Not a groan, but a song

 De Witt Talmage's words and our happiness in the reality of Jesus Christ's birth!

The music that broke through the midnight heavens was not a dirge, but an anthem. It shook joy over the hills. It not only dropped upon the shepherds, but it sprang upward among the thrones.

The robe of a Saviour’s righteousness is not black.

The Christian life is not made up of weeping and cross-bearing and war-waging.

Through the revelation of that Christmas night I find that religion is not a groan, but a song.

In a world of sin, and sick beds, and sepulchres, we must have trouble; but in the darkest night the heavens part with angelic song. You may, like Paul, be shipwrecked, but I exhort you to be of good cheer, for you who are trusting on Christ shall all escape safe to the land.