April 9, 2020 - Maundy Thursday

Each week, you may find information here about the music in the traditional worship services at First United Methodist Church in Lewisville, Texas.  Some of this information is original; much of it is "borrowed" from other sources such as Wikipedia, GBOD, and hymnary.org.  It is my hope that this information will enhance your understanding and enrich your worship experience.   

About the Organ Music:

Jesu Leiden, Pein und Tod -  J. G. Walther

Paul Stockmann (1603-1636) was a German academic, preacher and hymn-writer. He fought at the Battle of Lützen in 1632 and later served as court preacher to Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden, before dying of the plague in 1636.  Some of his hymns are included in the Danish hymnbook Psalmebog for Kirke og Hjem.

The melody, “Jesu Kreuz, Leiden und Pein,” was composed by Melchior Vulpius. This, his most notable, tune appeared in his Ein schon geistlich Gesangbuch, published at Jena in 1609, an enlarged edition of his Kirchen Geseng und Geistliche Lieder (Leipzig, 1604). It was set to Petrus Herbert’s hymn “Jesu Kreuz, Leiden und Pein.” Paul Stockmann’s Passiontide hymn, “Jesu Leiden, Pein und Tod,” in 34 8-line stanzas, first appeared in his Aller Christen Leib-Stucke (Leipzig, 1633). Adjusted to Paul Stockmann’s “Jesu Leiden, Pein und Tod,” M. Vulpius' melody was included in Johann Hildebrandt’s Geistlicher Zeit-Vertreiber (Leipzig, 1656). A reconstruction of it, set to P. Stockmann’s Hymn, was published by Gottfried Vopelius in his New Leipziger Gesangbuch, Von den schonsten und besten Liedern verfasset (Leipzig, 1682).

Jesus’ suffering pain and death, Jesus’ deep wounds have united in salvation
men who are only dung. Mankind! Get rid of sins; we have become Christians;
we should come out of the grave  into the ranks of angels.

Jesus went to the garden, sorrowful in manner. With prayer he began his work;
he knelt on the earth. His soul was greatly troubled even to death.
See in what great distress he gave himself for you.

Watch, pray, Jesus says, so that you do not lose heart.
The spirit indeed makes noble resolves, But the flesh dares do nothing.
With prayer begin everything, if it is to be successful.
Do not be a presumptuous person in such serious matters

Jesus! The choir of angels steadfastly wait upon you.
To give you strength there came an angel to the garden.
When my last hour comes, May your angel give me strength
whereby in my last struggle I may not notice the anguish of death

Jesus, your blood-red sweat, your troubled apprehension make black sins white,
can chase away melancholy. People! Do not be so apprehensive.
Christ has endured what I, you, others have deserved a thousand times.

With a kiss Judas his enemy became a traitor to God who named as a friend
this evildoer; when the false world, therefore, wants to deceive you,
repay evil with good; then you will be victorious.

All his disciples ran away and left Jesus in trouble.
Peter himself who was so bold before turned his back on him.
God endures it patiently, he has also suffered, 

he helps me and does not cease to plead for me.

Jesus! Though you had done no wrong, there in the garden they bound you firmly
with hard bonds; if the evil enemy wants to bind us with the bonds of sin,
then, friend of mankind, let us find a way to loose them.

False witness, shame, scorn, and being spat upon by servants -
this was suffered by God who is so righteous and alone just; and you, miserable sinner, 

find it mortally distressing when violent persecution rages also against you.

Peter, who does not think back, denies his God, but at the first look from him
weeps bitterly. Jesus, look at me also, when I will not repent, when I have done evil,
stir up my conscience.

Judas hangs himself, and then to urge on the governor all the people cry out together:
Away with him, away to the cross; not only Judas but I and my misdeeds
have without mercy betrayed my God.

For the Jews Jesus’ blood is death and nothing but hell.
If any Christian wants to check that he has got things right, if he wants worthily
to enjoy the precious blood, his tears must flow beforehand from a distressed spirit.

Jesus himself carried his cross; When they wanted to give him
Some help in this task, Simon on whom it is laid carries it with all his strength
but under compulsion he grasps it. Give Lord strength and ability,
Then I am willing to bear part of your burden without compulsion.

