Candlelight Carol - John Rutter

We have sung this song by British composer and conductor John Rutter on Christmas Eve in my congregation almost every year over the past ten years. There is something about it that so perfectly captures the intimacy and the cosmic nature of this night.

My favorite memory is of asking my husband at about 10:30 p.m. if he would come and fill in the tenor section in the choir that night for our midnight service. He agreed, and then as he looked at the list of music said, “Oh no, I can’t sing that one…it makes me cry.” That is a feat unto itself.

A beautiful modern carol, that makes grown men cry.

May you have a blessed Christmas Eve.



How do you capture the wind on the water? How do you count all the stars in the sky? How can you measure the love of a mother, or how can you write down a baby's first cry?

Candlelight, angel light, firelight and star glow shine on his cradle till breaking of dawn. Gloria, Gloria in excelsis deo! Angels are singing; the Christ Child is born.

Shepherds and wise men will kneel and adore him, Seraphim round him their vigil will keep; Nations proclaim him their Lord and their Savior, but Mary will hold him and sing him to sleep.


Candlelight, angel light, firelight and star glow shine on his cradle till breaking of dawn. Gloria, Gloria in excelsis deo! Angels are singing; the Christ Child is born.


Find him at Bethlehem laid in a manger: Christ our Redeemer asleep in the hay. Godhead incarnate and hope of salvation: A child with his mother that first Christmas Day.

Candlelight, angel light, firelight and star glow shine on his cradle till breaking of dawn. Gloria, Gloria in excelsis deo! Angels are singing; the Christ Child is born.