This Sunday’s readings speak of God’s glory, grace, and protection, and the response those attributes engender in us as we use our spiritual gifts to minister to all God’s creation.
For my opening Voluntary, I have chosen my favorite keyboard setting of Sebastian Temple’s “Make Me a Channel of Your Peace” arranged by Douglas Wagner. I have sung this beloved hymn in both English and Spanish, as well as in a choral arrangement made for the Funeral of HRH Princess Diana. I even wrote my own soaring descant for the hymn and use it when sung with a congregation. Our Gospel reading today speaks beautifully to this ancient prayer for peace – so desperately needed today.
Our Choral Prelude found at UMH #594 is “Where Charity & Love Prevail”, set to the hymn tune Saint Peter, on this day the Common Lectionary observes the Solemnity of Saint Peter & Saint Paul. The timeless text is Omer Westendorf’s translation of the 9th-century hymn to be sung at the Footwashing on Maundy Thursday, “Ubi Caritas”.
The Chancel Choir’s Anthem is a meditative setting of “Children of the Heavenly Father” with a second verse text altered to celebrate our Divine Mother as well! The familiar Swedish tune is now known in our hymnals by the first words of the hymn’s text “TRYGGARE KAN INGEN VARA”. The text by Lina Sandell was written after a boat trip across Lake Vattern on which her father, Rev. Jonas Sandell, fell overboard and drowned before her eyes. She was left fatherless at 26 years of age, and the experience inspired this profound text, and she went on to write 650 hymn texts in all. The arrangement our amazing choir will be singing is by Sean Paul, an Oklahoma native who studied at Southwest Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth.
This next week I will be serving as Hospitality Chair for a four-day Regional Convention of the American Guild of Organists in Fort Worth. There are amazing concerts each evening open to the public and free of charge, so if you’d like a mid-week excursion, check out the schedule here! The free evening concerts are: Monday at 7:30pm - Katelyn Emerson at Broadway Baptist Church Tuesday at 7:30pm – Ken Cowan at First United Methodist Church, Ft Worth Wednesday at 7:30pm – Jan Kraybill at Saint Stephen Presbyterian Church
