Lessons and Carols is traditionally presented on the Sunday after Christmas. Where the Christmas lessons are specific on the birth of Jesus, Lessons and Carols puts the event in perspective covering the earlier Old Testament as well as the New Testament events leading up to Christ’s birth.
The service, first held after World War I in 1918, was planned by Eric Milner-White, who at the age of thirty-four had just been appointed Dean of King’s College. His experience as an army chaplain had convinced him that the Church of England needed more imaginative worship.