Dev: Dec 19 - People, Look East

People, look east. The time is near

Of the crowning of the year.

Make your house fair as you are able –

Trim the hearth and set the table.

People, look east and sing today:

Love, the Guest, is on the way.

 

Have you ever sung a song without ever really pondering the lyrics?

 

Today, as I stopped to ponder, I wondered, Why look east?

 

My first thought swept me to the Christmas narratives. “East” is an important direction in part of the story. Remember the wise men from the east who followed the star? Ahh! Yes! Except they were people who were looking west. They were from the east – east of the Jordan River, probably from Persia – but they were looking at that star in the western sky. That star in the west finally drew them to Israel (generally), Jerusalem (regionally), and Bethlehem (specifically). Therefore, the wise men can’t be the inspiration for being people who look east.

 

So … what does this line mean?

 

Well, I’ve got a secret to tell you … I loved looking it up and finding it out! Why? Because the author of these words – set to the old French tune, besancon – was a fascinating woman. Eleanor Farjeon (1881-1965) wrote eighty – eighty! – children’s books and poem collections. Her most famous were Elsie Piddock Skips in Her Sleep, Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard, and The Little Bookroom.

 

Farjeon’s books won several awards, like The Hans Christian Andersen Award and The Carnegie Medal. But she refused perhaps the highest award offered to her – Dame of the British Empire – because she “did not wish to become different from the milkman.” Thus, perhaps her most enduring award had to come posthumously, when the Children’s Book Circle established The Eleanor Farjeon Award in her honor.

 

Ms. Farjeon also wrote lyrics (or at least had some of her poetry set to song), and perhaps her most famous song is Morning Has Broken. I grew up singing this song in church, not knowing that singer Cat Stevens made it famous first as an early 70’s folk song.

 

People, Look East, published first in a 1928 collection of carols, has gained increasingly popularity in recent decades. And what it’s opening line calls us to do is look to the horizon. A new day is dawning. The sun is rising, and the Son – the Son of God – is set to come again.

 

This is, therefore, a joyful, expectant call. And the rest of this verse is an invitation to “green” – or decorate – our house for the Christmas season. Ms. Farjeon encourages us to, “Make your house fair as you are able.” What is the last hymn that calls you to, “Trim the hearth and set the table”?! She celebrates, indeed, the festivities of the season.

 

But, why? Because Jesus who is “Love,” Jesus who should be our “Guest,” is truly “on the way.”

 

Are you ready?

 

In Christ’s Love,

a guy who looks east

from his own house

and sees a big white dog

that likes to bark