Lent 2013 — Brethren, We Have Met to Worship

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I know I shared this one last year but it’s been in my mind lately as I’ve been editing devotions for a book being put together by a friend of Jon’s family. I wish some of lines of this hymn could be painted and plastered on walls of churches because some of them are so useful in talking about how to support each other.

Brethren, we have met to worship and adore the Lord our God;
Will you pray with all your power, while we try to preach the Word?
All is vain unless the Spirit of the Holy One comes down;
Brethren, pray, and holy manna will be showered all around.

Brethren, see poor sinners round you slumbering on the brink of woe;
Death is coming, hell is moving, can you bear to let them go?
See our fathers and our mothers, and our children sinking down;
Brethren, pray and holy manna will be showered all around.

Sisters, will you join and help us? Moses?? sister aided him;
Will you help the trembling mourners who are struggling hard with sin?
Tell them all about the Savior, tell them that He will be found;
Sisters, pray, and holy manna will be showered all around.

Is there here a trembling jailer, seeking grace, and filled with tears?
Is there here a weeping Mary, pouring forth a flood of tears?
Brethren, join your cries to help them; sisters, let your prayers abound;
Pray, Oh pray that holy manna may be scattered all around.

Let us love our God supremely, let us love each other, too;
Let us love and pray for sinners, till our God makes all things new.
Then He??ll call us home to Heaven, at His table we??ll sit down;
Christ will gird Himself and serve us with sweet manna all around.
(HT: Net Hymnal)

The version I found by the Gospel Plowboys is, I think, most close to what it sounds like done in a congregation.

Lent 2013: “Jesus, Lover of My Soul”

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I featured this one last year but heard it this morning on a mix CD while driving to my eye doctor appointment. (My vision is improved, BTW.) I love it because it’s an interesting tune (it’s Welsh — no surprise there) and the words are lovely.

The words (with a third verse I have never heard sung):

Jesus, lover of my soul, let me to Thy bosom fly,
While the nearer waters roll, while the tempest still is high.
Hide me, O my Savior, hide, till the storm of life is past;
Safe into the haven guide; O receive my soul at last.

Other refuge have I none, hangs my helpless soul on Thee;
Leave, ah! leave me not alone, still support and comfort me.
All my trust on Thee is stayed, all my help from Thee I bring;
Cover my defenseless head with the shadow of Thy wing.

Wilt Thou not regard my call? Wilt Thou not accept my prayer?
Lo! I sink, I faint, I fall??Lo! on Thee I cast my care;
Reach me out Thy gracious hand! While I of Thy strength receive,
Hoping against hope I stand, dying, and behold, I live.

Thou, O Christ, art all I want, more than all in Thee I find;
Raise the fallen, cheer the faint, heal the sick, and lead the blind.
Just and holy is Thy Name, I am all unrighteousness;
False and full of sin I am; Thou art full of truth and grace.

Plenteous grace with Thee is found, grace to cover all my sin;
Let the healing streams abound; make and keep me pure within.
Thou of life the fountain art, freely let me take of Thee;
Spring Thou up within my heart; rise to all eternity.
(HT: Net Hymnal)

Both Michael Card and Fernando Ortega cover it but I prefer the recording by Michael Card from his album Starkindler because he takes it at a decent clip and pairs it with some Celtic jig music.

7 Quick Takes: Habemus Papam, Prayer Requests, and Drinking Games.

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

Forty Days to Forever. Brett’s special day to be featured as part of the Forty Days to Forever fundraiser was on Wednesday. If you missed this and would like to donate, click here. If you could pray for us to be able to find him a mama, I would muchly appreciate it.

— 2 —

Kaia’s Kindergarten Fund. The Kaia’s Kindergarten Fund fundraiser kicked off on March 1st. If you want to participate, you still can. Details are here. I also have a printable sheet for any families with homeschoolers who want to count coins that they donate. Kaia’s adoptive mama just started a blog dedicated to bringing her home. The Saving Kaia blog will remain active however because I can use it to raise awareness for her and hopefully help to raise some of the funds to bring her home.

