Ira Sankey

"Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end..." - Isaiah 9:7

More than a century ago, Ira Sankey led the singing for the great meetings of American evangelist Dwight L. Moody. On a certain occasion Sankey was asked to sing. He did, singing a then popular piece called "The Shepherd Song". After the meeting was over, a man with a rough, weather-beaten face approached Sankey and asked, "Did you ever serve in the Union Army?"

"Yes," replied Sankey curiously, "in the spring of 1860."

"Can you remember if you were doing picket duty on a bright, moonlight night in 1860?"

Again Sankey replied, "Yes," this time very much surprised.

"So did I," replied the stranger, "but I was in the Confederate Army." He continued, "When I saw you standing at your post I said to myself, ‘That fellow will never get away from there alive.’ I was standing in the shadow completely concealed while the full light of the moon was on you. That instant, you raised your eyes to heaven and began to sing. Music, especially song, has always had a wonderful power over me and I took my finger off the trigger. ‘Let him sing his song to the end,’ I said to myself. ‘I can shoot him afterward.’ But the song you sang then was the song you sang just now. I hear the words perfectly. ‘We are thine, do Thou befriend us, Be the guardian of our ways.’ Those words stirred up many memories in my heart and I began to think of my childhood and my God-fearing mother. She had many, many times sung that same song to me, but she died all too soon, otherwise my life would have been much different.

"When you finished that song, it was impossible for me to take aim at you again. I thought the Lord was able to save that man from certain death must surely be great and mighty, and my arms of its own accord fell limp at my side."

Out of every war and every tragedy come stories which deeply touch the heart, such as the time when American and German soldiers in World War I were in their bunkers on Christmas Eve, and someone began singing, "O Little Town of Bethlehem". Men who had been shooting each other only hours before, on both sides of the lines, blended their voices, some in German and others in English, singing,

"O holy Child of Bethlehem!

Descend to us, we pray;

Cast out our sin and enter in,

Be born in us today.

We hear the Christmas angels

The great glad tidings tell;

O come to us, abide with us,

Our Lord Emmanuel."

Christmas makes friends of enemies and brothers of strangers? Do you believe in Christmas enough to let the Prince of Peace bring peace to your troubled heart and life? He’s the only one who can case us to stack arms and surrender to the King of Love. It’s time to lay down our weapons and let Him touch our lives with His peace–the real kind that changes our hearts and eradicates our sin. Yes, that’s the abiding truth of Christmas.

Resource Reading: Luke 1:39-56