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; most of it is copied from other websites 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:
Festiva - Keith Christopher
(c.2020, Lorenz Publishing)
Keith Christopher is actively involved in music as a composer, arranger, orchestrator and producer. His musical roots go back to Wylie, Texas, where he grew up playing trumpet in band, accompanying in church, and singing in the church youth choir. He holds a Master of Music in Composition from Southern Methodist University.
About the Piano Music:
Wonderful Words of Life - William Ringham
(c.2018, Lorenz Publishing Co.)
Philip Bliss (1838-1876) went to Chicago in the employ of Dr. George F. Root, the musician, where he was engaged in conducting musical Institutes, and in composing Sunday School melodies. Originally a Methodist, he became, about 1871, a choirman of the First Congregational Church, Chicago, and the Superintendent of its Sunday Schools. In 1874 he joined D. W. Whittle in evangelical work. To this cause he gave (although a poor man) the royalty of his Gospel Songs, which was worth some thirty thousand dollars. His death was sudden. It occurred in the railway disaster at Ashtabula, Ohio, Dec. 30, 1876. He had escaped from the car, but lost his life in trying to save his wife. In spite of the shortness of his life, Philip Bliss is one of the most important and influential gospel song writers of the nineteenth century.
Christian publisher Fleming H. Revell (Dwight Moody’s brother-in-law) was about to launch a new Sunday School paper. He wanted a song that would capture the overall focus of the publication, which was to emphasize the vital importance of studying the Word of God. The name of the paper was to be Words of Life, so Mr. Revell asked Philip Bliss if he could come up with a song to fit, suggesting the key text, John 5 & 6. In the passage, many who had followed Christ were drifting away. The Lord turned to His disciples and asked, “Do you also want to go away?” And Peter made this reply on behalf of the other men: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life”. Bliss duly produced a song, as requested, calling it Wonderful Words of Life. It’s a simple song. Bliss wrote both the text and the tune, WORDS OF LIFE. And after it served its purpose, in the first issue of the publication, it was all but forgotten. But Revell passed on a copy of the Sunday School paper to another hymn writer, George Stebbins. Stebbins began using Philip Bliss’s song in evangelistic meetings, with he and his wife Elma singing it as a duet. It caught on, after that, and became very popular. Simple though it is, it reminds us that we have a precious treasure in the Scriptures–words of life.
Sing them over again to me, wonderful words of life;
let me more of their beauty see, wonderful words of life;
words of life and beauty, teach me faith and duty:
Christ, the blessed One, gives to all wonderful words of life;
sinner, list to the loving call, wonderful words of life;
all so freely given, wooing us to heaven:
Sweetly echo the gospel call, wonderful words of life;
offer pardon and peace to all, wonderful words of life;
Jesus, only Savior, sanctify forever,
Beautiful words, wonderful words, wonderful words of life.
William Ringham holds Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees in Piano Performance from Indiana University, where he also studied composition. He has performed as a piano soloist in concerts across the U.S. and Mexico. During many years of teaching music and serving various congregations as organist and conductor, Ringham continued to compose and arrange for the groups he was leading. After retiring from teaching, he turned his full attention to his writing, first publishing in 2000. A member of ASCAP, AGEHR, and ACDA, he has received consecutive annual ASCAP awards since 2003. In 2013, Ringham retired from his position of Director of Music at Mission Del Sol Presbyterian Church in Tempe, Arizona.
About the Choral Music:
Thy Word - Jack Schrader
(c.1999, Word Music/Meadowgrass Music)
This direct quotation from the King James Version is the refrain of Amy Grant’s well-known praise chorus. Amy Grant (b. 1960) was born in Augusta, Ga., where her father, Burton Paine Grant, was doing his medical residency. After living briefly in Houston, Texas, her family moved to Nashville, Tenn., where they were one of the most prominent and prosperous families. She grew up in the Church of Christ, a faith tradition that bans the use of instruments in worship.
Her recording career began with sweeping floors and demagnetizing tape heads in a Nashville recording studio where she made her first album singing her original, contemporary Christian music at the age of seventeen.
Following her first album in 1977, she accepted concert appearances with Billy Graham Crusades and as an opening act for the Bill Gaither Trio. Grant’s albums and performances have won multiple Dove and Grammy awards and multiple platinum records, indicating millions of sales. Although Amy Grant cannot claim to have invented the Contemporary Christian Music (CCM) style of gospel music, she did the most to popularize it in the 1970s and 1980s before successfully crossing over to pop music in the ’80s and early ’90s.
“Thy Word Is a Lamp” was written in 1984 and set to music composed by Michael W. Smith (b.1957) This song is not at all ambiguous in its affirmation of the importance of God’s word in our lives and the role of Jesus as a guide who is beside us to the end. Now a classic in the CCM genre, this song expresses a personal relationship with Jesus.
Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.
Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.
When I feel afraid, think I've lost my way,
still you're there right beside me,
and nothing will I fear as Iong as you are near.
Please be near me to the end.
Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.
Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.
“Fear not, I am with thee, O be not dismayed,
for I am thy God, I will still give thee aid.
I’ll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,
upheld by thy righteous, omnipotent hand.”
I will not forget your love for me,
and yet my heart forever is wandering.
Jesus, be my guide and hold me to your side,
and I will love you to the end.
Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.
Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path,
and a light unto my path, and a light unto my path.
Thy Word. Thy Word. Thy Word. Hmm.
