Periodically I will take a well worn paperback book off the bookshelf.  Over the years the binding has begun to crack and some of the pages are loose (I’m not too worried since I have a duplicate copy in the overflow box of books in the garage).  And what is this book?  “The Hammer of God” by Bo Giertz.

I discovered it about 9 years ago when I was boxing up my father’s office after he unexpectedly joined the church triumphant a few short days before Christmas.  During that time I found that it was the English translation of 3 novellas by the Swedish Lutheran bishop Bo Giertz.  Each novella focused on the spiritual growth of a pastor and the surrounding Swedish community.  I’ve heard that it’s required reading in seminary (at least it was for my dad back in 1975), but it’s still a good read for the layperson (check out the Amazon.com reviews).

The following excerpt from the first part of the novel is a good commentary on what is happening in the Divine Service.  As a brief background, Curate Henrik Savonius reluctantly relented to make a pastoral call to a dying man (Johannes) who needed some spiritual comfort.  Savonius’ florid words and philosophical education were not what Johannes needed.  Johannes needed the assurance of the forgiveness of sins which came through the body and blood of Christ.

He [Savonius] distributed the bread. . . Then he gave them the cup.  It was then that Johannes suddenly began to speak in a strangely distant voice.

“Listen!  Don’t you hear the organ tones?  I hear the rush of white wings.  I hear the sound of many waters.  Now Johannes is sitting in Ravelunda church, and never before has the organist played like this.  I hear them singing, ‘Holy holy, holy, Lord God of Sabaoth.  Heaven and earth are full of His glory.’  On the altar the Lord’s chalice shines like fire.  But the wall is of crystal and the church without a roof, and the angels of heaven ascend and descend.  They bow before the chalice, they cover their faces.  They say, ‘Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.’  Now an archangel takes the cup in his hand. It is like pure fire.  Now he comes toward me.  Sparks fly from his fingers, he will burn me to death!”

Johannes laid one of his hands over his eyes as if to shield them from too bright a light.  The other hand seemed to push something away.  But then both hands fell.  He became calm again, and his next words were whispered.

“You wanted only to cleanse me, Lord, to cleanse and redeem.  You wanted only to save, and now your angel says, ‘Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away.  Now you can behold the living God’”

“He is delirious,” whispered the wife. . .

“He is wiser than any of us,” Savonius answered somewhat abruptly.  “Let us give thanks and pray!” (pg 34-35, 1973 edition)

As Wilhelm Loehe wrote in his hymn “Wide Open Stand the Gates”,

The sacrament God gives us
Binds us in unity,
Joins earth with heav’n beyond us
Time with eternity. (LSB 639, st. 3)

As an organist it is a privelege and humbling experience to play for this heavenly host.  If there is any time to “pull out all the stops,” this is it.

In 2006, the LCMS through the Commission on Worship published its new hymnal Lutheran Service Book. Now it looks they have moved on to a new project - reviewing “worship and praise songs” for use in LCMS churches. According to a Reporter (official LCMS newspaper) article, 100 “worship and praise songs” have successfully made their way through the Synod’s doctrinal review process (13 of them appear in LSB or earlier publications). And more are on the way. In the future these songs will be sorted based on the church year.

And what are these 100 songs? The list has yet to be released — it isn’t on the Commission of Worship’s website. Evidently, they used CCLI data from LCMS churches to determine frequently used songs. I am interested to see what songs made the cut of the Synodical reviewers — what do these songs proclaim?

What bothers me about many “praise and worship” songs is what they often don’t say rather than what they do say. In particular, I recently reviewed a list of these types of songs to be used in a worship setting — out of the list of a dozen or so songs, Christ was mentioned once or twice directly, and a couple more times as indirect assumptions. Many tread lightly on sin and focus on the theology of glory rather than the theology of the cross. In comparison, I can randomly page through LSB and Christ and what He has done and continues to do for us is seen page after page. I assume there are some “praise and worship” songs that also do this, but these are not the norm from what I’ve seen.

In my post yesterday regarding the U.S. Religious Landscape Survey I noted that 66% of Protestants believed that many religions lead to eternal life. Of those classified as Protestants - Evangelical, 57% believed likewise.

In a comment to that post, blog reader Ben noted that the actual report also broke down the data based on denominational affiliation. Ben’s comment/research deserves to be more than just a comment, but a full fledged blog post.

