"A stable-lamp is lighted..."

A stable-lamp is lighted
Whose glow shall wake the sky;
The stars shall bend their voices,
And every stone shall cry.
And every stone shall cry,
And straw like gold shall shine;
A barn shall harbor heaven,
A stall become a shrine.

 

"A Christmas Hymn"
by Richard Wilber

 

Ave Maria!  This Christmas hymn is one of my favorites, though I must confess that I don't know the melody at all.  It's the words in the first verse above that tugged at my heart so many years ago when I came across them in my Christmas reading.  These words speak to me of the earthiness of the glorious birth of the Divine Child, so humbly making His home among us mere mortals.  A stable-lamp, stars and stones, straw made smelly by stinking animals and unwashed human beings crowded together in a barn harboring heaven.  The "Great Lord of earth and sea and sky" comes to us where we are, in all our humanness -- and behold, a stall becomes a shrine!  "What wondrous love is this, O my soul?"  It is the love of the Word made flesh, full of the grace and truth of the Everlasting Father.  We have seen His glory!  "And from His fullness we have all received, grace upon grace" (John 1:16).

 

Venite, adoremus Dominum!  O come, let us adore HIM!