Thou who wast rich beyond all splendour

For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,

that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor,
so that you by his poverty might become rich.

2 Corinthians 8:9 ESV

I first heard this beautiful carol shortly before Christmas 1991, at a carol service at Christ Church Beckenham.  It's been my favourite carol ever since.  It deserves to be far more widely known, although Keith and Kristyn Getty's version, released in 2016, has helped to bring it to a wider public.

The words to Thou who wast rich were written by Bishop Frank Houghton (1894 - 1972).  In 1920, as a young Anglican priest, Houghton joined the China Inland Mission.  He served in China until 1928, and after six years back in the UK, returned there as a Bishop in 1934.  He was General Director of China Inland Mission 1940 - 1951, and then spent the final 10 years before his retirement as a Vicar back in the UK.

In December 1934, two young CIM missionaries, John and Betty Stam, were captured and killed by Chinese Communists.  In the wake of these murders, and those of other missionaries in China at the time, Frank Houghton decided to set out on a tour of missionary outposts in the country.  As he travelled through the mountains of southwest China, he was inspired by the words of 2 Corinthians 8:9 (quoted above), to write this beautiful carol.

Dr John Tweeddale comments that this hymn focusses on Christ.  Each verse is a meditation on a different aspect of his work: verse 1 on his humiliation; verse 2 on his incarnation; and verse 3 on his exaltation.  His comments continue:

[Thou who wast rich beyond all splendour] reminds us that Christmas is about a gift beyond our comprehension.  In his humiliation, the Son of God exchanged a throne for a manger, celestial courts for a stable floor, and riches for poverty (Philippians 2:5-8).  In his incarnation, the Son of God became a man in order to redeem his people from their sins (cf Matthew 1:21-23; John 1:1,14).  In his exaltation, Christ is the object of our love and adoration (Philippians 2:9-11) . . . this carol . . . reminds [us] that the only fitting response to the Christ of Christmas is worship.

Christmas is about a gift beyond all splendour, all praising, all telling.  [We] simply cannot fathom how magnificent this gift is . . . Christmas is about the greatest, and costliest, gift of all - the gift of Christ himself.  

For me, Houghton's words touch my soul every time I hear or sing this carol.  If you don't know it, I hope and pray that you will follow one of the links, and find that Houghton's carol moves you to worship our Lord and Saviour anew.

The tune which I know for Thou who wast rich is a traditional French melody, usually called 'Fragrance' in English hymnbooks, but in French, 'Quelle est cette odeur agréable?'  It's a wonderfully simple tune, which carries these words to perfection.  

Sadly, I don't think that the Getty's version of this carol (see link above) does it justice.  There's a lyric video here, and another version, without the lyrics on screen, here.  

Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift!
(2 Corinthians 9:15) 

Photo by Pro Church Media on Unsplash

Lo, he comes with clouds descending

 

Behold, he is coming with the clouds 

and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, 

and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of him.  

Even so.  Amen. 

(Revelation 1:7, ESV)

This is my favourite Advent hymn.  It anticipates Christ's Second Coming, which is one of the major themes of Advent - the others being preparation to celebrate his First Coming at Christmas, and the individual believer's preparation to receive him in their heart.   Michael Dougherty comments that this hymn, which is a complete reworking of a previous hymn by John Cennick, shows "the facility with which Charles [Wesley] uses the English language and how he effortlessly mirrors the images of the book of Revelation . . . " (cf the verse quoted above).  C Michael Hawn comments that "this poem comes as close as poetic verse can in scaling the heights of spendour, majesty, and mystery as described in Revelation."