Jesus is nailed to the cross very firmly both through violence and cunning
of his friends and guests.  Men! You who are free, can you join yourselves with him,
if in time you are willing to turn from injustice and find what is justice.

Jesus! Both of your hands and also your feet, all four in front of the four ends;
all the world must repent. Here is no difference between Jews, Turks;
mercy is ready for everyone where your spirit is at work.

Jesus! Beneath your cross I stand and weep because I see that everywhere
from head down to feet flows your blood, the noble liquid as your body is pierced:
this gives me the perfect strength for which I greatly thirst.

This is Jesus from Nazareth, the king of the Jews. His prayer for the people
is painfully different.  When the evil Judas can suffer no savior,
then I want to be subject to him in every joy.

The soldiers divide amongst themselves clothes of the Lord,
they gamble about it carelessly; this unfortunately is how things are.
Whoever makes himself known to Christ, the enemy wants to devour him;
for this reason he robs and burns everywhere bold.

Jesus hangs on the wood and prays for the culprits who hate him ardently and arrogantly
more than the man who betrayed him.  Your sins caused his death.
O man , repent this.  His intercession is your gain.

He cared for all things in his last hours.  He thought of his mother
and appointed a guardian for her.  O man, act righteously. love God and man,
and then die without all sorrow and do not be distressed.

Jesus gives paradise freely as a gift, with an oath promise this to him.
He only said remember.  Think, oh man, and ask God that he should remember you
in such diverse distress and send you relief.

The person to whom life brought misfortune, the one who was already lost
and who thought without doubt it could never happen, is chosen by God.
Your rods, Job, benefit you not a little; they can to your glory reconcile you with Christ.

My God, my God, Jesus cried.  How I am forsaken! In such deep anguish I feel
sorrow beyond measure.  When there is distress, you also should call out
to God your Lord.  He will then be near you, even if at first he seems far away.

Jesus was given bitter vinegar - he who is Prince of our life,

who alone is everything to me.  He must suffer thirst in misery.
Jesus! When I suffer distress, I want to suffer with you 

so that I may with your God remain unseparated.

Jesus had accomplished all that had been said by the prophets long before this.
There are no more sufferings: do not weep, Christ’s work has acquired everything.
If his consolation did not strengthen me I would have long since been lost.

Father! This is what Jesus most of all cried out at his end.
I entrust my spirit to you, in your hands.  My soul to my God I shall entrust forever.
O there will my soul never more be tormented.

When the plea was finished, Jesus bowed his head. as he hangs on the cross so set apart
he bends his knee.  He wants to hear your word, to kiss the one he has redeemed
to his father in heaven, for those he consoles.

Darkness covers the whole earth, the earthquake splits the hard rocks, the dead rise up:
If my Jesus when he dies can do such things, how many much greater wonders
will he do when he rules.

Jesus, God’s son, became a righteous man. As we then read about the centurion/captain
and also many others who let themselves be struck to the heart by their sins.
Anyone who desires improvement may well in time find himself.

A wretch and soldier pierced  Jesus’s side with a spear.  Many people saw
how blood and water ran out on the earth by means of which both men and women
are able to become blessed.

Jesus, you lie in the earth buried like a worm. When I shall die let me
have peace in the grave.  Then Lord Jesus Christ, I will through thy strength and wounds
once and for all when it is time again find safety.

Jesus! I shall be blessed; through hope I already am, since from the pains of sin
which affected me I have been freed through your blood:
precious, precious treasure which I with heart and mind shall enjoy forever.

Jesus, you who were dead Now live forever.  In the last agony of death
may I turn nowhere else but to you makes my atonement.
Trustworthy Lord, give me what you have deserved.  I desired nothing more.

