“Forgiveness” –a track from TobyMac’s album Eye on It, performed with Lecrae.
Archive for music
Worthy of praise
Take Me to the Water
Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form, as a dove, and a voice came from heaven, “Thou art my beloved Son; with thee I am well pleased.” Luke 3:21-22
Today, on the day we remember Jesus’ baptism, the household of God welcomed many new family members through the sacrament of baptism. It is a day of solemn joy as we remember our own vows, and promise to do everything in our power to support the newly baptized in their life in Christ. Afterwards we give thanks to God for forgiveness of sins and the new life of grace. Finally, we ask God to bestow a most precious gift:
Give them an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love you, and the gift of joy and wonder in all your works.
Amen. And may it be so for all of us.
To see and hear historic American music and photographs of baptisms, explore Dust to Digital’s Take Me to the Water: Immersion Baptism in Vintage Music and Photographs.
I hear the song and I have to move
If you haven’t yet heard the Soweto Gospel Choir, then you owe it to yourself to listen to their Tiny Desk Concert on NPR. Their music is so joyful and infectious, it’s difficult to hear without moving. A good way to start the new year with sounds of praise!
Come quickly, King of kings!
Only a few more hours to wait, so here is one final musical selection for your Advent. Whether you attend a small church or large one, or if you greet the Savior in some other place this year, may you know the majesty and humility of Jesus’ birth, and may joy at His coming fill you entirely.
A hymn for Christmas Eve, humble or grand. God bless us all.
The King shall come when morning dawns,
And light triumphant breaks;
When beauty gilds the eastern hills,
And life to joy awakes.
Not as of old a little child
To bear, and fight, and die,
But crowned with glory like the sun
That lights the morning sky…
The King shall come when morning dawns,
And light and beauty brings:
Hail, Christ the Lord! Thy people pray,
Come quickly, King of kings.
Scenes from the Manger
On a recent visit to my parents’ home I pulled out the manger scene I played with as a child. That was what we called it then–not a Nativity or a Creche. It was a manger scene, complete with Mary and Joseph, Baby Jesus, a plastic donkey and a cow, sheep and their shepherd, three wise men with gifts, and an angel. The cardboard stable had (increasingly less) straw glued onto the roof, and there was a windup music box built in that played “Silent Night.” Over the years, I wound that music box many times, learning about springs and gears as the tune played slower and slower before finally winding down to a stop.
Ours was not a fancy nativity, but it was an important part of our Christmas preparation every year. We were not Nativity Purists at my house. We didn’t wait until Epiphany to place the wise men in the scene, and we ignored the historical accuracy issue by letting the wise men and the shepherd worship the Christ Child at the same time. Sort of a “more-the-merrier” approach I suppose, with the entire cast on stage at once.
It was important, I think, that the figures were plastic, because no one was ever afraid to let me play with this religious object. I could assemble the stable, arrange the characters in the Christmas story, wind the music box and let it play. I don’t remember ever making believe that the figures talked; it was a silent tableau except for the music.
Still, there are important considerations when you are a child arranging a manger scene. Mary and Joseph should be positioned where they can protect the baby. Everyone wants to be able to see Jesus, so the taller figures go in the back, and the shorter ones up front. The shepherds and wise men need to stand at a close, but respectful distance from the Holy Child–though sometimes a curious young lamb will come right up and peer into the manger. The cow and the donkey should stand together like old friends in the stable. And there must be an angel–preferably somewhere up high–to give the proper sense of mystery and holiness to the scene.
As I stretched out on the floor, the lesson I took from the plastic manger was that this was a Bible story for me. Jesus’ birth was the first Bible story I could inhabit in my imagination; experience with my hands, eyes, and ears. I could be eye-to-eye with these Bible people. Think about their relationships and express them in space. Come to know them in a way. Wait for their arrival every year.
During Advent I’ll be posting pictures of Nativities collected by friends and family over the years. If you have a creche or a story you’d like to share, let me know via email or in the comments section. Let’s get out the boxes, unwrap the tissue paper, and set up our manger scenes. It’s time for us to enter in.
Getting ready: Come Thou Long Expected Jesus
And now for something a little different as we move through Advent…
This is a classic YouTube video. A guy sits on his bed, says a few introductory words, and plays a song on his guitar. You can find a lot of these, and a lot of them are pretty interesting, but this one I wanted to share. I like the way Johnnybluelabel noted in the caption that he was playing a 1996 Lowden O10 guitar. (I always look at the headstock to see what kind of guitar people play.) And his voice and the arrangement of this hymn remind me of Bruce Cockburn–whose album “Christmas” I have enjoyed for many years. But most of all I think I like this video because it is unpolished. Just something to help the bass player get ready for Sunday. Maybe it will help us get ready, too.
Christ the King
King of Kings, c.1600
Public domain via Wikimedia Commons
The feast of Christ the King is celebrated the last Sunday of the liturgical year by Anglicans, Catholics, and many mainline Protestant denominations. It seems like every denomination has some aspect of the faith that they express better than the others, and to my mind, you can’t beat the Anglicans and Episcopalians for understanding the idea of kingship in Christianity. A sense of majesty and sovereignty permeate the language, music, and architecture. With a little imagination, even we democratically-minded Americans can worship the King without wishing for our independence.