The earlier hymn was published by John Cennick in the fifth edition of his Collection of Sacred Hymns in 1752.   You can see the text as quoted by John Julian here (scroll to page 681).  Julian goes on to quote Wesley's version of the hymn, which was published in 1758 in Hymns of Intercession for All Mankind.  Modern hymn books follow this text, with one or two alterations.  It's interesting to note that in the Methodist hymn books of 1933, 1983 (Hymns and Psalms) and 2011 (Singing the Faith), the last line of the first stanza is Wesley's "God appears on earth to reign", while the Anglican hymn books from the Ancient and Modern stable, published in 1922, 1950 and 2013 all replace "God" with "Christ" in that line.  (The second and third stanzas, with their references to the Messiah's death, pierced and nailed to a tree, make it clear that Wesley was indeed referring to the Second Person of the Trinity at the end of the first stanza).  The other common change is in the penultimate line of stanza 4, which successive Methodist hymnals have replaced with "Hallelujah!" or "Come, Lord Jesus!", while Ancient and Modern has consistently used, "Alleluia!  Thou shalt reign, and thou alone" for the final two lines.  Other versions use "O come quickly!" (which was the wording in Cennick's version) in the penultimate line.  John Julian's (see link above) entry on Lo, he comes, as published in 1907, gives details of various other reworkings of this hymn, but it seems to me that Wesley's version, with a couple of alterations, is what is in common use today.

Charles Wesley's hymn, as it was first published in 1758

As I said, this is my favourite Advent hymn.  In Anglican hymnals it usually appears in the Advent section.  Methodists place it under Advent in 2011, but in earlier hymn books it was under "The Lord Jesus Christ: his kingdom, present and future" (1933), and "Christ's Coming in Glory" (1983).  But as Hawn (see above) points out, "the context in which it appears in John Wesley's collection [1758] offers a very different understanding of the text."  He goes on to say, "the hymns in Hymns of Intercession for All Mankind address in amazing detail various categories of intercessory prayer."

Lo, he comes appears near the end of Wesley's collection, under the heading "Thy Kingdom Come!"  This is one of the petitions which Jesus commands us to pray near the beginning of the Lord's Prayer.  Hawn comments on the collection, and the place of Lo, he comes within it, 

Charles Wesley, having enumerated a comprehensive list of intercessory needs, establishes that God, in Christ, is the cosmic "monarch" of all earthly kings, nations, institutions, individuals in need, and all religions and theologies, and philosophies found on earth, even if they do not recognize God.

Lo, he comes is almost always sung (at least, in my experience!) to the tune Helmsley, which is attributed in modern hymn books as follows: 'Select Hymns with Tunes Annext (1765)', a book published by John Wesley, where the tune is called 'Olivers'.  It's been attributed to Thomas Olivers (1710-1778), but its origins are obscure.  However, in Hawn's words, "it is a magnificent pairing with this majestic text."  Dougherty comments further,

When sung together, this text and tune help the worshipping community observe with wonder the events of Jesus' crucifixion.  Well-place tune-driven repeats of text create a sense of excitement and urgency.  This drives us toward the . . .  day when we sing,   

Yea, Amen! Let all adore thee,

high on thy eternal throne;

Saviour, take the power and glory,

claim the kingdom for thine own.

Hallelujah!  Hallelujah!  Hallelujah!

Everlasting God, come down!  

You can hear this hymn here.

For more information about Charles Wesley, see my post on O, thou who camest from above.

Photo by Jeff Jacobs on Pixabay

Make me a channel of your peace

 

Most hymn books tell us that this song is based on the Prayer of St Francis, so I was fascinated to discover that the prayer concerned is entirely absent from his writings, and can be traced back no further than 1912, when it was published anonymously in France in a small Catholic spiritual magazine called La Clochette, under the title Belle prière à faire pendant la messe (A beautiful prayer to say during the Mass).  The original text of the prayer, with an English translation taken from Wikipedia, is as follows: 

Not only was this prayer not written by St Francis, but according to one biographer, "Noble as its sentiments are, Francis would not have written such a piece, focused as it is on the self, with its constant repetition of the pronouns 'I' and 'me', the words 'God' and 'Jesus' never appearing once."

