January 22, 2012

Jan 22 2012

Hymn: God Is Here!

The story of this hymn’s advent is as follows: The text was written by Fred Pratt Green in 1979, at the request of the co-director of music at University United Methodist Church in Austin, Texas, who wrote: “We are in need of a hymn. It would be sung for the first time at the closing service of an eight-month long festival centering round the themes of Worship, Music and the Arts...” The closing service was to be a “dedication of new reading desks, communion table, and font, and finally, the rededication of the people to the life commanded of us and given through Jesus Christ.” The text was written in 8.7.8.7.D meter so that the tune ABBOT’S LEIGH could be introduced to the congregation.

Hymn: Though I May Speak

This text originally appeared as an anthem written by Hal Hopson as a paraphrase of I Corinthians 13, set to the British folk song O WALY WALY. After being published in 1972, the anthem gained enough popularity to be converted and used as a hymn, particularly for weddings. Hal Hopson was a major contributor to the Presbyterian Psalter, published in 1994.

Hymn: O God, Our Faithful God

This hymn originally in German was written by Johann Heermann and titled “A Daily Prayer.” Paul Westermeyer writes, “Like Psalm 90 it contrasts the ever-flowing fountain of God—without whom nothing is—with the speck of humanity who nonetheless confidently ask God to turn with compassion to us and prosper our handiwork.” Englishwoman Catherine Winkworth, a prolific translator of German hymns, performed the translation. She promoted women’s higher education, and wrote a book, Christian Singers of Germany, which has long been of interest to music scholars. A tablet on the wall of Bristol Cathedral states that she “opened a new source of light, consolation, and strength in many thousand homes.”

Anthem: Gracious Spirit, Dwell With Me

The tune for this anthem, ADORO TE DEVOTE, is a beautiful melody that comes from seventeenth-century French songbook. It has changed little over the centuries, and its chant-like quality makes it very singable. The American composer K. Lee Scott set the tune with a text from Thomas Lynch, an English minister who published a nineteenth-century songbook (The Rivulet), which almost caused a split in the Congregational Church. The “Rivulet Controversy,” as it was called, centered on Lynch’s frequent references to nature in his hymn texts, but the controversy was probably exacerbated by his fresh poetic style. “Gracious Spirit, Dwell With Me” doesn’t contain examples of his controversial imagery, but does demonstrate Lynch’s creative poetic style.