Jack Schrader (b. 1942), arranger, composer, conductor, vocalist, and organist/pianist, is past editor with Hope Publishing Company, retiring in January of 2009. His association with Hope began in 1978. A 1964 graduate of Moody Bible Institute of Chicago, where he majored in Voice and Organ, he also received the Bachelor of Music Education degree from the University of Nebraska (1966). Further studies in theology culminated in Jack's ordination by the Evangelical Free Church of America (1975). Schrader is the best-selling choral composer in the Hope catalog. In addition to choral music Jack has published collections for keyboardists, instrumentalists and vocal soloists. He was a member of the editorial committee for Hope's most recent hymnal, Worship & Rejoice (2001), in which he has 24 hymn credits. His music is heard in hundreds of churches across the country each Sunday, and he can be seen throughout the year as a guest clinician at choral reading sessions and workshops.
About the Hymns:
Blessed Jesus, At Thy Word
Essentially a prayer asking for illumination by the Holy Spirit as the Christian community gathers around the Lord's Word, "Blessed Jesus" is a pre-sermon hymn by Tobias Clausnitzer (1619-1684). It was first published in the Altdorffisches Gesang-Buchlein (1663) and first attributed to Clausnitzer in the Nüremberg, Germany, Gesangbuch (1676). Catherine Winkworth translated the text and published it in English in her Lyra Germanica (2nd series, 1858).
Clausnitzer graduated from the University of Leipzig and became a chaplain in the Swedish army. He preached two sermons at memorable occasions: when Queen Christina ascended the Swedish throne in 1645 and when the Peace of Westphalia, which ended the Thirty Years War, was celebrated in 1648. Clausnitzer became a pastor in Weiden in 1648, where he remained until his death.
The tune was written by Johann Rudolph Ahle (1625-1673), who was born in Mühlhausen, Thuringia. In 1648 he published the Compendium per tenellis, a theoretical treatise on choral singing which was reprinted several times during his lifetime and for a last time 50 years later by his son Johann Georg. In 1654 Ahle assumed the post of organist at the Church of St. Blasen/Blasius in Mühlhausen. Much of his compositional output consists of sacred choral and vocal works, instrumental music, and organ music. He wrote over 400 sacred arias, from which hymn tunes have been adapted.
Blessed Jesus, at Thy word we are gathered all to hear you.
Let our hearts and souls be stirred now to seek and love and fear you.
By your gospel pure and holy, teach us, Lord, to love you solely.
All our knowledge, sense, and sight lie in deepest darkness shrouded,
till Your Spirit breaks our night with Your beams of truth unclouded.
You alone to God can win us; You must work all good within us.
Glorious Lord, yourself impart; Light of Light, from God proceeding,
open lips and ears and heart; help us by Your Spirit's leading.
Hear the cry Your church now raises; Lord, accept our prayers and praises.
Holy Bible, Book Divine
Burton, John (1773-1822), was born and lived inNottingham. He was a Baptist, a very earnest Sunday School teacher, and one of the compilers of the Nottingham Sunday School Union Hymn Book, 1812. This book reached the 20th edition in 1861. The 1st edition contains 43 hymns which have his signature. He is known almost exclusively by one hymn, "Holy Bible, book divine". He was also author of The Youth's Monitor.
“Holy Bible, book Divine” first appeared in the author's Youth's Monitor in Verse, 1803, and again in the Evangelical Magazine, June, 1805. In 1806 it was also printed in the Burton's Hymns for Sunday Schools; or, Incentives to Early Piety.
Holy Bible, book divine, Precious treasure, thou art mine;
Mine to tell me whence I came, Mine to teach me what I am:
Mine to comfort in distress, Suffering in this wilderness;
Mine to show by living faith, Man can triumph over death;
Mine to tell of joys to come, Mine to show a Savior’s love;
O thou holy book divine, Precious treasure, thou art mine.
Christ Be Beside Me
(c.1987, Faith Alive Christian Resources)
Scottish Jesuit Father James Quinn (1919-2010) was born in Glasgow, Scotland and educated at St. Aloysius' College in Glasgow and Glasgow University. His first hymn collection, New Hymns for All Seasons, was published in 1969, and Praise for All Seasons, which contained texts drawn from some of his earlier works, was published in 1994. In 2017, after becoming sole publisher and licensing agent, OCP published Hymns for All Seasons, the first-ever complete edition of Fr. Quinn's hymn texts. Fr. Quinn worked for decades to make the theology of the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965) accessible and easily sung by worshipers. He wrote paraphrases of psalms and Scriptures or English translations of Marian prayers to the number of beats in the lines of existing melodies. Many of his texts, set to traditional hymn tunes appear in the English-language hymnals of nearly every Christian denomination around the world. In 1998, the “Journal of the Association of Anglican Musicians” praised Father Quinn's ability to articulate the orthodox aspects of Christianity in new and fresh ways. He published more than 200 texts during his lifetime.
This hymn is a reworking of the prayer known as ‘St Patrick’s Breastplate’. The tune ‘Bunessan’ is said to have been noted down by Alexander Fraser from the singing of a wandering Highland singer and appeared in print first in Songs and Hymns of the Gael, which Lachlan McBean published in 1888. McBean was a major influence in widening the appreciation of Gaelic culture in his time.
Christ be beside me, Christ be before me,
Christ be behind me, King of my heart.
Christ be within me, Christ be below me,
Christ be above me, never to part.
Christ on my right hand, Christ on my left hand,
Christ all around me, shield in the strife.
Christ in my sleeping, Christ in my sitting,
Christ in my rising, light of my life.
Christ be in all hearts thinking about me,
Christ be on all tongues telling of me.
Christ be the vision in eyes that see me,
In ears that hear me Christ ever be.
First United Methodist Church, Lewisville, Texas
A Community of Everyday People Learning to Love Like Jesus
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