In the Bleak Midwinter (Stanzas 1-3)

 One of my favorite carols is "In the Bleak Midwinter"

The first stanza describes winter in northern latitudes: an ice-encrusted landscape with snow layered upon snow. Bethlehem's night temperatures in winter are around 50 degrees Fahrenheit. However, the imagery applies to bleakness in any climate--a sense of inescapable desolation faced by all humanity

"God is a spirit," John tells us (John 4:24). We forget that the descriptions of heaven are metaphors of a spiritual dwelling for an immortal God. At the final judgment, earth and heaven will flee from His presence (Revelation 10:11).
Yet the second stanza describes how this infinite, almighty God came to earth as a baby, making His debut entrance in a stable.

In heaven, angels stand in the presence of God (Luke 1:19), beholding His glory. In Bethlehem's stable, it was animals who stared at him. This God who "never slumbers or sleeps" (Psalm 124:4) now rested on the hay that He shared with livestock.

God "is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else." (Acts 17:25, New International Version, 1984)

The third stanza celebrates how this God who is worshiped by angels now needs His mother's milk to survive. The stanza is deleted in most hymnbooks and recordings--as if we're embarrassed by such humanity.

The icon, Madonna of Humility, lacks some of the lifelike perspective of later Renaissance paintings. But it is one of the few paintings that represents Mary feeding her Baby. I prefer to think of the title as referring to Jesus' own humility. Only a mother would grasp the full and tender implications of the Creator God voluntarily becoming a baby at Mary's breast.

In the bleak mid-winter
Frosty wind made moan
Earth stood hard as iron,
Water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow,
Snow on snow,
In the bleak mid-winter
Long ago.

Our God, heaven cannot hold Him
Nor earth sustain,
Heaven and earth shall flee away
When He comes to reign:
In the bleak mid-winter
A stable-place sufficed
The Lord God Almighty —
Jesus Christ.

Enough for Him, whom cherubim
Worship night and day,
A breastful of milk
And a mangerful of hay;
Enough for Him, whom Angels
Fall down before,
The ox and ass and camel
Which adore.

 Text: Christina Rossetti, 1872 http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/i/n/t/b/intbleak.htm

Illustrations:
"Cabin in the Wilderness," wood engraving by Henry Sandham, 1830.
"Madonna of Humility" by Masolino, c.1415.  '...stolen during Word War II and ended up in Hermann Goring's personal collection.' Photographed June 22, 2021, Uffizi Gallery, Florence.