A New Song
What the best Christmas songs point to
Every Christmas season you can’t escape this holiday tune, but nobody gets it worse than the retail workers who are forced to hear Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas” for hours and hours and hours on end. One worker turns on an industrial fan and stands under it every time he hears it, and others take refuge in the stockroom to avoid the holiday hit.1
That’s Fox News’ Jesse Watters, and I know exactly what he’s talking about. I have a lot of sympathy with his co-host Greg Gutfeld, who opined: “There’s a reason why you only hear this music once a year: cuz it’s that bad.”
Is it though? . . . Some of it is, I suppose. But it likely has more to do with hearing the same songs a thousand times over, and often with bad covers that inspire greater appreciation for the originals. But, having experienced years of working in retail—I can’t even stand the originals anymore. Sorry if you happen to like them; I’m just plain sick of them.
Don’t jump to the conclusion that I’m a “Scrooge,” though. It’s not Christmas I have a problem with. I’ve got about three and a half hours in my Christmas music collection. It’s just that they’re not mostly traditional songs. A few are very different covers of traditional carols that you certainly wouldn’t hear in department stores.
I guess I just want to hear unusual.
Or new.
“New” =/= “good”
Of course I’m approaching this from a Christian perspective, but non-Christians often have a similar idea. For example, take the ever-popular “Baby, It’s Cold Outside”: according to Vanity Fair, it’s “kind of a date-rapey choice” for my playlist. So naturally they endorse John Legend’s somewhat more progressive version, which includes such lines as:
What will my friends think? (I think they should rejoice)
If I have one more drink? (It's your body and your choice)
Now, to be fair, outside of the pro-abortion line, Legend’s rewrite isn’t actually problematic. Had the rest of his lyrics been the original version, they wouldn’t have been objectionable and we wouldn’t be talking about it.2
And yet, the fact that he felt a need to rewrite the words to Frank Loesser’s tune indicates a clash of worldviews. Loesser was just trying to evoke fun and flirtatiousness, without necessarily implying something lewd: “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” was “first performed with his wife during their housewarming party in New York City.”3 But of course postmoderns take offense to virtually anything that can’t be branded “woke.”
Sorry: I’ve just offended somebody. Vanity Fair author Karen Valby opts for the view that Legend’s version imbues the classic song with a “newfound sensitivity [that] feels genuine, not performative.”
Okay . . . Karen.4
I guess she knows, somehow, that Mr. and Mrs. Loesser weren’t “genuine” toward each other . . . ?
Daily Citizen’s Brittany Raymer asks a perfectly rational question: “Is it really necessary to push an abortion slogan in this song from the 1940s?” The question is rhetorical; in Raymer’s view, the controversy is just
another example of the growing snowflake culture, pardon the pun. . . . In this snowflake culture, everything is offensive. . . . [T]here is nothing seemingly that isn’t controversial.
But this article isn’t about the controversial.
Well . . . not that kind of controversial.
“Shiny and new”
What I have in common with John Legend is that I want newness; freshness. Not just at Christmas, but in life generally. Yet a far, far more profound and powerful sort of newness than what Legend or other progressives have in mind. Ironically, I find myself wanting a higher version of what Madonna—yes, Madonna—sang about decades ago:
I made it through the wilderness
Somehow I made it through
Didn't know how lost I was
Until I found youI was beat
Incomplete
I'd been had, I was sad and blue
But you made me feel
Yeah, you made me feel
Shiny and new. . . . . . . .
I'll be yours
'Til the end of time
Honestly: I’m not a fan of “Like A Virgin” or most anything else from Madonna. But the lyrics of this particular song—note especially the words I bolded—actually relate to the truths of the Bible, and to what I'm after: a new me, and a new world for me to live in. With other new people—that is: people who have been made new.
With the God who promises us: “Look, I am making everything new!”
