Liturgy Lesson: December 22, 2019 (Fourth Sunday in Advent)
Prelude
Welcome/Announcements
Musical Introit – O Come, O Come Emmanuel
Call to Worship: Isaiah 40:1-5, 9-11
Prayer of Invocation
Hymn of Invocation: Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus (#196)
Call to Confession: Malachi 3:1-3
Song of Confession: Come, Lord Jesus and O Little Town of Bethlehem (vs. 4)
Word of Assurance: from Luke 1, Song of Zechariah
Hymn of Praise: O Savior of Our Fallen Race
Advent Reading: Matthew 1:18-25
Congregational Prayers
Reading of the Word: TBD
Advent Doxology
Sermon: Rev. Eric Irwin
Tithes and Offerings
Supper: Of the Father’s Love Begotten; What Child is This?
Closing Hymn: Joy to the World (#195)
Benediction
Sung response: Gloria in Excelsis Deo!
Music on Christmas Morning
By Anne Brontë (1820-1849)
Music I love – but never strain
Could kindle raptures so divine,
So grief assuage, so conquer pain,
And rouse this pensive heart of mine –
As that we hear on Christmas morn,
Upon the wintry breezes borne,
Though Darkness still her empire keep,
And hours must pass, ere morning break;
From troubled dreams, or slumbers deep,
That music kindly bids us wake;
It calls us, with an angel’s voice,
To wake, and worship, and rejoice;
To greet with joy the glorious morn,
Which angels welcomed long ago,
When or redeeming Lord was born,
To bring the light of Heaven below;
The powers of Darkness to dispel,
And rescue Earth from Death and Hell.
Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus
Text: Charles Wesley (vss. 1,4, 1744); Mark Hunt (vss. 2,3, 1978)
Tune: HYFRYDOL, Rowland Hugh Pritchard (1855)
As a singing people, the church has an astonishing creative legacy! Consider the victory songs of Moses and Miriam (Ex. 15:21), David (1 Sa. 18:7) and Jehoshaphat (2 Ch. 20:21), the laments of the Israelites (Psalm 137), the hopeful praise of Paul and Silas (Acts 16), and the heavenly chorus around the throne (Rev. 5:9-10). God’s creative spirit has breathed through the ancient Psalms, medieval chant, reformation hymnody, gospel refrains, and modern choruses. From Wesley to Watts, Bliss to Bonar, and even Gaither to Getty, songs have poured into the sanctuary in every generation. Among that astonishing arsenal, there are “silver bullet” hymns whose text captures the essence of a moment in the church calendar. Charles Wesley seemed to hit a bullseye with each season, perhaps because of his astonishing output (over 9,000 hymns). If you fire off enough verse, you are bound to hit the target a few times! For Easter, he gave us “Christ the Lord is Risen Today,” and for Christmas, “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing.” For Advent we have this quintessential text, which perfectly captures the two-fold purpose of the season—remembering the birth of Christ and re-awakening a longing for his second coming. Wesley’s original text consisted of two stanzas of eight lines, and he uses a lot of repetition to hammer home some key themes. Notice how in verse four he repeats the word “born” three times to emphasize the incarnation and highlight its ultimate purpose. Christ was born to “deliver,” “reign,” and “raise us to thy glorious throne.” In contrast to other advent hymns that focus exclusively on the Christmas narrative or the unfolding drama in Bethlehem, Wesley’s verse contains beautiful eschatology and points us to the hope of Christ’s second coming.
This popular hymn text has been set to many tunes. Our hymnal uses HYFRYDOL, a Welsh tune composed by Rowland Prichard in 1830, and commonly associated with “Love Divine, All Loves Excelling,” or “Jesus, What a Friend for Sinners.”
Scripture references:
Vss.=1-2: Cor. 4:14, Rev. 3:21
Vss.=3-4: Isa. 61:1-2, Luke 4:18-19, Rom. 6:22
– Accompaniment and text to vs. 1 and 4
– Recording by Fernando Ortega
Of the Father’s Love Begotten
Music: Plainsong Chant, 12th Cent.
Text: Aurelius Clemens Prudentius, 4th cent.
Aurelius Prudentius Clemens (348-c. 413) was a Spanish poet and lawyer who began writing poetry at the age of 57. Hymnologist Albert Bailey, who considers Prudentius “the earliest Christian writer who was a real poet,” calls this a “fighting hymn.” During the 4th century, the theology of the early church was under attack by heretical perspectives. A teacher named Arius (c. 250-336) was arguing that God the Father and the Son did not co-exist throughout eternity, that Jesus did not exist through all time. Under this false teaching, Jesus was a creature that, though divine, was not equal to the Father. So, In the 4th century, Emperor Constantine called together the First Council of Nicea to discuss the Church’s official stance on the nature of the Trinity. The council condemned the teaching of Arius, and produced The Nicene Creed, written as a statement of faith that clarified and codified the Trinitarian theology for the church.
Prudentius’ hymn, “Of the Father’s Love Begotten,” written shortly after the Council of Nicea, opens with “Corde natus ex parentis ante mundi exordium (literally “Born from the parent’s heart before the beginning of time”). Starting from this point, the lawyer-poet Prudentius sets forth his argument that the Son is co-eternal with God. It is very clear from this hymn text that Christ is both human and divine, and was “begotten” of the Father.
The textual themes of transcendence are supported beautifully by the melody, which is a plainchant from the 12th century. The original is a meditative and meter-less chant that is quite haunting. It reflects the humble nature of the incarnation. As we sing it, may we remember this truth from the Gospel of John:
“In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. All things were made by Him; and without Him was not anything made that was made. In Him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in darkness; and the darkness has not understood it…and the Word was made flesh and made his dwelling among us and we beheld His glory (the glory as of the only begotten of the Father), full of grace and truth.”
– Sheet music
– Original chant
Joy to the World
Text: Isaac Watts(1719)
Tune: arr. Lowell Mason, with help from Handel
Did you know that the word “carol” comes from a French and Latin word for dancing and spinning? Well, if the purpose of a Christmas carol is to get the soul to “dance and spin” with joy at the celebration of Jesus’s birth, then there is no better example than this song. But surprisingly, this hymn was not written for Christmas. Rather, Isaac Watts wrote the hymn as a paraphrase of the last five verses in Psalm 98 for his 1719 publication, The Psalms of David Imitated. Verse nine of the psalm reads, “…let them sing before the LORD, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples with equity.” Watts unapologetically interprets this as a reference to Christ. The theme of “Christ coming” made it an apt hymn to be sung at Christmastime, and it has since become one of the most beloved Christmas carols. There are multiple theories as to where this melody came from. Some believe that Lowell Mason was the arranger; others believe he only changed four notes of an existing tune. What is quite clear, however, is that the tune, ANTIOCH, is derived from various melodies found within Handel’s Messiah. The opening phrase sounds like the chorus “Lift up your heads,” and the last four measures, with the text “heaven and nature sing,” sound like the beginning of “Comfort ye my people.” The tune is thus often attributed to Handel, with Mason as the arranger and combiner of text and tune. Sing through the opening line of the tune, or listen to it, and you will quickly notice that it is simply a descending scale.
What better musical depiction of the incarnation is there than a melody that starts “on high” and ends inevitably at the lower octave? And, after that blessed descent, the rest of song leaps forth in a celebratory dance. If Jesus is born the “King of Israel,” then this song that celebrates him is indeed the “King of carols.” What a great way to celebrate the season!