I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day
In 1864, during the dark days of America’s terrible Civil War, 19-year-old Union Lieutenant Charles Longfellow, son of America’s great poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, was nearly killed by a bullet during the Mine Run Campaign in Virginia. His famous father had lost his beloved wife Fanny in a house fire in 1861. He himself was badly burned while trying to save her.
Until recent times it could be said that the American Civil War claimed more American lives than all our nation’s other wars combined. In many a home in every city and hamlet of our country, both north and south, mothers wept for lost sons, wives for lost husbands, and children for their daddies, who would never return.
“How inexpressibly sad are all the holidays,” Longfellow wrote during this time. “I can make no record of these days….Perhaps someday God will give me peace.”
Finally, a grief-stricken Longfellow sat down and wrote the words of “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day,” looking to Christ for comfort and hope, not only for himself, but also for our grieving, hurting nation. Though these words were written 156 years ago, they are just as relative to our hearts today, for “hate is strong and mocks the song of peace on earth, good will to men.”
Longfellow ended his song with the hope that only Christ brings.
“Then pealed the bells more loud and deep,
God is not dead, nor doth He sleep,
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail,
With peace on earth, good will to men.”
There is so much hatred in our country now. For my wife Gisela and me, it is too much. We have been filling our home with the great carols of Christmas now for several weeks.
“For unto us a child is born,
Unto us a Son is given,
And His name shall be called
Wonderful,
Counselor,
The Mighty God,
The Everlasting Father,
The Prince of Peace.”
God be with you all. May we look to Christ for the comfort that only He can bring.