Johann Gottfried Walther (1684-1748) was a German music theorist, organist, composer, and lexicographer of the Baroque era. Not only was his life almost exactly contemporaneous to that of Johann Sebastian Bach, he was the famous composer's cousin.  Walther was most well known as the compiler of the Musicalisches Lexicon (Leipzig, 1732), an enormous dictionary of music and musicians. It the first dictionary of musical terms written in the German language, and it was the first to contain both terms and biographical information about composers and performers up to the early 18th century. In all, the Musicalisches Lexicon defines more than 3,000 musical terms; Walther evidently drew on more than 250 separate sources in compiling it, including theoretical treatises of the early Baroque and Renaissance. The single most important source for the work was the writings of Johann Mattheson, who is referenced more than 200 times.

Walther was the music teacher of Prince Johann Ernst von Sachsen-Weimar. He wrote a handbook for the young prince with the title Praecepta der musicalischen Composition, 1708. It remained handwritten until Peter Benary's edition (Leipzig, 1955). As an organ composer, Walther became famous for his organ transcriptions of orchestral concertos by contemporary Italian and German masters. He made 14 transcriptions of concertos by Albinoni, Gentili, Taglietti, Giuseppe Torelli, Vivaldiand Telemann. These works were the models for Bach to write his famous transcriptions of concertos by Vivaldi and others. As a city organist of Weimar, Walther wrote 132 organ preludes based on Lutheran chorale melodies. 

Go to Dark Gesthemane - David Cherwein

“Go to Dark Gethsemane” is a Lenten hymn that spotlights scenes from the last 12 hours of Jesus Christ’s life.  It takes us on a journey from the Garden of Gethsemane where we are charged to stand and watch, to the judgment hall and our denial of him, to the cross where we witness his death and his grace, and finally to his glorious resurrection and our redemption. We become part of the drama of Christ’s passion and resurrection. 

The poet repeats the phrase “learn of” at the end of each stanza, charging us to apply each scene to our lives. James Montgomery uses repetition to draw attention to what he considers important about each scene and each stanza.  “Learn of Jesus Christ to pray” encourages us to remember the scene of the garden and to go to God in fervent prayer. “Learn of Christ to bear the cross” is a charge to lay down our lives, take up the cross and follow Christ. “Learn of Jesus Christ to die” is a reminder of what Paul wrote in Galatians 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.” 

James Montgomery( 1771-1854), considered one of the most important hymn writers of the English language, wrote this beautiful hymn in 1820. He was born in Irvine, Ayrshire, Scotland, the son of Moravian missionary John Montgomery.  When Montgomery was 5 years old, his parents moved him to a Moravian settlement at Bracehill, Ireland, near Ballymena in Antrim County. Soon after, his parents accepted a call to the mission field and left him behind in Bracehill. He never saw his parents again. They both died while in the Barbados Islands.  At age 7, Montgomery was enrolled at Fulneck Seminary in Yorkshire, where he would remain for the next nine years. Struggling to meet the expectations of his instructors, he left the school at age 16 and became an apprentice at a chandler’s shop in Mirfield.  After five years, he tired of the work and took an apprenticeship with Joseph Gales, the owner and publisher of the Sheffield Register. For two years he learned about the publishing business, and in 1794, when Gales was forced to flee the country to avoid imprisonment, Montgomery took over the Register and changed its name to the Sheffield Iris.  Montgomery published and managed the Sheffield Iris for 32 years. He used the Iris as a tool to distribute the 360 hymns written throughout his life. His most well-known hymns are “Angels, From the Realms of Glory,” “Go to Dark Gethsemane,” “Hail to the Lord’s Anointed,” “Songs of Praise the Angels Sang” and “Stand Up and Bless the Lord.” 

Montgomery’s “Go to Dark Gethsemane” is still one of his most widely used hymns, most often sung during Lent or during Holy Week. The first three stanzas are most commonly available in hymnals. The fourth stanza, though often omitted today, has been preserved in The United Methodist Hymnal.  Even though the text is now over 185 years old, it has rarely been altered. Many hymns from this era use language that is no longer common in today’s hymns or speech. Hymnal editors typically remove antiquated language and replace it with modern equivalents, but this hymn has remained essentially intact.  This beautiful somber hymn has stood the test of time. We benefit from the art and poetry of Montgomery still today.

Go to dark Gethsemane, You who feel the tempter's pow’r; 

Your Redeemer's conflict see; Watch with Him one bitter hour; 

Turn not from His griefs away; Learn of Jesus Christ to pray.

