This sermon was delivered on December 5, 2021 at the weekly service at The Kensington in Galesburg, IL.
For me this song gets at that deep need for peace and tranquility but also at the power of wonder.
Collected by John Jacob Niles in Murphy, NC in July 1933 from a young traveling evangelist Annie Morgan. Niles was a song “collector” who spent a great deal of time in Appalachia, specifically rural eastern Kentucky. He collected the songs he heard and often rewrote, revised, or completed them in some manner. Because of this, he is often not given “author credit” on his songs, but rather called the “collector.” He worked to preserve the songs, but, “he didn't preserve folk songs to display them as museum pieces. He revived and reanimated them with immediate, palpable emotion. And just as his touch lent something to the songs, the songs seemed to transform him as well.”
Niles was a native Kentuckian and spent his life trying to preserve the music of Appalachia. He said of the experience of collecting this song, "I Wonder As I Wander grew out of three lines of music sung for me by a girl who called herself Annie Morgan. The place was Murphy, North Carolina, and the time was July, 1933. The Morgan family, revivalists all, were about to be ejected by the police, after having camped in the town square for some little time, coking, washing, hanging their wash from the Confederate monument and generally conducting themselves in such a way as to be classed a public nuisance. Preacher Morgan and his wife pled poverty; they had to hold one more meeting in order to buy enough gas to get out of town. It was then that Annie Morgan came out--a tousled, unwashed blond, and very lovely. She sang the first three lines of the verse of "I Wonder As I Wander". At twenty-five cents a performance, I tried to get her to sing all the song. After eight tries, all of which are carefully recorded in my notes, I had only three lines of verse, a garbled fragment of melodic material--and a magnificent idea.”
Before we listen, think about the word “Wonder” as it is traditionally used at this time of year—think about wise men and shepherds and stars and babies—think about this being “the most wonderful time of the year” and then listen…
I am from the hills of Kentucky. I did not grow up in Appalachia proper but it is deep in my bones. Long before I knew of my genetic roots, I felt a deep connection to the mountains and to the people of Appalachia.
A few years ago, for Christmas, I was given an ancestry DNA kit to try to find my birth father. Using the results of that test and my Ancestry account, I tried to find relatives who might possibly be my birth family. I was shocked when someone reached out to me- a “close relative” according to DNA results. Close relative indeed. It turns out that she was my aunt. Her brother, Bill, is my birth father. After years of not knowing anything, I had a connection to my family and to my roots. And Bill? He’s a native of Appalachia descended from Scots and who settled in Appalachia because of how it reminded them of home.
Today is the sunday of peace. And when I think of peace at Christmas this is the song that immediately comes to mind. I think about being at home standing under the stars and singing the song. When I’m at home in my hills under the stars that I think are mine is when I feel most at peace. This is complicated because I don’t always feel at peace at home, but there’s something magical about the hills at night and the way the stars are brighter in the dark sky.
When you grow up with a few street lights you get spoiled by the night sky and it’s easy to imagine wandering under the big bright sky and wondering about Jesus and wondering about the nativity and the story and about Mary and about all of it. It’s easy to be contemplative when the sky is quiet and when the world is at peace.
Advent is a time for contemplation, a time to wonder, and a time to think about the meaning of it all. When we take those moments we can really go deeply into the season in a way that we can’t when we are surrounded by bright lights and hubbub and noise.
Peace at this time is more than just about quiet. It's more than a silent night and it’s more than praying for peace in the world. It's about a deep and lasting inner peace and the relationship with the come in Christ that can bring that peace in the world.
But there’s something even deeper about this song. And i think it’s because it’s uniquely Appalachian. For my friend Mary Ann, this song is about a deep connection to her grandmother who likely learned the song from her own mother because she couldn’t remember NOT knowing it. Her family was from Pike county Kentucky and had started out poor and living in a coal camp. They worked their way across Appalachia working and moving and growing their own families. Christmas for the family had always been simple, but warm and joyful, centered on attending church before coming home to treats and small gifts.
It was not an extravagant affair, but small and simple and beautiful. As life grew harder for the family, the traditions and gifts dwindled further, but there was always singing. The sisters would sing the songs they remembered, this one among them. When her daughter joined a religious sect that didn’t celebrate Christmas, it hurt her deeply. But she’d sing this song to her granddaughter, my friend, as a means of connection and quiet celebration. This song connected Mary Ann to her grandmother, and to Christmas, and it still remains her favorite.
Appalachican culture is largely matriarchal- each family has stories of their one great matriarch and those who followed in her footsteps. My grandmother, my friend’s grandmother, countless grandmothers singing and passing on traditions and stories from generation to generation. And yes, Appalachia has a long dark history of poverty and reliance on coal and the complications that came when the coal industry left Appalachia behind. There’s a painful history of opioid addiction and crumbling infrastructure.
But there’s so much more to Appalachia than that. There is nothing more beautiful than a sunrise cresting over the mountains as the haze settles deep into the hollers. There’s nothing like a winding road that carries you home- and no secret to why John Denver sang about those country roads. And there’s nothing quite like the deep love passed on from generation to generation through stories and songs.
My heart is always out wanderin the hills. And today my heart is especially heavy as a dear friend has headed home to the mountains to say goodbye to his own matriarch. So this song seems a fitting blessing for his journey and for hers as she transitions to her rest.
I will look up at the sky in wonder tonight, but I can’t wait to get home and wander my hills and sing this song.
Amen.