It’s a wonderful time each December when we take a break from the normal routines of the year to celebrate the holiday season. For me, two special days come to mind: Christmas and New Year’s. One of the exciting things that I like to do around this time of year is to listen to an engaging and meaningful set of Christmas-themed songs that will take me from Thanksgiving to the New Year — over a month’s time of celebrating joy, love, hope, favor and new beginnings.
I’m sure that most of us are familiar with songs like “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year,” “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” “Here Comes Santa Claus” and “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!” Those songs are certainly very festive and energetic tunes about celebrating life in a cold and dark time of the year. However, I don’t want to limit Christmas music to songs that we have been familiar with year after year.
Instead, I try to keep an ear out each December to find brand new sounds to highlight the happiness and the traditions of the holiday season. After the discovery quest is over and everything is considered, the blend of classics from previous decades and some contemporary songs from the past few years makes for an amazing variety of cheerfulness. I’d like to share some of the more recent songs created by Christian artists I listen to regularly.
We the Kingdom takes listeners on a journey to a special land in the middle of the Pacific Ocean: Hawaii, which was where I was born and spent my first Christmas. In the song “Christmas in Hawaii,” the group tells the story of Santa somehow getting stuck in a coconut tree. With no one to distribute presents to the people, is there still someone to save the world? Yes — I think maybe We the Kingdom is showing that this duty can be entrusted to people like us. Santa might be taking a break and relaxing from some high overlook on the beach, but we have this wonderful opportunity to serve, whether that’s in the scenario of bringing presents around, or maybe just simply caring for another person in need. We can bring out the best of the Christmas spirit by helping out where help is needed.
If you do happen to be the one who is bringing presents around, beware of a certain group of people who really don’t seem to care much about receiving. Forrest Frank, in his song “The Present,” claims that the blessings in the moment are the only things on his wish list this year. You can also spare some wrapping paper for Phil Wickham, who uses “This Year for Christmas” to express his feeling of being so happy to just be able to be with the ones he loves for Christmastime that he would throw away any other chances for gifts to come his way. TobyMac and Terrian feel the same way. In “All I Need for Christmas,” they shout out that their singing, thankfulness and family are all they are waiting for during the holiday celebration.
Then there are some other songs that put out a simple realization of how far we’ve come: look at us, December 2024! We Are One brings up a good point that “Xmas Won’t Wait.” The holiday season really will be here regardless of if we want it to or not, so it’s best to enjoy it while it is here. In “Christmas on the Radio,” Finding Favour agrees that the holidays come one day, and then eventually, they’re gone. But in all of it, there’s a great cheerfulness in just knowing that “The Holidays Are Here,” says Danny Gokey. Micah Tyler adds on to this sentiment with a highlight of the joyful feeling of Christmastime in “Feels Like Joy.”
The feeling of being present in Christmastime also brings back a sense of the past, of memories stacked upon memories, of places and sights that we might not be able to go back to anymore, and of people from our past that we might not be able to gather with anymore. That does seem to be the case for Chris Renzema. In his song, “Every December,” he reminds us that he carries around a certain sense of his past no matter where he goes, trying to preserve that wonder of the season from long ago. For the sense of lost people and losing hope, TobyMac and Tasha Layton are here to comfort us in their song, “Christmas Hits Different.” They really want us to make the best of the moments that we have. And of course, if we have people that we can keep in contact with on the phone, even if they’re missing out from being physically with us, Tedashii and V. Rose remind us that we can give them a special “Christmas Call.”
There’s the act of calling people, and there’s also a sense of time calling us through holiday music. In “Christmas in Florida,” Social Club Misfits call us to the place of warm weather to wish us a merry Christmas and a happy new year. Speaking of the new year, we’ll be giving 2025 a call and having a moment to celebrate one fourth of the twenty-first century having gone by. Although the holiday celebrations might be winding down by the time January comes in, I think Ben Rector wants us to listen to his proclamation, “The Best Is Yet to Come,” as we open up on a brand new adventure in time. Hopefully, a joyful and thankful celebration of the holidays coming up will allow us godspeed, joy, and moments of value and comfort in whatever is coming our way in 2025.