Follow to the judgment hall; View the Lord of life arraigned;

O the worm-wood and the gall! O the pangs His soul sustained!

Shun not suff'ring, shame, or loss; Learn of Him to bear the cross.

Calv'ry's mournful mountain climb There' adoring at His feet,

Mark the miracle of time, God's own sacrifice complete:

"It is finished!" Hear the cry; Learn of Jesus Christ to die.

Early hasten to the tomb Where they laid his breathless clay;

All is solitude and gloom; Who hath taken Him away?

Christ is ris'n! He meets our eyes: Savior, teach us so to rise.

Dr. David Cherwien (b. 1957) is currently serving as Director of Music at Mt. Olive Lutheran Church, Minneapolis, MN, and in 2002 was appointed Music Director for the National Lutheran Choir, also based in the Twin Cities. He has also held full time parish music positions in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area, Chicago, Seattle, and Berlin.  He completed the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in organ performance, and the Master of Arts degree in Theory and Composition, both from the University of Minnesota. His undergraduate work was in organ performance and music education at Augsburg College, Minneapolis, where he was honored as distinguished alumni in the fall of 2000.

About the Piano Music:

Soul, Adorn Yourself with Gladness - Nancy Raabe

"Schmücke dich, o liebe Seele" ("Deck thyself, my soul, with gladness", literally: Adorn yourself, O dear soul) is a Lutheran hymn in German, with lyrics by Johann Franck and a melody by Johann Crüger from 1649. It is a song for Lutheran Communion, and first appeared in 1649 in Crüger's hymnal Geistliche Kirchen-Melodien, later also in the 1653 edition of his Praxis pietatis melica. The hymn was often set to music to be played or sung under communion.  A translation by Catherine Winkworth, "Deck thyself, my soul, with gladness" of 1858, appears in 100 hymnals.  The hymn is a song for Abendmahl, the Lutheran Communion. The hymn lyrics were written in nine stanzas by Johann Franck, who was not a minister but a politician and mayor, between 1646 and 1653. Franck compared the unity between Jesus and a Christian receiving communion to the closeness of bridegroom and bride. With a melody by Johann Crüger from 1649, the song appeared first in Crüger's hymnal Geistliche Kirchen-Melodien (Sacred church melodies) of 1649, and was included, now in nine stanzas in his Praxis pietatis melica in the 1653 edition. 

Soul, adorn yourself with gladness, leave the gloomy haunts of sadness;

come into the daylight's splendour, there with joy thy praises render

unto him whose grace unbounded hath this wondrous banquet founded:

high o'er all the heavens he reigneth, yet to dwell with thee he deigneth.

Hasten as a bride to meet Him, And with loving rev'rence greet Him.

for with words of life immortal He is knocking at your portal.

Open wide the gates before Him, Saying, as you there adore Him:

Grant, Lord, that I now receive You, That I nevermore will leave You.

He who craves a precious treasure Neither cost nor pain will measure;

But the priceless gifts of heaven God to us has freely given.

Though the wealth of earth were proffered, None could buy the gifts here offered:

Christ's true body, for you riven, And His blood, for you once given.

Now I sink before thee lowly, filled with joy most deep and holy,

as with trembling awe and wonder on thy mighty works I ponder:

how, by mystery surrounded, depth no mortal ever sounded,

none may dare to pierce unbidden secrets that with thee are hidden.

Sun, who all my life dost brighten, light, who dost my soul enlighten,

joy, the sweetest heart e'er knoweth, fount, whence all my being floweth,

at thy feet I cry, my Maker, let me be a fit partaker

of this blessed food from heaven, for our good, thy glory, given.

Jesus, Bread of Life, I pray thee, let me gladly here obey thee;

never to my hurt invited, be thy love with love requited:

from this banquet let me measure, Lord, how vast and deep its treasure;

through the gifts thou here dost give me, as thy guest in heaven receive me.

Jesus, sun of life, my splendor, Jesus, friend of friends, most tender,

Jesus, joy of my desiring, Fount of life, my soul inspiring:

At Your feet I cry, my maker, Let me be a fit partaker

Of this blessèd food from heaven, For our good, Your glory, given.