Dr Christian Renoux, who wrote a study of the origins of this prayer, says that it was first attributed to St Francis in 1927 by a French Protestant movement, Les Chevaliers du Prince de la Paix.  The earliest known English translation dates to the same year, and was also attributed to St Francis.  It became very popular in America during the Second World War, and has remained so ever since.  Although written in a Catholic Christian context, it has been widely adopted by people of many different faiths.  According to Kevin Flannagan of the United Methodist Church, this has been possible because of the "broadly inclusive language" of the prayer.

The hymn based on this prayer, Make me a channel of your peace, was written by Sebastian Temple (1928 - 1997), and published in 1967.  Temple was born in South Africa, spent some time living in London  working for the BBC, and moved to America in 1958, where he joined the Franciscan Third Order.  He wrote Make me a channel of your peace as one of a collection of songs commissioned by the Franciscans.  In a letter quoted by Ian Bradley in his book, The Daily Telegraph Book of Hymns (p 277), Temple described writing the song:

I wrote so easily and so prolifically that I took for granted that I could write music to the peace prayer of St Francis . . . its strange form drove me crazy.  I could not come up with anything that sounded like music to my ears . . . Finally, I was disgusted, looked at the little statue of St Francis on my shelf and said angrily, 'Well if you want it, YOU do it.  I can't.'  I got up, went to the kitchen, made a cup of tea and drank it.  When I returned to the guitar, I picked it up, had the tape running, and the song fell out of my mouth as it was recorded a few days later.

The hymn is well-known and very popular in the UK.  Both GodSongs.net  and Kevin Flannagan (see above) put that popularity down to its inclusion in the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997.  However, it appeared in British hymn books well before that: Mission Praise (1983) and Songs of Fellowship (1991) both include it.

This week, as we mark the anniversary of the end of World War One, (Remembrance Day in the UK and Commonwealth, Veterans Day in the US, Armistice Day in France, Volkstrauertag in Germany), it seemed appropriate to choose a song based on a prayer for the grace to bring peace and all that is good into our relationships and dealings, one with another.    

You can hear Sebastian Temple's original recording of Make me a channel of your peace here.  There's a Songs of Praise recording with lyrics, featuring Tessera, here. 

A word about the picture above (link and accreditation below): When I found this picture, and read the notes with it, I decided that it was perfect to illustrate this post.  The photo was taken in the Philippines on 26 June 2020.  The photographer was enjoying the sunset on his/her way home from work:  

And then I saw a kid approaching with his bike.  I quickly grabbed my phone, hoping I'd catch him . . . He looked so safe and secure.  There's so much beauty, peace, and calmness.  A little different from what the world is going through right now.  Fear.  Hate.  Injustice.  Pain.  Despair.  Confusion.  Unbelief.  The list can go on.  But that doesn't mean that we can no longer live like the kid in the photo.  We still can.  Think of the beauty that's still left.  Have Faith.  Believe.  Hope.  The world needs you.  Us.  Keep praying.  Remember, peace is not the absence of chaos.  It is that despite the chaos, we still surprisingly experience extraordinary, unexplainable peace . . . only God can give us that kind of peace.  The peace that transcends all understanding!   

Picture: Peace undeniable.  Calm so tangible; trimmed. by Arch.elam  CC BY-SA 4.0.

We plough the fields and scatter

I've been intending to write this post for a few weeks now, and it's a bit late for Harvest, but having had it on my mind, I thought I'd write it up anyway.  Actually, in some parts of the British Isles, the harvest won't be completed gathered in until the end of this week.  I always remember my grandmother, who lived in rural Suffolk, saying that it was strange to be holding a harvest festival in late September or early October, singing "all is safely gathered in" (from Come, ye thankful people, come), when the harvest of the main local crop, sugar beet, didn't start until the beginning of October, and lasted until the end of the month!

