# Good Christmas song list



## whirlingmerc (Dec 22, 2014)

Which are the best Christmas songs?
My short list would would include:

- Thou didst leave Thy throne
- Thou who wast rich beyond all measure
- I heard the bells on Christmas day
- Good Christian men rejoice
- Come ye lofty


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## NaphtaliPress (Dec 22, 2014)

I am sure this depends on the definition of good; the songs as much as anything contribute to the sentimentality which makes this observance so difficult to reform out of the church. I thought Pastor Glaser had a good blog post; I've recognized for years it is not principles but sentimentality and nostalgia which outweigh all in giving this thing life and staying power (and do doubt modern consumerism and advertising). https://benjaminpglaser.wordpress.com/2014/12/21/the-powerful-narcotic-of-nostalgia/


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## whirlingmerc (Dec 22, 2014)

And I agree that music should not be merely for nostalgia


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## Jake (Dec 22, 2014)

If you mean a good song about the incarnation of the Son of God, perhaps Psalm 2 could be a contender? I don't celebrate mass, but I do celebrate Christ. 



> 1 Why rage the heathen? and vain things
> why do the people mind?
> 2 Kings of the earth do set themselves,
> and princes are combined,
> ...


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## JimmyH (Dec 22, 2014)

I don't celebrate Christmas, or approve of what it is to most of society, but I love singing the hymns of Issac Watts, John Wesley, Martin Luther &c. Perhaps it is sentimentality, but singing the hymns is one of the things I look forward to every Sunday. I find myself singing Hark The Herald Angels Sing, Joy To The World, A Mighty Fortress, while driving in my car, cooking or washing dishes.


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## Elizabeth (Dec 22, 2014)

I love this one. Listening to my husband sing it at Lessons and Carols(which we had the joy of attending last night) is a yearly delight:


"Lo! He comes with clouds descending,
Once for favored sinners slain;
Thousand thousand saints attending,
Swell the triumph of His train:
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
God appears on earth to reign.

Every eye shall now behold Him
Robed in dreadful majesty;
Those who set at naught and sold Him,
Pierced and nailed Him to the tree,
Deeply wailing, deeply wailing, deeply wailing,
Shall the true Messiah see.

Every island, sea, and mountain,
Heav’n and earth, shall flee away;
All who hate Him must, confounded,
Hear the trump proclaim the day:
Come to judgment! Come to judgment! Come to judgment!
Come to judgment! Come away!

Now redemption, long expected,
See in solemn pomp appear;
All His saints, by man rejected,
Now shall meet Him in the air:
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
See the day of God appear!

Answer Thine own bride and Spirit,
Hasten, Lord, the general doom!
The new Heav’n and earth t’inherit,
Take Thy pining exiles home:
All creation, all creation, all creation,
Travails! groans! and bids Thee come!

The dear tokens of His passion
Still His dazzling body bears;
Cause of endless exultation
To His ransomed worshippers;
With what rapture, with what rapture, with what rapture
Gaze we on those glorious scars!

Yea, Amen! let all adore Thee,
High on Thine eternal throne;
Savior, take the power and glory,
Claim the kingdom for Thine own;
O come quickly! O come quickly! O come quickly!
Everlasting God, come down!"


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## Jack K (Dec 22, 2014)

Hark! The Herald Angels Sing. It's stuffed with biblical language and expresses great joy in the gospel of Christ.


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## Reformed Covenanter (Dec 22, 2014)

Grandma got run over by a reindeer. 

I particularly like the edited version we made-up in high-school: Grandma got run over by a reindeer, walking back from Mass on Christ-mass eve! Now you can say there's no such thing as popery, but as for me and grandpa we believe!


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## Logan (Dec 22, 2014)

Were you and your high-school friends particularly nerdy?


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## whirlingmerc (Dec 22, 2014)

I think some amount of sentimentality is fine... it just shouldn't be all nostalgia or sentimentality...

I passed on the movie version of 'grandma got run over by a reindeer'


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## Bill The Baptist (Dec 22, 2014)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> Grandma got run over by a reindeer.
> 
> I particularly like the edited version we made-up in high-school: Grandma got run over by a reindeer, walking back from Mass on Christ-mass eve! Now you can say there's no such thing as popery, but as for me and grandpa we believe!


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## Reformed Covenanter (Dec 22, 2014)

Logan said:


> Were you and your high-school friends particularly nerdy?



Yes; not much has changed in that regard. I was also one of those hard-core Prods, who had Union Jacks and Ulster flags on his school folders; not much has changed in that regard either


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## Philip (Dec 22, 2014)

Of the Father's Love Begotten
Veni Veni Immanuel
Come Thou Long Expected Jesus
Really any of Handel's settings of prophetic text in _The Messiah_
Coventry Carol
Sussex Carol
O Magnum Mysterium


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## Warren (Dec 22, 2014)

So outside the psalms? Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silent. It was an ancient Eucharistic chant, a pre-Mass hymn.


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## ProtestantBankie (Dec 22, 2014)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> Logan said:
> 
> 
> > Were you and your high-school friends particularly nerdy?
> ...



I thought they stopped letting you guys into Queen's.


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## Reformed Covenanter (Dec 22, 2014)

ProtestantBankie said:


> Reformed Covenanter said:
> 
> 
> > Logan said:
> ...


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