O Little Town of Bethlehem

From Carols & Lessons for Advent on YouVersion  

First off, let’s start off with the song and the lyrics, then we’ll get into the story behind the classic.

O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie!
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep the silent stars go by.
Yet in thy dark streets shineth the everlasting Light;
the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.

How silently, how silently the wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts the blessings of his heaven.
No ear may hear his coming, but in this world of sin,
where meek souls will receive him still, the dear Christ enters in.

O holy Child of Bethlehem, descend to us, we pray.
Cast out our sin and enter in; be born in us today.
We hear the Christmas angels the great glad tidings tell;
O come to us, abide with us, our Lord Emmanuel.

. . . that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. (Ephesians 3:17)

There is a beautiful story behind this popular carol. Phillips Brooks was one of the most famous preachers in 19th-century America. He was pastor of Trinity Church in Boston for many years and later became the Episcopal bishop of Massachusetts. While Brooks was touring the Holy Land in 1865, he visited Bethlehem on Christmas Eve and stood in the shepherds’ field that overlooked the town, where local tradition said the shepherds were “keeping watch over their flocks” on the night Jesus was born. 

Three years later Brooks recalled that scene in a simple carol he wrote for his Sunday school’s Christmas service. Neither Phillips Brooks, nor his church organist Lewis Redner, who wrote the tune, thought that “O Little Town of Bethlehem” would ever be sung again after that service. But today it is known and loved throughout the world.

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

‭‭Ephesians‬ ‭3:14‭-‬19‬

The carol breathes a spirit of peace and draws us into the stillness of that Christmas Eve scene. We’re standing in the shepherds’ field with Phillips Brooks, watching Bethlehem under the stars. With him we pray for the “wondrous gift” to be given to us too—that “Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith.” It doesn’t necessarily happen dramatically. “How silently, how silently” our receiving Christ by faith can be, as Brooks exclaims. But it’s real nevertheless.

No ear may hear his coming,
but in this world of sin,
where meek souls will receive him still 
the dear Christ enters in.

The Back Story

According to The United Methodist Church, Phillips Brooks (1835-1893) wrote this beloved Christmas hymn for the Sunday school children at his Philadelphia parish, Holy Trinity Church, following a pilgrimage to Bethlehem in 1865, according to British hymnologist J. R. Watson. The hymn was printed on an informal leaflet in December 1868 and then appeared in The Sunday School Hymnal in 1871.

In the United States, the hymn is generally sung to its original tune, ST. LOUIS by Louis H. Redner (1931-1908), a wealthy real estate broker who served as a church organist for his avocation. UM Hymnal editor Carlton Young notes that Redner “increased Sunday school attendance at Holy Trinity Episcopal, where Phillips Brooks was rector, from thirty-six to over one thousand during his nineteen years as superintendent.”

According to the story, Brooks traveled on horseback between Jerusalem and Bethlehem on Christmas Eve.

“Before dark we rode out of town to the field where they say the shepherds saw the star. It is a fenced piece of ground with a cave in it, in which, strangely enough, they put the shepherds. . . . Somewhere in those fields we rode through, the shepherds must have been. As we passed, the shepherds were still ‘keeping watch over their flocks,’ or leading them home to fold.”

https://www.umcdiscipleship.org/resources/history-of-hymns-o-little-town-of-bethlehem