Lord, by love and mercy driven, You once left Your throne in heaven

On the cross for me to languish And to die in bitter anguish.

To forego all joy and gladness And to shed Your blood in sadness.

By this blood redeemed and living, Lord, I praise You with thanksgiving.

Nancy M. Raabe (b. 1954), has been the pastor at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Marshall WI, since 2018.  Raabe is an energetic and creative leader of Christian worship.  She specializes in incorporating music and the liturgical arts into worship services.  She is known as an empathetic servant leader, an effective preacher, and as a thoughtful teacher for those of all ages.  Pastor Raabe has been successful in developing sound mission-based plans so that her congregations can grow and thrive in a sustainable manner.  Further, Nancy strives to involve her congregation in the activities of the surrounding community.  Pastor Raabe is an author, worship leader, and composer of church music. 

In November 2015, Nancy Raabe received the Award of the Concordia Historical Institute recognizing the importance of her book, Carl Schalk:  A Life in Song, in carrying forward the legacy of the Lutheran Church in this country.  Pastor Raabe's original arrangement of I Dream A World was a finalist for first prize at the 2010 Ithaca College Choral Composition Festival.  Nancy M Raabe was the Communications chair of the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians.  She was the founding editor of the Association's newsletter In Tempo, in which appeared her column Prairie View. 

About the Hymns:

Let Us Break Bread Together

Some of the stanzas of this African American spiritual may date back to the eighteenth century. Other stanzas have been added by oral tradition. A look through modern hymnals will reveal an array of variations on the text. The most notable alteration in the Psalter Hymnal is the phrase "to the Lord of life" in place of the original "to the rising sun," in which "rising sun" was a metaphor referring to the Son rising. The song's use at communion services probably dates from after the American Civil War. Miles Mark Fisher notes in Negro Slave Songs in the United States (1953): [Originally the hymn] relates hardly at all to holy communion, which does not necessarily require early morning administration or a devotee who faces east.  It was a signal song of Virginia slaves during the eighteenth century who used it and similar ones to convene their secret meetings.

The text describes participation in the Lord's Supper as a humble act in which we not only eat the bread and drink the wine, but also praise our God "on our knees." The refrain ends with a prayer for mercy, an African-American Kyrie that reminds us of the tax collector's prayer in Luke 18:13.

One Bread, One Body

John Foley, S.J., (b. 1939) is an American Jesuit priest who is a composer of Catholic liturgical music and a professor of liturgy. Among his better-known compositions are One Bread, One Body (1978), Earthen Vessels (1975), Come to the Water (1978), The Cry of the Poor (1978), For You Are My God (1970), and the album As a River of Light (1989).  Much of Foley's early work on liturgical music was as a member of a group called the St. Louis Jesuits, composed of fellow Jesuit seminarians, with whom he released several albums. Other members of the St. Louis Jesuits were Dan Schutte, Bob Dufford, Roc O'Connor, and Tim Manion. He has also released several solo collections of liturgical music. Foley went on to earn a doctorate in liturgical theology from the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California.  In 1993 he returned to Saint Louis University where he founded the Stroble Center for Liturgy, of which he has served as director since its founding. 

Written in 1978, “One Bread, One Body” is based on I Corinthians 10:16-17, ”Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ? Since there is one bread, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the one bread.”  The first verse is readily identifiable as a paraphrase of Galatians 3:28, which reads, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” In the second verse, we have more Scriptural paraphrase.  This time, the text is clearly taken from 1 Corinthians 12:4-5, which reads, “Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.  And there are varieties of ministries, but the same Lord.”  You don’t have to be a preacher to serve.  You don’t have to be a song leader to serve.  Even if your work is visiting the sick or cleaning the church building, you are no less important a part of the body of Christ than its most visible members.  Ultimately, every kind of service gets back to serving Jesus. The third verse echoes various Biblical texts (Matthew 13:3-9 and John 12:23-26 among them).  As Christ assembles us into one body, so too He plants us, causes us to grow, and gathers us in.

First United Methodist Church, Lewisville, Texas

A Community of Everyday People Learning to Love Like Jesus

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