15
DECEMBER
But as the church bells intoned, Longfellow's spirits lifted. The mood of the final stanza shifts
to a confident, even defiant affirmation of God's victor y over evil:
"Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
'God is not dead, nor doth He sleep.
The Wrong shall fail,
The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men."
Neither the boys who went off to war from Nor th and South nor their families ever
imagined a five-year conflict (1860-65). Each year, there was hope that the fighting would
be over by Christmas. Fighting that should have ended a long time ago continues in many
par ts of our world this Christmas. A worldwide struggle against Covid continues, with all the
injustices of real wars. And these are just par ts of the perennial spiritual warfare between
the powers of the devil and the unseen armies of Christ.
Longfellow's magnificent poetr y reminds us that no matter how bleak things look, the Son of
God has already won the battle that has turned the tide in the war. Soon complete victor y
will be His. A glorious new heaven and new ear th await us (Revelation 21:1).
Craig Blomberg, PhD, Distinguished Professor of New Testament
I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day
Lyrics by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1863)