I've been singing this hymn since I was a child, but it's only now that I've learned that this favourite of British harvest festivals was originally a German poem called Im Anfang war's auf Erden, which was published in 1782.  The poem was written seven years previously, by Matthias Claudius (1740-1815), a journalist who also wrote and published poems.  Claudius' father was a pastor, and he was brought up in the  Lutheran church.  As a young man, he rejected his faith, but in 1777, he suffered a severe illness, and realised that his life was spiritually empty.  John Julian writes that "he once more became in faith as a little child."  While he was ill, he occupied himself by writing some poems.  In 1782, he was invited to a party, and asked to bring one of his poems to read aloud.  Im Anfang war's auf Erden, based on Psalm 144, was the poem he chose.  His poems were popular, because they were written in simple German, which appealed to ordinary people.

Claudius' original poem was in stanzas of four lines, with a chorus between each.  It was published in volume 4 of Claudius' collected works, Asmus omnia sua secum portans; oder sämmtliche Werke des Wandsbecker Bothen (Asmus was Claudius' penname).  It appears as part of a 'sketch' called Paul Erdmanns Fest, which describes a rural harvest festival attended by both gentlemen and farm workers.  The poem Im Anfang war's auf Erden is a peasants' song, sung by the farm workers in the sketch, with the verses sung by a soloist, and all the farm workers joining in the chorus.  These are the original words.  After the first 13 verses, there's a bit of dialogue (in square brackets), which basically says, "My Lord, we've added something for today.  May we sing that as, well?" with the reply, "Why not?"  The last few verses are then praising God for his goodness to their host, Paul Erdmann.  

The hymn as we know it in English has three verses of eight lines, as does the German hymn as it is sung today.  In both English and German, the hymn is usually set to a tune written especially for it: Wir pflügen by Johann Abraham Peter Schulz (1747-1800).  The first verse of the German hymn consists of verse 3 of Claudius' poem (Wir pflügen . . .), followed by verse 5 (Der sendet . . .); the second verse is verse 7 (Was nah ist . . ) followed by verse 8 (Von ihm sind . . .); with the third verse continuing with verses 9 and 10 of the original.  Words have been slightly altered in places.

Wir pflügen und wir streuen was translated into English as We plough the fields and scatter by Jane Montgomery Campbell (1817-1878).  Miss Campbell was a gifted linguist and a German scholar.  She did not attempt to translate the hymn literally, but she did keep the theme of thanksgiving for the harvest.  Her first verse is quite close in meaning to the first verse of the German hymn, although the lines aren't in exactly the same order.  The beginning of her second verse is very similar in meaning to the beginning of verse 2 of the German hymn, but the translation becomes freer, and the final line is close in meaning to the final line of verse 3 in the German.  Miss Campbell's final verse bears very little direct relation in meaning to any of the German verses.  According to The Conservative Woman, she taught the English version of the hymn to children at the Church of England parish school where her father was the Rector, before it was first published in 1861 in A Garland of Songs; or an English Liederkranz by Revd Charles Sandford Bere.

When I was at secondary school, our school did a big production of the musical Godspell, which includes a version of this hymn, set to a tune written for the musical, and omitting the second verse.  You can hear that version here.

There's a Songs of Praise recording of the hymn sung to the traditional tune here.

We plough the fields, and scatter
the good seed on the land,
but it is fed and watered
by God's almighty hand:
he sends the snow in winter,
the warmth to swell the grain,
the breezes, and the sunshine,
and soft, refreshing rain.

All good gifts around us
are sent from heaven above;
then thank the Lord, O thank the Lord,
for all his love.

He only is the maker
of all things near and far;
he paints the wayside flower,
he lights the evening star;
the winds and waves obey him,
by him the birds are fed;
much more to us, his children,
he gives our daily bread.

We thank thee then, O Father,
for all things bright and good,
the seed-time and the harvest,
our life, our health, our food.
Accept the gifts we offer
for all thy love imparts,
and, what thou most desirest,
our humble, thankful hearts.

