As we approach our Christmas Eve services, I thought it might be interesting to look at the responsive reading from our 1959 Christmas Eve service. 

MINISTER:  From our heritage we have seen the light as it cometh unto us from many sources. We would cherish the light as an insatiable burning of the hunger within us for a glory we have yet to win. O divine glow from on high, kindled in the human heart, strangely and deathlessly.

PEOPLE: Thou are the illumined glory by which we men of earth fashion our visions and our dreams of sweeter life and nobler kingdoms.

MINISTER:  Thou are the sacred flame discerned in every age … by Persian and Jew, by Hindu and Christian, by scientist and prophet, by wiseman and child. We see thy holy fire flaming this night in the manger-cradle, and it signifies hope and promise to life against the darkness of the night.

PEOPLE: Many there have been in other centuries and other years who have been guardians of this flame. They have dispelled ignorance and superstition and cruelty and injustice.

MINISTER: They have been the way-showers and light-bearers. They have thrown back the frontiers of darkness and planted the sacred torches boldly in far and perilous places.

PEOPLE: Now it is our watch. Now the light will move from the manger-cradle to the silent and songless streets of the world only if our hearts carry it and our hands shield it from the blasts of wintry selfishness.

MINISTER: Many are the windows of the world that stay darkened unless we light them. It is our watch now. Come then, apostles, come great hearts, come dreamers and singer and poets, come men of the soil and men who command the might of the machines – carry the sacred flame to make light the windows of the world.

PEOPLE: It is we who must be keepers of the flame. It is we who must carry the imperishable fire. It is our watch now.