It's Christmas (Medley)

Chris Tomlin stitches two much older songs together rather than writing new verses. "Away in a Manger" opens gently — "the little Lord Jesus laid down his sweet head... the cattle are lowing, the baby awakes" — before the medley breaks into its own repeated declaration: "it's Christmas, the angels are singing, and I know the reason, the Savior is born."

That reason gets named directly a moment later, borrowing Isaiah 9:6's ancient promise — "unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given" — centuries before Bethlehem, now sung as fact rather than prophecy. Luke 2:10's angel tells the shepherds "good news of great joy," and the medley's own hook, "I feel like shouting, joy to the world," is that same announcement handed down through a different carol.

The medley closes by folding in a third song entirely — "go tell it on the mountain, over the hills and everywhere" — an old spiritual whose whole content is the instruction to pass the news along. Three separate songs, written across different centuries and traditions, end up making the same argument stacked on top of each other: the news is worth repeating, and worth telling somewhere past the room it was first sung in.