References
St Martin's Methodist Church, Woolston  
Griggs 
John Julian 
Wikipedia entries: Matthias Claudius, We plough the fields and scatter, and Wir pflügen und wir streuen 
The LiederNet Archive for the original German words
The Conservative Woman

Jesus, lover of my soul (It's all about you)

Jesus, lover of my soul was a favourite song at St Stephen's Gateacre when I was a curate there in the late 1990s.  It was first published in 1995, and must have made it into the Spring Harvest songbook for at least one of the following couple of years.  In those pre-internet days, Spring Harvest was one of the main avenues for new songs to gain popularity and enter local church repertoires.  This song has remained popular, and is probably Oakley's best known song.  

For a long time, Paul Oakley was one of the worship leaders at the New Frontiers Church in Brighton.  Currently known as Emmanuel Church, it began life in the late 1970s as Brighton and Hove Christian Fellowship, and has been known at times as Clarendon Church, and the Church of Christ the King.  Oakley worked alongside a host of singer-songwriters there, among them Lou and Nathan Fellingham, and Stuart Townend.  Until 2011, the church was led by Terry Virgo, who has written about Oakley as follows (see riveroflifecbs.com):

As a man in touch with the Holy Spirit, Paul Oakley is wonderfully gifted to draw people into the presence of God.  His love for the Lord is expressed through the great songs that he has written.  I, for one, love singing them, not only at big events but also when I am alone with the Lord.

Oakley himself says (following on from the above in the same article):

The main focus of my writing comes from my walk with God.  I’ve seen God and I don’t want to write about anything else.  Like Isaiah I felt like I’ve had a radical encounter with God and "I’m ruined, I’m undone!"  When you’ve seen God what else is there to write about?  He is everything!  He’s awesome and He’s jealous for His glory in every aspect of our lives.  So whatever I go through, I walk through it with Him and I hope that comes out in the songs.  Music, as well as being a precious gift from God, is for Him as well.  There’s almost a sense in which music itself is more complete when it’s to Him and for Him.  That’s not to say there isn’t a place for entertainment or performance songs because it all points to a Creator and brings glory to God.  I want God at the centre of what I’m saying and writing because He’s totally changed my life.

The opening phrase of this song was first used by Charles Wesley in his hymn, Jesu, lover of my soul.  According to John Julian, many have found difficulty in the use of:

. . . the term 'lover' as applied our Lord.  From an early date this tender expression was felt by many to be beneath the solemn dignity of a hymn addressed to the Divine Being.  Attempts have been made to increase the reverence of the opening line by the sacrifice of its pathos and poetry. 

Julian points to the Wisdom of Solomon 11:26 in defence of Wesley's turn of phrase - a source which, being found in the Apocrypha, will not satisfy some!

Be that as it may, Oakley has borrowed the phrase for the first line of his song.  It's a song which reminds us that our lives as Christians are not about ourselves: they're all about glorifying the Lord Jesus.

You can hear a powerful version of this song, sung by Stuart Townend, here.  

 

What a friend we have in Jesus

Image: 'My Friend' by Helen Thomas Robson; © 2010; used with permission; https://www.htrbydesign.com/

I'm currently reading God on Mute by Pete Greig, in which he includes the story of how Joseph Scriven (1819 - 1886) came to write the hymn, What a friend we have in Jesus.  It's certainly not the only Christian hymn written following intense suffering in the life of the author - in fact, I began this blog with a post on another: It is well with my soul.  

For many older folk, What a friend we have in Jesus is a favourite from Sunday School days.  It always went down well with the clients of St Mary's Care Centre in Halewood, when it was included in one of their weekly services when I was Vicar at the Church there.  I can't remember when I first learned it, but I'm sure it wasn't when I was a child.  

There are a number of retellings of Joseph Scriven's life story which I've found online.  They don't all agree on the details, but the broad outline is that he was born and grew up in County Down in Ireland.  He studied at Trinity College Dublin.  He'd fallen in love and was engaged to be married, but tragically, his fiancée died in an accident not long before their wedding was due to take place. 

