Christmas Devotion (December 3) - Silent Night

Silent Night

So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger.

Luke 2:16

Silent night, holy night
All is calm, all is bright
Round yon virgin, mother and child
Holy infant so tender and mild
Sleep in heavenly peace
Sleep in heavenly peace

It was December 24, 1818, and in Oberndorf, Austria, the assistant priest went to the home of his friend, the organist of the small church. He brought the words of a poem that he had written two years earlier and asked him to write a tune to it, to use at the Christmas Eve Midnight Mass. The organist, Franz Xaver Gruber, reminded Fr. Joseph Mohr that the organ wasn’t working and so they would not be able to have music for the service. Fr. Mohr went in the other room and got a guitar. Gruber strummed a few chords, then started humming. He exclaimed, "The song, it sings itself." A few hours later, he had composed the tune, and the two men presented the carol for the first time that Christmas Eve.

When the organ repairman, Carl Mauracher, later heard the carol, he took a copy of it with him. He presented it to two groups of traveling singers, who then performed it in their Christmas repertoire, and thus it began its journey around the world. The Strasser and Rainer families traveled and performed all over Europe, and they sang "the Tyrolian folk carol". The Rainer family brought the carol to the United States, first performing it in German in New York City in 1839.

A publisher heard the carol sung near Innsbruck, Austria around 1832. He liked it and published it for the first time, claiming the source to be a "Tyrolian folk song." The songwriters were not known at that time, and the tune had been changed somewhat from the original. That printed version is the melody that is still widely sung. However, in 1995 a copy of "Silent Night" was found, written in Fr. Joseph Mohr’s own hand, which gives the origin of this carol, along with proof of its creators.

Silent Night speaks of peace...heavenly peace...and that is just what Jesus brings to our weary world. Peace with God the Father, our creator, who could not bear to look upon the sinful world, totally unforgiven and separated from Him. So He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to bring us peace with Him through His sacrificial death on the cross. Heavenly peace to every weary soul who will look to the Lord Jesus and be saved.

Here is Silent Night with lyrics sung by Casting Crowns https://youtu.be/Sb7M81xHK0k