective timelines in the future− “Things will surely be back to ‘normal’ by ____!” Ultimately, this experience has increased my longing for Christ’s return, and for Him to restore all things. So as we begin this new year, my desire is for my hope to remain rooted in Christ and his promise of redemption. I think music is one of God’s graces to nourish and sustain me in His love until that day. And I look forward to the day when I can join in with other singers in a choir and hopefully make that truth real for others, too. 

Ellyn Steidl