Here for Christ the King Sunday is St. Anne’s Cathedral, Belfast. Presented by BBC Songs of Praise.
Where are you from?
…the LORD loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwelling places of Jacob. Glorious things are spoken of you, O city of God….The LORD records as he registers the peoples, “This one was born there.”
If you grew up in the Church like I did, it’s difficult to read this psalm without hearing Haydn’s tune to “Glorious Things of Thee are Spoken” playing in the background. In fact, sometimes the hymn plays so loudly in my head that it’s difficult to actually read the words–it all gets tangled up with John Newton’s poetry. This morning, however, I was able to quiet the music long enough to hear the refrain “This one was born there,” which appears three times in a brief seven verses.
“Where are you from?” I expect we’ve all been asked this at one time or another. It’s a line we use to start a conversation, to get to know someone, and to try to establish some kind of connection. It can be a way to identify something intriguing you’ve noticed–a curious accent, an ethnicity you can’t quite place, a distinction that you need to locate geographically. “Where are you from?”
“Oh, you must be from Texas!” While our place of origin may be a point of pride for us, it’s not always so for others. Think about the story of shibboleth, and Nathanael’s mocking, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” In this psalm, however, it seems like everyone would want to be from Zion.
Zion is complicated in the Bible. It’s Jerusalem, it’s Solomon’s Temple, it’s the holy habitation, it’s the world to come. Zion, like Hollywood or Beijing, is a place that stands for an idea–in this case, an idea that as complicated as very the notion that there is a place where God dwells. Zion is the city of God and everything that can mean.
Amid all the complication, what we do know is that God loves Zion, and that love makes Zion glorious. Everyone who was born there shares in her glory. People from other places sit up and take note: “This one and that one were born in her.” And they’re not the only ones. The psalmist includes the curious and lovely image of the Lord writing in the heavenly census, “This one was born there.”
Like Joseph and Mary in the days of Caesar Augustus, God’s people know their house and lineage; and when the decree goes out, we will return to our city of origin, to Zion. For next to our names, there is a note: “This one was born there” This is where we belong. This is our beginning and our end. This is home.
“Glorious Things of Thee are Spoken” words: John Newton; tune: Kevin Twit
Lustily and with a good courage
Church music. Is there any other aspect of our worship with so much power to lift us to the company of heaven, or plunge us into the depths of petty squabbling? We Christians are as passionate about music as we are about politics. Oh, the organist! Oh, the hymns! Oh, my tone-deaf neighbor!
I suspect that one reason for this passion is that we crave the blessings of good music: the experience of beauty, a sense of something greater than ourselves, a feeling of community, and the opportunity for praise. Our hunger is great, and we want worship to feed us with wonderful music every time we make the effort and get ourselves to church.
The problem, of course, is that a worship service is not just about being fed. We come to praise, to give thanks, to learn, and I would argue, to create an experience in which our neighbor can do the same. It’s not a show to watch. It’s not something the people “up front” do for us. When we join in prayers, when we sing the hymns–even the ones we don’t know or don’t like–we make worship happen. We do it for God and for ourselves and for others. And when we do it for others, our singing can be an act of hospitality.
The Wesley brothers knew a thing or two about the power of hymns. You can find John Wesley’s “Directions for Singing” in the preface to the Methodist Hymnal. His instructions are plain, stern, and full of hope. He had such faith in what we could do if we sang with heart, soul, mind, and strength. It makes me smile. It makes me want to sing.
Directions for Singing
I. Learn these tunes before you learn any others; afterwards learn as many as you please.
II. Sing them exactly as they are printed here, without altering or mending them at all; and if you have learned to sing them otherwise, unlearn it as soon as you can.
III. Sing all. See that you join with the congregation as frequently as you can. Let not a single degree of weakness or weariness hinder you. If it is a cross to you, take it up, and you will find it a blessing.
IV. Sing lustily and with a good courage. Beware of singing as if you were half dead, or half asleep; but lift up your voice with strength. Be no more afraid of your voice now, nor more ashamed of its being heard, then when you sung the songs of Satan.
V. Sing modestly. Do not bawl, so as to be heard above or distinct from the rest of the congregation, that you may not destroy the harmony; but strive to unite your voices together, so as to make one clear melodious sound.
VI. Sing in time. Whatever time is sung be sure to keep with it. Do not run before nor stay behind it; but attend close to the leading voices, and move therewith as exactly as you can; and take care not to sing too slow. This drawling way naturally steals on all who are lazy; and it is high time to drive it out from us, and sing all our tunes just as quick as we did at first.
VII. Above all sing spiritually. Have an eye to God in every word you sing. Aim at pleasing him more than yourself, or any other creature. In order to do this attend strictly to the sense of what you sing, and see that your heart is not carried away with the sound, but offered to God continually; so shall your singing be such as the Lord will approve here, and reward you when he cometh in the clouds of heaven.
from John Wesley’s preface to Sacred Melody or a choice collection of psalm and hymn tunes, with a short introduction (1761)
