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The past few weeks the singers in the Park Avenue Youth Chorale have been working on a fantastic setting of There’s a Wideness in God’s Mercy by the late Calvin Hampton. If you are looking for a well-written, singable piece for young voices that both challenges and inspires, I highly recommend it. It’s also an easy read for adult choirs.
The text Hampton uses is a combination of various couplets from a larger poem, Souls of Men, Why Will Ye Scatter, by Frederick William Faber. The text is a bit dated in some respects, but there is a freshness to many of the lines, which don’t sound as if they were penned in 1862. It has been a joy to share this piece with the choir and I only hope that these powerful words shape their understanding of God’s love and grace in their lives.
There’s a wideness in God’s mercy,
like the wideness of the sea;
there’s a kindness in his justice,
which is more than liberty.
There is no place where earth’s sorrows
are more felt than up in heaven;
there is no place where earth’s failings
have such kindly judgment given.
For the love of God is broader
than the measure of man’s mind.
and the heart of the Eternal
is most wonderfully kind.
If our love were but more simple,
we should take him at his word:
and our lives would be all sunshine
in the sweetness of our Lord.
Souls of men! why will ye scatter
Like a crowd of frightened sheep?
Foolish hearts! why will ye wander
From a love so true and deep?
There is welcome for the sinner,
And more graces for the good;
There is mercy with the Savior;
There is healing in His blood.
This morning we had a joyous service at church, celebrating our 199th Anniversary. There is always lots of congregational singing throughout worship and it has been really great to hear the congregational choir’s voice growing in sound and confidence since I began my ministry at The Park almost a year and half ago.
As is the norm, I work with the pastor to select service music, get those selections into the order of worship and then prepare the hymns and responses on the organ, piano or sometimes with percussion, as we regularly draw music from the world church. Many factors go into selecting music for a service: connection to the scripture texts and preaching focus, familiarity to the congregation, or occasionally a desire to expand our repertoire and introduce a wonderful new text or tune. This week I was also highly aware of the time constraints of worship, with a special luncheon and other events afterward. So, I selected a rousing closing hymn that the congregation really loves, In the Midst of New Dimensions, which appears in both of the hymnals our congregation sings out of, the New Century Hymnal and the Chalice Hymnal. A confession: the other hymns in the service were longish (a five-verse opener and a four-verse middle hymn) so I selected the version out of the Chalice Hymnal, as it’s one verse shorter. But what I didn’t realize is that the tune has some rhythmic variants and the refrain is lacking a repetition that is in the New Century Version.
So we got to the end of a wonderful, uplifting service and I launched into the hymn (playing out of the New Century Hymnal because the harmonization is better) with a nice full registration. Halfway through I noticed that the congregation and choir were off by a few beats and when we sang the refrain, I was still playing while everyone had stopped. In a moment of panic, I realized that there were two versions of the hymn, so I came to the final cadence, turned around and announced, “I apologize. I made a mistake.” There was a ripple of relieved laughter from the congregation. Then I directed folks to the number in the New Century Hymnal and off we went through a verse together.
About that point I wanted to crawl into a cave and not come out. It was an embarrassing moment, especially as I’m a person who cares a lot about getting things right. I’ve typed the wrong hymn number into the bulletin before (and the secretary usually gets those mistakes) but I felt that I should have looked at the version I selected more carefully and noticed the differences. I am a trained musician after all! But strangely, as I spoke with people after the service they said that they really appreciated the honesty of that moment. Instead of carrying on as if nothing had happened, I acknowledged that something was wrong and we started over. One visitor even said that the mistake made her feel that this is the kind of congregation that she would be comfortable in – where there is a space for imperfection.
And I suppose that’s the take away from this morning. As much as folks in the church (and outside the church) like to project an image of having it together, of confidence and skill, we are human. We make mistakes, we forget important details, the flowers are a little crooked, the paraments are a bit wrinkled, words get misspelled or mispronounced, a singer in the choir misses a cut-off. Thankfully church isn’t about getting it right but it’s a place where we can be ourselves, where there is the grace to start over again if we’ve gotten off on the wrong foot, where we can celebrate that we are fully-loved, imperfectly beautiful people. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t strive for our best or be sloppy (you can believe that I’ll be examining every hymn closely over the next months!) but that when mistakes and imperfections do happen, we can approach them in a spirit of grace and love, with a relieved laugh, and thank God that we’re not perfect and neither is anyone else. Thanks be to God!
It has been a busy month and I keep chiding myself for not posting much but I find that blog writing ebbs and flows for me. I’ve also been thinking that I will try to make shorter posts rather than feel that I have to write an essay each time. So, stay tuned.
Last week I had the opportunity to travel to Middletown, NY to lead worship with the Hudson River Presbytery. The featured speaker of the morning was Rev. Dr. Serene Jones, the President of Union Seminary here in NYC. She’s an incredibly articulate and pastoral theologian (that is rare in my experience) and gave three stunning reflections on the theology of John Calvin, who turned 500 this year! Three themes – messy/broken/glorious – were explored through scripture, the writings of Calvin and music. I performed three improvisations on the hymn I Greet Thee Whom My Sure Redeemer Art (which is the only hymn attributed to Calvin) and we sang a setting of Psalm 98, New Songs of Celebration Render, which I arranged for flute, violin and organ in an attempt to bring lightness and energy to this beautiful, rhythmic tune.
I also composed a simple response based on Calvin’s “motto”: Cor meum tibi offero, Domine, prompte et sincere (My heart I offer to you, O Lord, promptly and sincerely. I have added it to the Music page and invite you to download it and try it out with your congregation. It is like a Taizé chant, which is repeated until it has become a prayer of the heart. It would work well in a contemplative prayer service or you could even consider using it as a Response to the Assurance of Pardon or a Doxology for Reformation Sunday at the end of October. Either way, let me know if you use it.
