{"id":114093,"date":"2025-12-19T23:21:44","date_gmt":"2025-12-20T06:21:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=114093"},"modified":"2025-12-19T23:21:44","modified_gmt":"2025-12-20T06:21:44","slug":"him-whom-cherubim-worship-night-and-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2025\/12\/him-whom-cherubim-worship-night-and-day.html","title":{"rendered":"“Him whom cherubim worship night and day”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Our<\/a>
Proxima Centauri (our nearest stellar neighbor beyond the Sun), as seen from the Hubble Space Telescope (ESA\/NASA) \u00a0(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This year\u2019s Interpreter Foundation Christmas message went up earlier today: \u201cChristmas Stars: Inviting Us to Come to Christ,\u201d<\/a> written by Shirley S. Ricks<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Abstract:<\/strong> The Christmas season evokes tender feelings within us as we contemplate the newborn Christ child, whose life and mission would change the world forever. Many retellings of the nativity story include the unusual\u2014the awkward boy\/innkeeper who impulsively offers his own room to Mary and Joseph or the Herdman kids who unwittingly impart a realistic view of the Christ child\u2019s birth. The Christmas star of Bethlehem, leading the wise men to the newborn baby, symbolically invites us to come unto Christ as we celebrate the season through memorable stories and Christmas songs.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"Tiepolo's<\/a>
\u201cThe Prophet Isaiah,\u201d by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (d. 1770)
(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I enjoyed this article by Richard D. Gardner<\/a>, which appeared in Meridian Magazine. \u00a0<\/em>It treats a subject that I think quite appropriate to consider as we approach Christmas: \u00a0\u201cThe Fatherhood of Christ.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9:6)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And I\u2019m pleased to report that Kyler Rasmussen\u2019s brief summaries of many of the articles that appear in Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship<\/em> will now be appearing in Meridian Magazine<\/em> as well<\/em> as on the website of the Interpreter Foundation. \u00a0See, for example, his brief article \u201cThe King Who Shouldn\u2019t Have Been: Nephi\u2019s Surprising Claim to Divine Authority,\u201d<\/a>\u00a0which commences his new column for Meridian<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"SLC's<\/a>
The Church History Library in Salt Lake City
(Wikimedia Commons public domain)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It\u2019s been a busy day and a long one. \u00a0I\u2019ve just returned from several hours spent with two of my immediate offspring and a third-generation unit at Luminaria<\/a>, \u00a0The annual Luminaria Christmas light show, at Thanksgiving Point in American Fork, is nothing short of spectacular and is a huge gift to the Wasatch Front and to Utah more generally from Alan and Karen Ashton<\/p>\n

I spent much of this morning meeting with two of the vice presidents of the Interpreter Foundation and the head of the company<\/a> that, over the past two years, fundamentally redesigned the Foundation\u2019s website. \u00a0Then it was up to the Church History Library in Salt Lake City to be present during an interview for the Interpreter Foundation\u2019s forthcoming series of short Becoming Brigham<\/em> documentaries. \u00a0(We have now, by the way, barring some unforeseen surprise, settled on a launch for Becoming Brigham<\/em> on Monday, 26 January 2026. \u00a0New episodes will then be released each and every Monday thereafter.)<\/p>\n

Our team did two interviews today. \u00a0Unfortunately, because of my website-related meeting in the morning, I was unable to be there for the first of them, which involved our \u201cEmma,\u201d Camrey Bagley Fox, interviewing Matthew McBride<\/a> regarding the completion of the Nauvoo Temple.<\/p>\n

