Cantate

Dear Christians, One and All, Rejoice

LSB 556

Introduction

How does it feel listening to someone talk about himself or herself? Yeah, I know. It can get old fast. Somebody else’s vacation pictures. Details of his surgery. Even personal testimony of what Jesus has done in her life. Borrrrrrring! Or worse. Believe me — I know! I remember once when I had to listen to…
On the other hand, there are times when “I” and “me” and “my” are anything but dull — and not at all self-centered. What makes the difference? Let’s talk about that (yes, let us talk about that) as we study Martin Luther’s “Dear Christians, One and All, Rejoice.”

❚ What is it about another person’s personal story that may become tiresome for us?
❚ Can you think of examples of other peoples’ first-person accounts that you found quite engaging?

Exploring the Scriptures

The Season of Easter carries us from the joy of the resurrection morn, through those 40 days Jesus showed Himself alive to His disciples, toward the Ascension of Our Lord, and finally to Pentecost. Thus, the last couple of Sundays before Ascension Day develop two major motifs, both of which show up in our Hymn of the Day.

First, as we near Jesus’ visible departure to heaven, it’s a moment to look back on the events of our salvation He has now nearly completed. Psalm 66 invites us to hear about these great events. 

Read Ps. 66:16.

❚ One problem: Do we really want to hear the psalmist talk about what God has done for his soul?
❚ What do you hope the psalmist really means? Now read Psalm 67. Notice especially verse 3.
❚ What could cause “all the peoples,” rather than just the psalmist, to praise God?
❚ Any hints you see in the psalm of what God has done for everyone?

Read Ps. 98:1–3.

❚ Think of the events of Jesus’ time on earth. What are some of the “marvelous things” the psalmist might have foreseen Jesus doing? For whom did the psalmist see Him doing these?

The second major motif for these late Sundays of Easter is preparation for the coming of the Holy Spirit. The Gospel
Readings for these Sundays all come from Jesus’ last discourse to the disciples before His arrest.

Read John 14:15–21; 15:9–17; 16:5–15; and 16:23–33.

❚ What activities of the Holy Spirit does Jesus promise?
❚ What special names does Jesus use for the Holy Spirit? If your group has different translations, compare how they render one of these names (14:16; 16:7). How does each different rendering express a unique blessing He brings? How precious will these blessings be in light of 16:32–33?

Now look again more closely at 16:13–15.

❚ What particular activity of the Spirit is described here? Does the Holy Spirit talk about Himself? About whom does He speak? 

See also John 15:26.

❚ What sorts of things does the Spirit say about Jesus? Consider, for example, John 15:13. How does He speak about Jesus today?

Exploring the Hymn

Background
“Dear Christians, One and All, Rejoice” was probably the first hymn Luther wrote specifically for singing by a congregation
in worship.

❚ What makes a truly congregational hymn, one to be sung together by dozens or hundreds of worshipers? Should a congregational hymn be one person talking about himself? Why not?
❚ The original title of “Dear Christians” was “A Christian hymn of Dr. Martin Luther, setting forth the unspeakable grace of God and the true faith.” Does that sound congregational? Why or why not?

Text
The congregational character of this hymn is immediately evident in stanza 1. Read it, and remember the psalms you studied a few minutes ago.

❚ How, apparently, will the hymn summon up the call of Ps. 67:3?
❚ here do you see Ps. 98:1 paraphrased?

OK, but what about Ps. 66:16? Well, perhaps surprisingly, this hymn is all about what God has done for “my soul.” Read stanzas 2–3.