Christmas is about God beginning to fulfill that promise, through the coming of His Son, Jesus of Nazareth. Christmas is about newness.
Evangelist Ray Comfort has written:
We have become so accustomed to the celebration of Christmas that we’ve forgotten that this is when a sinful world celebrates the birth of our Savior. It’s when they sing that He was born that man no more may die—born to raise the sons of earth, born to give them second birth. In the light of that, how could we withdraw and play solitaire?
Notice the key phrases.
“A sinful world celebrates the birth of our Savior”: The world (at least where Christianity has been culturally influential) has inherited the celebration but doesn’t actually get it—much like orthodox Jews have inherited a horde of spiritual treasure, but haven’t taken it to heart. Even many Christians don’t fully realize or appreciate the true meaning of the season.
Jesus “was born that man no more may die”: Because He died for us.
Advent is a . . . beautiful reminder that God loved us enough to stoop to us, to become one of us, to take on our poverty and weakness in order to save us. . . . But that story is only good news if we understand it in light of the atoning sacrifice of Christ on the cross. The message of Advent is that the baby born in a manger was coming to die[.]5
Jesus was “born to raise the sons of earth”: Because He rose for us, as a preview of the future resurrection of anyone who believes in Him.
Jesus was “born to give them second birth”: His death and resurrection brings us new life—a relationship with God that starts right now, and a glorious, joyful eternity beyond this life. The Bible symbolizes each stage with a “new song.”
Sing a new song to the Lord! Let the whole earth sing to the Lord!
Every Christmas, every single year—every single day—the carols should be “new.” These truths are what the best Christmas songs reflect.
A dance . . . or a dirge?
“We played music for you, but you did not dance;
we sang a sad song, but you did not cry.”
For the one who’s given their heart to Jesus, the “new song” exists even in challenge and sorrow. Shortly after Jesus was born, a prophet blessed the young family,
and he said to Mary, the baby’s mother, “This child is destined to cause many in Israel to fall, and many others to rise. He has been sent as a sign from God, but many will oppose him. As a result, the deepest thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your very soul.” [Luke 2:34-35]
But although this was a foreboding thing to hear, we can be confident that Mary, devoted to her God, continued to sing the new song He’d put in her heart: “Oh, how my soul praises the Lord. How my spirit rejoices in God my Savior!” (Luke 1:46-47)
By tragic contrast, however, those who reject the Christ of Christmas will be “singing a new song” themselves: an eternal dirge.
. . . Advent isn’t only about celebrating the birth of Jesus. It’s also a time to rejoice and hope in the second coming of Jesus Christ. In the same way that people waited with anticipation and prepared for the birth of the Messiah, Advent reminds us to remember God’s promises and prepare our hearts for His return. . . .
. . . Advent gives us hope and reminds us that Jesus Christ will return to this earth someday and that we need to renew and prepare our hearts every day for his return.6
There’s a veiled warning there: when Jesus was born, “there was no place for [His family] in the inn.” (Luke 2:7) Years later, Jesus said to His enemies, who refused His offer of salvation: “there’s no room in your hearts for my message.” (John 8:37) If you want the newness God offers in Christ, renew your heart daily in advance of His return.
At Christmastime—but really, all the time—we should imitate Jesus’ mother, who “stored all these things in her heart.” (Luke 2:51)
That’s what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.
†
Well, I don’t think we would. In today’s world, who the heck knows?
Brittany Raymer, “ ‘Baby It’s Cold Outside’ Getting New Progressive Lyrics, Including Abortion Phrase ‘It’s My Body, My Choice,’ ” Daily Citizen (1 Nov. 2019; accessed 20 Dec. 2022).
Michael McKinley, “Advent: Coming to Suffer,” Focus on the Family, 13 Dec. 2022 (accessed Dec. 20; emph. mine).
Carol Cuppy, “What Is Advent All About?” Focus on the Family (n.d., © 2022) (accessed Dec. 17; emph. mine).