The survey classified the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS) to be an Evangelical denomination. Based on the survey results of the 588 LCMS respondents, the LCMS is very open minded and tolerant. So open minded and tolerant that 78% of the LCMS respondents believe that “many religions can lead to eternal life.” We beat the national average! That’s not something to be proud of.

I was frankly shocked. Ben wrote, “What’s going on in our churches?” When my mother found out, she didn’t express too much surprise. She echoed what I had been ruminating on yesterday. When pastors aren’t preaching Christ and Him crucified and instead preaching on friends, depression, anger, etc., what can you expect? When the hymns/songs on the lips of the people don’t say much of anything or are not focused on what Christ has done/is doing, the people are not being catechized in the true faith.

These survey results are a cause for reflection. What is going on in your church? Is Christ and His gifts the focus of what your church is about? Do the people want or value this? God help us.

This evening during dinner, I had the ABC Evening News on in the other room. I wasn’t paying too much attention to it, but once I heard something similar to “70% of Americans believe many religions can lead to eternal life”, my attention was engaged. Fortunately, with the power of Tivo I could rewind to the beginning.

It turns out that the opening news story was on the U.S. Religious Landscape Survey by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. Protestants (66%) and Catholics (79%) have evidently determined that Jesus Christ is not the only way to heaven. The Protestant category is broken down further to: Evangelical (57%), Mainline (83%), historically black churched (59%). An Episcopalian said “I believe in every religion. It’s hard for me to be just nailed down to Christianity.” The Catholic interviewee focused on “living a good life and being a good person.”

Frankly, I am saddened when I hear that a Christian believes that Jesus Christ is not the only way to eternal life. What options are there? Christ (Gospel) or Self (Law)? Humanity is stuck in the mire of sin and we cannot free ourselves from its grasp — nor do we by nature want to be free from it. Jesus came to fulfill the law we could not meet and reconcile us to God through His death and resurrection.

Ever since Issues Etc. was abruptly canceled due to business . . . err. . . . stewardship reasons, I’ve been listening to the White Horse Inn. A few weeks back they had an intriguing episode entitled “Assuming the Gospel” (6/8/08). The topic was more or less was what should people be hearing from the pulpit. In good news fashion, they went out and asked the random pastor at an evangelical pastor’s conference what should be preached. Based on the responses they played, it took them awhile to find someone that said Christ should be preached.

These are pastors — who have been to seminary — who don’t even seem to get the fundamental message of the Gospel. What gives? What are people hearing from the pulpits? Oh yeah . . . pulpits are so last century! I want to be drenched in the blood of Christ each week. Is that too much to expect? Unfortunately, even I sometimes only get a drop or two of Christ when the sermon only mentions Christ in passing. Grrr. Pop psychology or Christ? Hmm. Evidently Christ must be so last century as well.

So my plea is that pastor’s give their people Christ. Please pour it on. Wrap our sin sick selves in the forgiveness of sins. Proclaim to us the great gifts of God. We need pastors who will faithfully preach the Word and administer the sacraments.

As I look back on this blog post, I see that it has meandered from religious pluralism to pastors and preaching. The question I’m thinking about now is: Does the church change the culture or does the culture change the church?

These familiar words from Psalm 51 - “O Lord, open my lips and my mouth will declare Your praise” - prepare us as we pray through Matins and Vespers. It is good to pray these words since our sinful nature does not have the words or desire to praise God.

In a short article I recently acquired, Kevin Hildebrand reflects on the import of these familiar words.

We are by nature sinful and unclean. Therefore we ask with the psalmist, “O Lord, open my lips,” as we cannot open our own dead, sinful lips. Only with lips that have been touched with the words of absolution, drenched with the waters of Holy Baptism, and quenched with the Blood of the chalice can we then say with confidence, “and my mouth will declare your praise.”

** An excerpt from “The Organ Also Sings: Some Brief Thoughts to Introduce an Organ Reading Session” in the 2004 journal of the Good Shepherd Institute - Singing and Preaching the Close of the Year: “Zion Hears the Watchmen Singing)

Our praise is a result of the great gifts God gives us through His word and sacraments. Thanks be to God!

When you look back on this past Sunday (or any Sunday you can remember), what were you doing while waiting for the worship service to begin? Praying? Reviewing the service? Talking? Listening to the prelude?

I would surmise most organists try to choose preservice music that reflects the theme of the day and the hymns that will be sung. Perhaps the musician will highlight a hymn tune that is not being sung, but still evokes the season of the church year or theme.

