This page is provided so that you can hear the tunes of items which we use in church. Mostly they are written by the vicar. Please note that they are copyright - we are very happy to give permission to you to use them, but we would like to hear about it. Please include any use on your Christian Copyright Licence returns.
Down this page:
- the words,
- the story,
- the sheet music,
- media player.
Gabriel came down
Gabriel came down
Gabriel came down, to Nazareth he came,
came to find a girl, Mary was her name;
came to give God’s word: news of God’s own Son.
He was coming to the world and Mary was his mum:
“Mary, hear, God is near, Jesus Christ will come:
He will be a little baby, you will be his mum, oh,
Mary, hear, God is near, Jesus Christ will come:
He will be a little baby, you will be his mum.”
Mary was afraid, wondered what she’d done?
“Don’t be frightened now, you’ve done nothing wrong.
Jesus will be great: Son of God Most High,
Saviour of the world, so God’s people never die.
“Mary, hear...
Mary asked him “How?” Gabriel said “See:
When God’s Spirit comes, he will make it be.”
“Yes, sir!” Mary said, “I’ll do what you say,
I’ll look after Jesus when he’s born on Christmas day.”
“Mary, hear...
Words copyright © John Hartley 2002.
Story behind the song
This song was written for our Christmas Crib Service in December 2002. Young children would be attending, some of whom wouldn't be regular at church. I wanted songs which would tell the story of Christmas as we divided it into five parts, each with a story and then a song; and I wanted the songs to have easy tunes which children would be able to sing along with straight away.
There are lots of songs about some parts of the Christmas story, but not many easy ones about this little incident. The song was well-received on that first Christmas Eve, and has been sung most Christmasses since then.
John Hartley
You can find the original words at this link. Music copyright expires 50 years after the author's death, so we're probably safe printing this music on this site.
Windows Media Player. When you click the left-hand "play" button your computer should have started to play the tune. If it didn't, you might be able to get the tune by clicking here, or by right-clicking the link, choosing "save target as", saving it onto your computer, and then opening it with a music-playing program.
Please remember that a midi file of a tune isn't supposed to be a state-of-the-art musical arrangement - it is only supposed to give a basic idea of how the tune goes. Any reasonable organist / keyboard player / music group could make it sound far better.