February 20, 2025
7th Sunday After Epiphany
This Sunday we continue reading from Luke’s version of the Beatitudes, and our remaining scriptures contain themes of faith, mercy, and pardon of sin.
Our opening Voluntary is a setting of Steal Away arranged by local composer Hal Hopson, who has created a gentle and moving version of this great spiritual with a flowing piano accompaniment and sensitive melodic line for the violin. The original tune was composed by Wallace Willis, a slave, sometime before 1862. Alexander Reid, a minister, heard Willis singing it, transcribed the words and melody, and sent the music to the Jubilee Singers of Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. It is believed that songs like Steal Away and Wade In The Water had double meanings for the slaves who sang them. Not only did the words reflect their faith and that they would one day “steal away to Jesus” but also acted as code to their fellow workers that they were going to seek to escape their slave-owners, that they would “steal away” via the secret Underground Railroad network that would help them reach the northern U.S. states or Canada where they would be free.
One academic has suggested other lines in the song have this double meaning too. “He calls me by the thunder”, for example, refers to the fact that stealing away during a storm was safer because the rains washed away clues that might lead the trackers and their dogs to find the fleeing slave.
Our Choral Prelude and Offertory Music will again be provided by our amazing Upendo Choir, singing
Ninaye Yesu, Nimehakikisha [I Have Jesus, I Have Made Sure] and Atawale Mwachie Yesu, Atawale
[Let Jesus Rule, He Will Rule]. Both are popular east African “gospel” songs with lilting rhythms and powerful texts. The linked videos include onscreen translations of these tuneful songs of praise.
The Chancel Choir’s Anthem is my favorite English language setting of The Beatitudes text in a profound recasting by Marilyn Biery, a talented organist, choirmaster, theologian and poet. Her husband shares all her talents but crafting poetry, and he wrote a sweeping melody for her modern take on Christ’s Sermon on the Mount text. Marilyn’s insightful paraphrase combines with James’ flowing musical lines to make a moving hymn-anthem.
The composer encourages the congregation to join in on Stanzas 4 & 5 once you have learned the melody, and the music will be included in Sunday’s Bulletin to enable your praise. I encourage you to prayerfully read Marilyn Biery’s inspired text when you reach your pew before Worship begins and experience anew the power of Christ’s timeless words for those who are “bent in two with mourning” or experiencing “aching hunger”. These texts have brought tears to my eyes every time I sang them over the last 15 years, and I pray they speak powerfully to you as well.
My music at Communion is an organ setting of one of my favorite hymns which the choir sang very recently, Draw Us in the Spirit’s Tether, by Harold Friedell. Well-known to all graduates of Union Theological Seminary in New York, there have been many settings of this tune and text, but the most enjoyable organ setting is by Austin, Texas native Dr. Gerre Hancock (1934-2012) who was organist of St Thomas Church, Fifth Avenue, New York, for some 33 years until 2004. (The video linked above features a photo of St. Thomas breathtaking reredos behind the altar, organ façade and soaring neogothic architecture.) Hancock wrote Meditation on Draw Us in the Spirit’s Tether in 1998, and it quickly became a favorite for organists who love Friedell’s original hymn-anthem and love a technical challenge on Sunday morning!
Our closing hymn How Can I Keep From Singing sends us forth with Robert Lowery’s timeless reminder that our life flows on in endless song above earth’s lamentation, compelling us to sing because Christ is in control of heaven and earth. I pray that this week our lives are a witness to the Holy One who alone brings peace, comfort, healing and hope amidst all the tumult and strife of our world.
With a Grateful Heart,
Kenton