❚ How many uses of “I” and “me” and “my” can you count? Pool your knowledge of the life of Luther to discuss how well these stanzas fit his story.
❚ So, is this hymn all about Luther? If so, singing it could mean our congregations are idolizing him.
❚ Who else fits this description? Read Rom. 3:9–20. Read, too, something Luther wrote in the Small Catechism: “Which are these [sins we should confess]?” (LSB, p. 326). Whoever we are, whatever our station in life, we are this one sinner Luther describes!
❚ Is this what makes a first-person account compelling — that it in fact applies to every individual?
What, then, has God done for my soul — for every soul? Read stanza 4.
❚ Imagine that! God had me in mind even before He created the world! See 2 Tim. 1:9. We can all say that!
❚ How precious am I to Him? What did He give for me?

Everything God has done for me is now laid out in stanzas 5–9. Read through the familiar story — but notice the very personal way it’s told.

❚ Where do you see each of these passages reflected in the stanzas: 2 Tim. 1:10; Gal. 4:4–5; Phil. 2:5–8; Ps. 46:1, 7, 11; John 15:13; 17:6, 10, 21; 2 Cor. 5:21; Rom. 3:24–28?
❚ Which words in these stanzas are especially sweet to you? Consider “compassion”; “my brother”; “A servant’s form, like mine”; “To lead the devil captive”; “close to Me”; “rock and castle”; “Your ransom I Myself will be”; “For I am yours, and you are Mine”; “The foe shall not divide us”; “for your good”; “My innocence shall bear your sin.” What others are special to you?
❚ Is this first-person story self-centered?

And now, like these Sundays of the Church Year, we reach the end of Christ’s story. Or do we? Read stanzas 9–10.

❚ Which of those functions of the Holy Spirit does the hymn recall? Remember John 16:13–14, 33. Of whom, again, does the Spirit speak?
❚ How does the Spirit see to it that Christ’s story continues? For whom is His personal story now?

Making the Connection

So, Luther’s story is our story. More important, Christ’s story is our story.

❚ No need to talk about yourself out loud right now, but take a moment to talk to God silently about who you are and what you’ve done under the Ten Commandments, as Luther reminded in stanzas 2–3.
❚ Then — and this you surely will want to do aloud together — talk about why all of us dear Christians can rejoice at hearing Christ tell again what He has done for us. As you discuss, consider silently what it means that the sins known only to you and God have been forgiven by Christ.

In Closing

Hearing someone else talk about himself can indeed be thrilling if his story is one in which we also see ourselves. A hymn is properly congregational if it vocalizes the experience of all the worshipers. Dear Christians, one and all, rejoice! And rejoice to sing! Because what Christ has done personally, individually, for Luther, He has done personally, individually, for you!

❚ Sing or read aloud together all 10 stanzas of LSB 556 — with joy!

Prayer
Almighty God, our heavenly Father, because of Your tender love toward us sinners You have given us Your Son that, believing in Him, we might have everlasting life. Continue to grant us Your Holy Spirit that we may remain steadfast in this faith to the end and finally come to everlasting life; through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen (For steadfast faith, LSB, p. 311).

Jubilate

With High Delight Let Us Unite

LSB 483

Introduction
One of the characteristics of good hymnody is the rich use of imagery. In today’s hymn, we have jarring and powerful phrases to describe the most jarring and powerful truth of Christianity: Jesus Christ, the true Son of God in human flesh, died to kill death and rose to bestow eternal life. Pick out some of the most compelling phrases of this hymn. Guess when this text was written.

❚ Were you surprised?
❚ Did you expect such stirring phrases in an old hymn?
❚ This hymn was translated from the German by a hymn writer known for his own poetic skill. Does this surprise you, or does it seem appropriate?

Exploring the Scriptures
Writing to the Corinthian church, St. Paul insists that the whole faith rests upon the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. This is hardly hyperbole. The prophets spoke in promise of the day God would reign over all His enemies.

Read over Is. 52:7–10.

❚ What is the cause of the great joy?
❚ See how the prophet ties together the comfort of the Lord, His redemption of Jerusalem, how He has laid bare His holy arm and revealed His salvation to all the ends of the earth. How does Jesus’ resurrection do all of this?