As he struggled to come to terms with what had happened, Scriven decided to leave Ireland.  He emigrated to Canada, where he settled in Ontario.  It's believed that he originally wrote the words of What a friend we have in Jesus to send to his mother in Ireland, because he couldn't afford to travel back there at a time when she was in great need of comfort.  He never intended his poem to be published, although he did publish Hymns and Other Verses in 1869 - 115 of his own compositions, but not including What a friend we have in Jesus.  

The usual tune for What a friend we have in Jesus is called Converse, after the composer, Charles Crozat Converse (1832 - 1918).  It was first published in 1870, five years after the words are first known to have been published. 

What a friend we have in Jesus became popular after Ira Sankey included it in Gospel Hymns and Sacred Songs, published in 1875.  Sankey erroneously attributed it to Horatius Bonar (author of Fill thou my life, O Lord my God and I heard the voice of Jesus say).  When Scriven was asked about the hymn, he's reported to have replied, "The Lord and I did it between us."

Eventually Scriven fell in love and became engaged for a second time.  It seems unbelievably cruel that once again, he suffered the bereavement of his fiancée.  Eliza Roach fell ill and died before she and Scriven could be married.  

Scriven's experiences of loss and hardship combined with his knowledge of Scripture, as expressed in this hymn, continue to provide comfort and hope to struggling believers today: 

What a friend we have in Jesus,
all our sins and griefs to bear!
What a privilege to carry
everything to God in prayer! 
O what peace we often forfeit!
O what needless pain we bear!
All because we do not carry
everything to God in prayer.

Have we trials and temptations?
Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged;
take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend to faithful
who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness;
take it to the Lord in prayer.

Are we weak and heavy-laden,
cumbered with a load of care?
Precious Saviour, still our refuge,
take it to the Lord in prayer.
Do thy friends despise, forsake thee?
Take it to the Lord in prayer;
In his arms he'll take and shield thee,
thou wilt find a solace there.

 You can listen to this hymn here.

After looking at a number of websites which came up when I searched for What a friend we have in Jesus, most information here comes from Chris Fenner on Hymnology Archive, and from Hymnary.org.

He came to earth (King of kings)

From Altar to Throne by Signe Flink; used with permission

I first remember hearing this song while I was at theological college in the mid-1990s.  It's not an easy one to sing; in fact the Church of Scotland advises: 

There are pitfalls in this passionate song when sung by congregations, and accompanists need to handle the 'empty bars' with skill and resolution, particularly when the arpeggio chords do not 'point to' the note on which the singers come in.

The language of the song isn't necessarily very easy either.  The Singing the Faith plus website of the UK Methodist Church comments:

[Pantry] uses language understood (or maybe not!) by those already bound up in the Church and Christian conversation.

With most hymns and songs, what draws us to them (or not!) is the combination of words and music.  This may not be the easiest song, but it is passionate and powerful, and beautiful when sung well.  Singing the Faith plus points out that He came to earth is a highly personal response to Jesus' self-sacrifice for our sakes.  That response is required of every Christian believer.  I guess these were all factors in my decision to have it sung as a solo during the signing of the registers at my wedding in 1997.  

John Pantry was born in Harrow in 1946.  He originally trained and worked as a recording engineer, and became a Christian in the early 1970s as a result of the influence of Christian artists for whom he produced albums.  He'd already started writing his own songs, and had released one album, but after becoming a Christian, he says, his secular work "just seemed to fold up  . . . the phones stopped ringing."  He continued working in many roles, mainly in the Christian music scene.  In 1993, he was ordained as a Non-Stipendiary (ie not paid) Minister in the Church of England, and in 1995, he joined the staff of Premier Christian Radio as a presenter.  He recently (June 2020) retired from his position as presenter of Inspirational Breakfast on Premier Christian Radio, after 24 years, which made him the longest-serving national breakfast radio presenter in Britain (see Keep the Faith). 

There is much more information about John Pantry's career (up to 2009) here.  

I can't find any information which relates specifically to this song, which was originally released on Pantry's album The Church Invincible in 1992.  Neither have I been able to source a lyric video.  You can see the lyrics of He came to earth here, where you'll also find a link to play the song on Youtube.