I was<\/em>, however, able to be present for\u00a0John Donovan Wilson\u2019s interview with Christopher B. Rich<\/a>, the co-author, with\u00a0LaJean Purcell Carruth and Professor Paul Reeve (both of whom we have already interviewed), of the award-winning<\/a> Oxford University Press book This Abominable Slavery: Race, Religion, and the Battle Over Human Bondage in Antebellum Utah<\/a>. <\/em>\u00a0 (I\u2019ve praised this book publicly in at least two venues, in my remarks at the August 2025 FAIR conference\u00a0(\u201cBrigham Young and Slavery\u201d<\/a>) and in a 26 August 2025 article for Meridian Magazine (\u201cBrigham Young, Race, and Slavery: Reexamining Utah\u2019s 1852 Service Act\u201d<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\"Nativity,\" by Kershishnik<\/a>
\u201cAngels and archangels may have gathered there, cherubim and seraphim throng\u2019d the air.\u201d \u00a0A large copy of Brian Kershisnik\u2019s \u201cNativity\u201d has often been displayed on my living room wall regardless of the season. I love the joyous fascination of the angels with the newborn Redeemer.
(I hope that this will somehow count as fair use or, at least, as well-intentioned advertising.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I\u2019ve always loved Gustav Holst\u2019s beautiful setting of Christina Rossetti\u2019s beautiful 1843 poem \u201cA Christmas Carol,\u201d which is far better known to most of us by its opening words:<\/p>\n

In the bleak mid-winter
\nFrosty wind made moan,
\nEarth stood hard as iron,
\nWater like a stone;
\nSnow had fallen, snow on snow,
\nSnow on snow,
\nIn the bleak mid-winter
\nLong ago.<\/p>\n

Our God, Heaven cannot hold Him
\nNor earth sustain;
\nHeaven and earth shall flee away
\nWhen He comes to reign:
\nIn the bleak mid-winter
\nA stable-place sufficed
\nThe Lord God Almighty
\nJesus Christ.<\/p>\n

Enough for Him whom cherubim
\nWorship night and day,
\nA breastful of milk
\nAnd a mangerful of hay;
\nEnough for Him whom angels
\nFall down before,
\nThe ox and ass and camel
\nWhich adore.<\/p>\n

Angels and archangels
\nMay have gathered there,
\nCherubim and seraphim
\nThrong\u2019d the air,
\nBut only His mother
\nIn her maiden bliss
\nWorshipped the Beloved
\nWith a kiss.<\/p>\n

What can I give Him,
\nPoor as I am?
\nIf I were a shepherd
\nI would bring a lamb,
\nIf I were a wise man
\nI would do my part! \u2018
\nYet what I can I give Him,
\nGive my heart.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Of course, those opening words are almost certainly historically false; as most Latter-day Saints and many others understand, there is no real reason to believe that Jesus was actually born \u201cin the bleak midwinter.\u201d \u00a0But it was probably still cold in a stable in Bethlehem in April (situated at about 2543 feet above sea level) and, anyway, the misconception probably helps to emphasize the undoubtedly humble and uncomfortable circumstances of his birth and, in that sense, may actually have done us a bit of good.<\/p>\n

Moreover, as I\u2019ve said here before, because of its vagueness, its lack of concreteness, I regard the line \u201cIf I were a Wise Man, I would do my part\u201d as rather weak. \u00a0So this year, as on prior occasions, I invite anybody out there who wants to make the attempt to try to fix it. \u00a0I myself haven\u2019t yet thought of a good way to change the line that would preserve the overall power of that final stanza. \u00a0And yet it seems to me that\u00a0this<\/em> stanza, the second, is absolutely magnificent:<\/p>\n

Our God, Heaven cannot hold Him
\nNor earth sustain;
\nHeaven and earth shall flee away
\nWhen He comes to reign:
\nIn the bleak mid-winter
\nA stable-place sufficed
\nThe Lord God Almighty
\nJesus Christ.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Listen, here, to the Royal Choral Society sharing the wonder of the piece and its message in 2022 at St. Giles, Cripplegate, in the City of London: https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=OHHl0NiIAy4<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 This year\u2019s Interpreter Foundation Christmas message went up earlier today: \u201cChristmas Stars: Inviting Us to Come to Christ,\u201d written by Shirley S. Ricks: Abstract: The Christmas season evokes tender feelings within us as we contemplate the newborn Christ child, whose life and mission would change the world forever. 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