Notes on the Notes – November 30, 2025

Thursday, November 27, 2025 Laura

Advent 1/Communion

This week’s music:

“We Light This Candle” (TLUS #55)

“We light this candle for Hope.
Await the new life within.
May our hearts now live each day,
So Hope can find a way,
So Hope can find a way.”

Our Advent candle-lighting song was written by Pat Mayberry (2016) and arranged by David Kai (2016). It appears in the new United Church song book, “Then Let Us Sing.”

Hear the song recorded at WPUC at: We Light This Candle

“Once in Royal David’s City” (VU #62)

“Once in royal David’s city stood a lowly cattle shed,
Where a mother laid her baby in a manger for his bed.
Mary was that mother mild, Jesus Christ her little child.

He came down to earth from heaven who, with God, is over all,
And his shelter was a stable, and his cradle was a stall.
There among the poor and lowly lived on earth our Saviour holy.

For he is our lifelong pattern; daily, when on earth he grew,
He was tempted, scorned, rejected, tears and smiles like us he knew.
Thus he feels for all our sadness, and he shares in all our gladness.

And our eyes at last shall see him, through his own redeeming love;
For that child who seemed so helpless is our Lord in heaven above;
And he leads his children on to the place where he is gone.”

“Once In Royal David’s City” is a Christmas carol originally written as a poem by Cecil Frances Alexander. The carol was first published in 1848 in Miss Cecil Humphreys’ “Hymns for little Children.” A year later, the English organist Henry John Gauntlett discovered the poem and set it to music. Since 1919, the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols at the King’s College Chapel Cambridge has begun its Christmas Eve service, with Dr Arthur Henry Mann’s arrangement of “Once in Royal David’s City” as the processional hymn.

Hear The Choir of Trinity College Cambridge recorded in Trinity College Chapel: https://youtu.be/QmspXB6lUeg

“Come, Come Emmanuel” (MV #11)

“Come, come Emmanuel. Come, Emmanuel.
Come, come Emmanuel. Come, Emmanuel.”

This gentle chant will be used as our response to the Words of Assurance during the season of Advent. It was written by James J. Chepponis in 1995.

“Be Born in Us”

“In a world of darkness where light has lost its way,
And our hearts grow colder with each passing winter day;
Beneath the pain and sorrow, hope is waiting to be born
Through a tiny Babe whose life will change this world forevermore.

Be born in us, O Holy Child, and let the light of Your love shine within our lives.
Be born in us, O Prince of Peace, let the hope You bring this world be born in me.

To a world that’s longing for a Child and King,
For the joy and comfort only heaven’s love can bring,
We must be the beacon, we must show the world the way to the tiny Baby whose life can change each heart that humbly prays:

Be born in us…

Born for us, to deliver;
To reign in us forever
Unto us You will be given.
Come to us, that You may be

Born in us…”

This week’s anthem, expressing the longing for the Christ within our hearts, was written by David S. Gaines and Ruth Elaine Schram (2003).

“Jesus, You Have Called Us”

“Jesus you have called us to your table here.
By your invitation all are blest and dear.
Bringing our gifts, we meet each other here.
Christ we come rejoicing! Come, O Christ appear!

In this feast of mercy, Christ, we thirst for you.
Open wide our hearts to what your love will do.
Make us your Cup, the Manger where you lay.
Love made flesh among us, Christ be born today.”

As we prepare for the Sacrament of Communion we sing this Advent Communion hymn with words by Steve Garnaas-Holmes. The tune is the tradition French carol NOEL NOUVELET, which can be heard at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEVNV4yt_5o.

“In this Advent Time of Waiting”

“In this Advent time of waiting may we serve the Prince of Peace.
Share our gifts with those around us, joy and hope in all increase.
Dream the vision, tell the story, healing bring to those in need.
Share the promises once more, Christ is near, who came before.”

Our offering response for the season of Advent will be sung to a variation of the traditional Polish carol, W ZLOBIE LEZY, known in English as the carol “Infant Holy, Infant Lowly.”

“Holy Child Within the Manger”

“Holy Child within the manger, long ago, yet ever near,
Come as friend to ev’ry stranger, come as hope for ev’ry fear.
As you lived to heal the broken, greet the outcast, free the bound.
As you taught us love unspoken, teach us now where you are found.

Once again we tell the story—how your love for us was shown,
When the image of your glory wore an image like our own.
Come, enlighten with your wisdom, come and fill us with your grace,
May the fire of your compassion kindle ev’ry land and race.

Holy Child within the manger, lead us ever in your way,
So we see in ev’ry stranger how you come to us today.
In our lives and in our living give us strength to live as you,
That our hearts might be forgiving and our spirits strong and true.”

The words for our closing hymn were written by Marty Haugen (1987). As we leave our time of worship, we again hear the story of God’s love through Jesus. The tune we will be using is the familiar tune BEACH SPRING.

“A World of Hope”

“May we be filled with hope in our hearts, in our lives.
May we be filled with a world of hope.
May we be filled with hope in our hearts, in our lives.
May we be filled with a world of hope.

Hope, now the promise begins.
Hope is the light within.
Hope in the mystery.
Hope holds all that can be.

May we be filled with hope in our hearts, in our lives.
May we be filled with a world of hope.
May we be filled with hope in our hearts, in our lives.
May we be filled with a world of hope.”

Our benediction response for the season of Advent was written by Mary-Ellen Kish in 2010.