St. Paul contends that Christ died, was buried, was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and showed Himself to more than 500 witnesses. First Corinthians 15:20–23 insists that our hope is inseparably tied to the fact of Christ’s resurrection.

❚ If Christ is not raised, what is left? (See vv. 17–18.)
❚ If Christ is raised, what has not changed? (See vv. 22 and 26.)
❚ In contrast to the way some speak of a friendly or natural death, St. Paul insists death is the final enemy that must be overcome. Has the way many have come to speak of death reduced the importance and the joy of Christ’s resurrection and our own joyful resurrection in Him?

Hebrews 2:14–15 insists that Christ became incarnate so that through death He might destroy the power of death. “His death has been death’s undoing” (st. 2). This is the Gospel. This is what we proclaim to a world still captive to sin and its death.

❚ We sing it in the Alleluia and Verse of Divine Service, Setting One (LSB, p. 156): “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” How does this characterize the message we tell the world?
❚ Is there any joy or consolation that does not come from Christ’s death to end death and His life that bestows everlasting life?

Exploring the Hymn
Background
Georg Vetter (1536–99) was a priest of the Unity of Brethren who composed this hymn sometime in the mid-1500s. It first appeared in a hymnal of the Bohemian Brethren in 1566. It was forgotten until Martin Franzmann (1907–76) translated it and it appeared in Worship Supplement 1969. Originally 13 stanzas, we have the first two and the final stanza. This is an exuberant example of a well-written hymn translated to preserve the vitality and richness of its original text. Even without the missing 10 stanzas, the hymn compels God’s people to witness in song the Christ who set us free, subduing all our enemies and bestowing upon us His victory over death and the grave.

❚ Read through the text as we have it and imagine the missing stanzas. What other themes might you have included in a hymn of praise to the risen and ascended Christ?
❚ How difficult is the job of the translator to preserve the poetic structure of the text, the rhyme scheme of the hymn and the richness of imagery?

Text
Notice how in stanza 1 the hymn not only says what we should sing, but how: “With high delight.” Also in stanza 1, the singers are described as “Ye pure in heart.”

❚ Who are the pure in heart? How are we made pure in heart? Read Ps. 51:10–12. What is the duty of the pure in heart? Read Ps. 51:13.
❚ Note the economy of words employed by the text. In but a few words, “Is ris’n and sends / To all earth’s ends,” the hymn encompasses the Great Commission of Matt. 28:18–20 and Mark 16:15. What is the “Good news to save ev’ry nation”?

The second stanza reads like the Creed. We sing of Jesus as “True God.” How does the resurrection of Jesus connect to His claims to be God incarnate? The stanza is brimming with words that jump right off the page. Christ “burst” from death, subduing all things, leaving the tattered remains of death behind.

❚ What does it mean that “His death has been death’s undoing”?
❚ Notice the quotation marks around “And yours shall be / Like victory / O’er death and grave.” The hymn makes Jesus’ resurrection the prototype of our own. How does this make Easter also about us?
❚ Read Col. 1:15–20, especially verse 18. Jesus is firstborn of creation and the “firstborn from the dead.” Does this change how you see the Easter message?
❚ “His life for us” is the constant theme of this stanza and of Scripture itself. Is there any hope apart from Christ?
The third stanza exhorts, “Let praises ring; / Give thanks, and bring / To Christ our Lord adoration.” This is then our duty as well as our privilege and our delight.
❚ Look at the location of our hope. “So shall His love / Give us above … .” What does this mean? Is our hope in a better or easier today, or is it in the eternal tomorrow Christ has prepared for us?
❚ First Corinthians 13:9–10 speaks of what we now know only in part but shall then know fully. How is this echoed in the last lines of this hymn?
❚ “All joy and full consolation.” In Rev. 7:13–17, we see our heavenly consolation and joy. Imagine the scarred and wounded hand of Christ wiping away the tears from our eyes. How does Easter point us to this victory? How does the character of Christian life shape us for this eternal victory?

