Virtual Methodist

Earlier on this month a friend posted another Christmas song on facebook, and while I had heard it before, I'd never really listened and knew nothing of the background to it. It was Casting Crowns' live version of "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" which I have posted below... It is probably better known among my American friends not only in this version, but numerous others, including variations by artists as diverse as Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Harry Belafonte, Johnny Cash, The Carpenters, Bing Crosby and Bette Midler. Most of them, however, omit the central stanzas of the poem on which it is based... "Christmas Bells" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882). That's probably because they refer to the American Civil War which was raging when Longfellow wrote this poem on December 25th 1864. Yet it is the contrast between the dreadful reality of war and the promise of God's peace that lends the real power to this poem. I heard the bells on Ch...