I’ve been recently reading portions of the “Manual on the Liturgy” for the Lutheran Book of Worship (LBW). I had to smile when Philip Pfatteicher wrote:

Preludial music by instrumentalists or vocalists can help to prepare the worshipers for the service. . . . It must be assumed that the congregation will actually listen [my emphasis] to the music played before the service, for to perform music in church to which no one listens or which is simply to cover up the noise of the entering and gathering congregation is liturgically and artistically misguided. (pg 200)

As I was preparing and practicing the hymns for today, I came across the following quote from Luther Reed in a book of Creative Hymn Accompaniments by Gerhard Krapf:

A poor organist will make of hymn playing a commonplace thing.  A good organist will challenge the intelligent interest of the congregation and charge its hymn singing with thought and feeling.

I know I sometimes rush through the practicing of the hymns and liturgy so I can get to practicing the preludes and postludes (that’s the most important thing, right?).  But those of us who are organists should remember that our most important function is leading the congregations song — and we can only do that effectively through practice.  That means we occasionally search out alternate hymn accompaniments and introductions/intonations.  Perhaps that means spending some time to “prepare” an improvised introduction or playing around with pedal points and registrations.  Sometimes that means spending extra time on the hymns rather than the prelude or postlude.

See a previous blog post entitled Invitation to Sing for more reflections.

Let God’s people sing! — and you can help them sing out by being a good leader of the congregations song.

1. AND IT CAME TO PASS, when Paul was in Corinth, he and certain disciples came upon a mob that was stoning an organist.
2. And Paul said unto them, “What then hath he done unto thee that his head should be bruised?”
3. And the people cried with one voice, “He hath played too loud!
4. Yea, in the singing of the psalms, he maketh our heads to ring as if they were beaten with hammers.
5. Behold, he sitteth up high in the loft, and mighty are the pipes and mighty is the noise thereof, and though there be few of us below, he none the less playeth with all the stops, the Assyrian trumpet stop and the stop of the ram’s horn and the stop that soundeth like the sawing of stone, and we cannot hear the words that cometh out of our own mouths.
6. He always tosseth in variations that confuse us mightily and he playeth loud and discordant and always in a militant tempo, so that we have not time to breathe as we sing.
7. Lo, he is a plague upon the faith and should be chastised.”
Paul, hearing this, had himself picked up a small stone, and was about to cast it, but he set it down, and bade the organist come forward.
8. He was a narrow man, sallow of complexion, with dry skin, flaking and thin of hair.
9. And Paul said unto him, “Why hath thou so abused thy brethren?”
10. And the organist replied, “I could not hear them singing from where I sat, and therefore played the louder so as to encourage them.”
11. And Paul turned round to the mob and said loudly, “Let him who has never played an organ cast the first stone.”
12. And they cast stones for a while until their arms were tired and Paul bade the organist repent and he did.
13. And Paul said unto him, “Thou shalt take up the flute and play it for thirty days, to cleanse thy spirit,” and afterward they returned to Corinth and sang psalms unaccompanied and then had coffee and were refreshed in the faith.

The previous extra-biblical literature was passed on to me a few years back. I am unsure of who to credit for it, though I have seen it attributed to Garrison Keillor. Despite the humor, there are some lessons for organists hidden in there.

How often do you hear Lutheran hymnody on television? Not often. How often does it make the evening news? Almost never . . . that is until “Singing the Faith: Living the Lutheran Liturgical Heritage” was produced by the Good Shepherd Institute. I stumbled across the news story “Seminary Prof. Produces Music Documentary” at the Indiana NewsCenter website via a Google search. There is a text news story and an online streaming video from the evening news with that Seminary Prof. - Kantor Resch. Not bad for only a 1 or 2 minute video.

I received my copy of the DVD this past weekend and am working my way through the videos and the study guide. Eventually I might write a review on Singing the Faith. If you’d like more information, surf on over to the Good Shepherd Institute website and view the introductory video - it’s only about 12 minutes +/-.

The Concordia Publishing House website reports that Dr. Jaraslov Vajda died on May 10, 2008. I first encountered his hymns with the now familiar “Go, My Children, With My Blessing”.

Some of us recently sang or read his Ascension hymn “Up Through Endless Ranks of Angels” (LSB 491) . The doxological verse to this hymn is a fitting closing to a long and productive service to God and the church.

Alleluia, alleluia! Oh, to breathe the Spirit’s grace!
Alleluia, alleluia! Oh, to see the Father’s face!
Alleluia, alleluia! Oh, to feel the Sons’ embrace!