Making the Connection
It is often said that what the Church fails to preach and to sing, she will forget to believe. The translator of this hymn, Martin Franzmann, made the same point by saying, “Theology must sing.” Though Easter is a season of the Church Year, the queen of seasons, it is also the ground and hope of our own resurrection and eternal life. We are constantly reminded that Christ is author and pioneer, Alpha and Omega, who has gone before that we might follow.
In this respect, we are like the children of Israel, bound for the Promised Land that only God can give, but not quite there yet. It is too easy for us to look backward and for our journey to become an aimless wandering in the wilderness. The resurrection of our Lord, Jesus Christ, aims us toward the future beyond imagination that Christ has prepared for those who love Him. It also reminds us that the message we share with the world is this Gospel — Jesus Christ crucified for our sins, dead and buried to end death’s reign, and risen to bestow upon us and all believers eternal life.

❚ How does this hymn ground us in this Easter faith and direct us toward our own Easter hope?
❚ It is too easy for us to be content with a spiritual victory alone. God has given us much more — the hope for a resurrection of the body/flesh and the full renewal of our lost lives. To the world this may seem like a fairy-tale hope. Think of Thomas and his doubts in John 20:24–29. Is this hope real? Why can we trust Jesus? What is our resurrection hope?

In Closing
Easter joy is inexpressible but not unsingable, and the richest imagery of the poet helps us sing our hope before the world

❚ Sing or read aloud together LSB 483.

Prayer
O God, through the humiliation of Your Son You raised up the fallen world. Grant to Your faithful people, rescued from the peril of everlasting death, perpetual gladness and eternal joys; through Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen..

Misericordias Domini

The King of Love My Shepherd LSB 709

study by Marion Lars Hendrickson

Introduction
Whom do you trust? What are the voices that call you? A mother calls to her children to get ready for bed. A teacher calls students to come in from the playground to get ready for class. A police officer commands, “Stop!” A doctor says to a patient, “We must talk.” A young man on bended knee asks his beloved, “Will you marry me?” We hear and trust many voices.
Yet, there are other voices that call. The voice of advertising says, “You cannot live without this product.” The voice of temptation says, “You owe it to yourself.” The devil asks, "Did God really say…?” We hear and doubt many voices.
Jesus said, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life” (John 10:27–28).

❚ How do you decide whether or not to trust what someone says?
❚ Is it possible to ever fully trust anyone?

Exploring the Scriptures

Read Ps. 23:1. This verse states the theme of the entire psalm: “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.”

❚ What is the comfort in this confession of trust?
❚ What challenges in your own life put this confession of trust to the test?

Read Ps. 23:2–3.

❚ What four actions does the shepherd undertake?
❚ Give examples of His actions from your own life.

Read Ps. 23:4.

❚ According to this verse, is suffering a given in life?

Read John 10:11–18. Jesus calls Himself the Good Shepherd and says, “I lay down my life for the sheep” (v. 15).

❚ In what ways does Jesus fulfill the trust expressed in Ps. 23:4?

The shepherd’s rod was a short club used as a weapon to defend the flock from predators. The staff was a long stick for guiding the flock and retrieving strays.

❚ How is the cross of Jesus both a rod to protect the flock of the Good Shepherd and also the staff that sustains the flock?

Read Ps. 23:5–6. The scene changes from the open fields to a setting of hospitality.

❚ As sheep of the Good Shepherd’s flock, what table does He set for us?
❚ What is the “goodness and mercy” from that table that follows us all the days of our lives?

Exploring the Hymn

Background

Henry W. Baker (1821–77) was an Anglican priest of the high church tradition who served a parish in Herefordshire, England. Even today this county is a popular tourist destination for sightseers in search of the “real” England of unspoiled,
green and rolling countryside. This scenic domain was coupled with Baker’s own rich vision of the Christian life, a life thoroughly shaped by the Gospel and Sacraments within the living traditions of the ancient Church. Baker was a strong advocate of the views expressed within the Oxford Movement.

