Lessons & Carols 2015 Roundup (1 of 3

(Part 1 of 3. Better late than never!)

On December 12, 2015, we had our annual Festival of Lessons & Carols at Uptown Church. If you are not familiar with this service, it comes out of the Anglican tradition, specifically King’s College in Cambridge. More on that here and here. Following the 2014 L&C service, I posted a Roundup which was well received, so here is the next one.

Note: All of the musical selections are in the third part this post. I put them last because I want to draw recognition to all of the other amazing talent that is so important to this event. But if that’s what you are looking for, just click here.

THE THEME

This year, we themed our service “In the Fullness of Time,” a reference to Galatians 4:4-5:

“But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.”

This is such a compelling image to me. I imagine the brokenness of all of creation waiting, groaning in anguish, impatient for the day when she would be redeemed from the curse. Then, at just the right time, salvation came in the person of Christ. Not a moment too soon or late.

THE PUBLICITY

This year Uptowner Mandie Spear collaborated with Tyler LaCross to develop an invitation and poster that well captured the spirit and ethos of the night:

I love everything about this design. The intertwining holly and thorns is a sobering reminder of the reason Christ came which was to suffer and to die the death we deserved to die. But this is good news worth celebrating because we know that death could not hold the maker of life, and defeating death he bought us life. Mandie did the beautiful hand lettering. The black and white image on the left was for these beautiful letter-pressed invitations by Emory Cash. The color image on the right was for posters printed by Mom & Pops Printshop here in Charlotte.