November 27 

For Ages Women Hoped and Prayed 

TEXT: Jane Parker Huber

b. October 24, 1926, Tsinan (now Jinan), China

d. November 17, 2008, Hanover, Indiana

Jane Parker Huber was born in China to missionary parents. They returned to America in 1929 when her father was appointed the president of Hanover College. Jane graduated from Hanover in 1948, married a pastor, and moved to Indiana. It wasn’t until 1976 that she began writing hymns, but by 1996 she had over 125 hymns published. Jane was awarded a Doctor of Humane Letters in 1988 by Hanover College. In this hymn, Huber pictures the state of mind of what was probably a very early teenage girl who receives the shocking and almost incomprehensible news that she will be the mother of the Messiah. And though the centuries-long national prayer for a Messiah was the prayer of every Jew, no doubt many women dreamed of having the unparalleled honor of being the mother of the Messiah.

TUNE: Traditional English Folk Tune

Arranged, Ralph Vaughan Williams

b. October 12, 1872, Gloucestershire, England

d. August 26, 1958, London, England

It is unlikely that Jane Parker Huber used this tune for her text. But in this collection, it seemed appropriate and unifying to use the same tune for the parallel texts that speak of Mary and Joseph. KINGSFOLD is an ancient tune that some scholars think goes back to the Middle Ages and was used with a variety of texts in both England and Ireland. It was first published in 1893. The composer Ralph Vaughan Williams arranged it for a setting of another text by Horatius Bonar named, “I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say.” This tune is unusual as it sounds both minor and major, but is likely based on one of the seven modal keys from early music. Modal keys use different arrangements of whole and half steps than major or minor.

As you sing this hymn … you come alongside someone who was crucial to the Christmas story—Jesus’ mother, Mary. The opening stanza reveals a paradox that this highest honor would also come to enormous grief. Read and meditate on the story from “Christmas in the Bible,” #9–21.

You will see that Mary’s humility is remarkable. She did not understand how she could be pregnant before marriage, but she simply responds to the angel’s explanation with these words: “I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word” (Luke 1:38). There is no argument or reluctance.

Mary’s prayer that follows is sometimes called the Magnificat, based on the third word in her prayer, “My soul magnifies the Lord” (v. 46). It is incredible that such a young, probably illiterate, peasant girl understood the ways of God as described in her song. Few others write with such clear and insightful theology of the nature of God.

Why should we sing a hymn—a Christmas carol—about Mary? Do we offer it as a form of worship of Mary—a type of veneration or honoring of a “saint”? No. We know that Mary, like all of us, needed a Savior. In her prayer, she says, “he has looked on the humble estate of his servant” (v. 48). Then she proclaims, “my spirit rejoices in God my Savior” (v. 47b) and “he who is mighty has done great things for me” (v. 49). We do not come to Mary as a means of reaching her Son. Rather, we learn from her obedience and devotion. Her song becomes our song of praise. As the carol says, “we join the song that Mary sings.”