This rich resource of images and allusions drawn from the Church and from the land found deep expression in Baker’s hymn paraphrase of Psalm 23. Although Baker asked John Dykes to compose a tune, different from the Irish melody in LSB, the wedding of text and tune (whether Dykes’ tune or “St. Columba”) wraps the singer in the atmosphere of the psalm, a decidedly idyllic atmosphere that breathes the air of the English shire and the Irish glen.

❚ Name two or three other hymns in which both text and tune are so wedded together as to be inseparable.
❚ Like Martin Luther, Baker held that music could “preach” the text. What does this mean?

This hymn paraphrase of Psalm 23 is set to the tune of the Irish folk melody “St. Columba.”

❚ How does the Celtic melody color the images of this text?
❚ What is gained by the text with the musical associations of this melody? Is anything lost?

Text

Stanza 1 quickly reveals that “trust” is not an abstract feeling. It is grounded on a firm foundation. “I am His / And He is mine forever.

❚ What specific actions has Jesus taken toward us that we may have the confident trust to sing, “I am His / And He is mine”?

In stanza 2, the text proclaims, “Where streams of living water flow, / My ransomed soul He leadeth.”

❚ In what ways is the phrase “streams of living water” an allusion to Holy Baptism? To the Holy Spirit?
❚ From what you have learned about Holy Baptism from the Small Catechism, how does our Good Shepherd “lead us” by this Sacrament?

This second stanza closes with the words, “With food celestial feedeth.” This image is tied together with the “transport of delight” flowing “From Thy pure chalice” in stanza 5.

❚ Can this be an allusion to the Lord’s Supper? Why or why not?
❚ Explain what it means that by the bread and cup of the Sacrament, “I am [Christ’s] / And He is mine.”
❚ In what ways does the participation in Christ’s body and blood nourish our trust in Him?

The poet, Henry Baker, had the words of stanza 3 on his lips as he died in 1877. In this he echoed Martin Luther’s dying words, “We are beggars; this is true.” Regardless of our condition, “in love” Christ seeks us. Stanza 4 goes on to show the full extent of Christ’s love.

❚ Find phrases throughout the hymn text that show that Christ’s love is an active love.
❚ What is the height of Christ’s love? What action of His love is alluded to in stanza 4?
❚ In the mystery of the crucifixion, Jesus Himself cries out, “Why have you forsaken me?” (Matt. 27:46). What effect does this cry have on our trust in Christ? What effect does it have on our trust in God’s goodness and mercy?

The closing two stanzas sing of a life of trust that flows from Christ’s cross in the new life that is revealed in His resurrection.

❚ Do you read any allusions to Easter in this hymn text? If so, what words suggest this?
❚ It is the resurrection of Jesus that reveals the basis of our trust in singing, “Thy goodness faileth never” (st. 6). In what ways is our trust in Christ tested and strengthened when the promise of Easter is hidden under the experiences of Christ’s cross that we share?

Making the Connection

“Good Shepherd, may I sing Thy praise…!” Not every person has lived in an agrarian setting where sheep are common. Some who sing this hymn may always have lived in an urban setting, having no personal familiarity with the image of a shepherd and a flock of sheep.

❚ What elements of the text transcend the pastoral imagery of Psalm 23?
❚ What do you think it is about Psalm 23 that makes this psalm so immensely popular in so many human settings?

In Closing
After the Christian has been following his Good Shepherd for a long time, a voice may ask, “Have you lacked for anything?” The answer given by faith is “Nothing.”

❚ Sing or read aloud together LSB 709

Prayer
Almighty God, merciful Father, since You have wakened from death the Shepherd of Your sheep, grant us Your Holy Spirit that when we hear the voice of our Shepherd we may know Him who calls us each by name and follow where He leads; through the same Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen (Collect for the Fourth Sunday of Easter in the Three-Year Lectionary).