— 3 —

Habemus Papam. I’m probably the only Protestant who was watching for white smoke on Wednesday when I got up and saw that there had been no black smoke after I went to sleep. (The morning votes in Rome were shown at 2:00 a.m. my time.) I was sitting at $tarbux working on devotions and flipped to Chrome where I saw the smoke. About 5 seconds later, I got a text from the Pope Alarm. After about forty minutes of waiting for them to announce it, I had to run to the bathroom due to the venti Cool Lime Refresher I was sipping on while I worked. Thankfully, I didn’t miss anything. I couldn’t understand the announcement in Latin because the microphone was echoing too much (I was watching the EWTN feed on my laptop) and all I could pick out after “Habemus Papam” was “Franciscum”. I knew that “Franciscum” was Francis so I was looking at the list of all the cardinals with that name until I heard them explain that it was Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio. (I was able to go onto YouTube later and find a clean recording of it that I could understand.)

— 4 —

My thoughts on Pope Francis. Truthfully, I’m happy. He has a commitment to social justice while also being committed to preservation of doctrine and a reputation for living simply. I was displeased when Joseph Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI because he had written some rather inflammatory things about non-Catholics in his pre-papal days but I respected him because of his office. Not so much with Pope Francis — I’m a fan. It’s a moot point because I’m Lutheran and he isn’t considered an authority for us but it’s still nice to have a Pope with whom I am enamored. And seriously… he’s a Jesuit — that’s a pretty long shot to become Pope because Jesuits are not supposed to aspire to higher office.

— 5 —

Grumpy Cat. Tard the Grumpy Cat is at SXSW and has landed on our CBS affiliates in Sacramento because the anchors were amused by her. Friskies has done a photo shoot and filmed a commercial with her and I found this online tonight. It’s a parody of the backstage rider for Van Halen that is tailored to Tard herself.

— 6 —

I’ll drink to this. Are you a fan of The Big Bang Theory? There’s a drinking game for you! Consider it’s on for an hour every day in syndication on one of our antenna channels in addition to the new episodes on CBS, I think I could get blotto drunk really fast if I actually drank alcohol.

— 7 —

On a somber note. Ian, a friend of mine from college, is fighting leukemia. His wife posted this today:

I’m writing with tears streaming down. We just heard that they have diagnosed him with a rare liver disease associated with the transplant called “sinusoidal obstructive syndrome” or SOS. Basically, there are clots in the lining of the veins of his liver stopping the flow of fluid, and actually reversing the flow causing fluid to build up in his stomach. The ultrasound this morning confirmed this is the case.

Up until recently, there has been no cure for this and it’s an end game situation. There is a medication called Defibrotide they are very hopeful about via clinical trial that they are working on getting for him. It is only made in Italy and there are hoops to jump through but they assure us he will get it. It takes a week or two for response from the medication, and he will be on it for at least three weeks. In the mean time, things are expected to get worse and they may need to drain his belly multiple times to allow room for his kidneys to function. His stomach looks twice as big as it did last night and he hasn’t been able to eat or drink. He is in such pain and discomfort already, I can’t imagine two more weeks of this progressing… I’m still in shock.

Please pray they can get Ian in the clinical trial and receive the Defribrotide quickly.
Please pray he responds as fast as possible and it is completely effective in treating his liver. Sometimes people never fully recover even with the medication and need to have their stomach drained regularly for the rest of their lives. Please pray this is not the case with Ian.

So it seems the heat has been turned up a few notches. Please pray that when we walk out of this furnace we’d be like the young men in Daniel- glowing brighter with a testimony and not even smelling like smoke.

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.

Lent 2013: “Hear My Prayer, O Lord”

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I heard this song while watching Praise TV one night 9 years ago and loved it. I kept hoping to see it again but it was almost a year and a half until I caught it. It’s so simple and so incredibly appropriate for so many situations in faith.

Hear my prayer, O Lord
From the ends of the earth I cry
Your peace will lead me to
The Rock that is higher than I

For you have been my strength in times of trouble
A tower above my enemies
And Lord, I will abide with you forever
In the shelter of your wings
(HT: Lyrster)

I went with the first YouTube video I found.

Lent 2013: “To God Be The Glory”

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I first sang this in a chapel service at Trinity Lutheran Seminary. It’s another Fanny Crosby hymn with a tune by W. How?ard Doane. It’s mentioned as a possible hymn for this Sunday in Year C on the Episcopal hymn site and as the Episcopalians are as finicky as I am about using the A-word/H-word during Lent, I’ll go with it.

To God be the glory, great things He has done;
So loved He the world that He gave us His Son,
Who yielded His life an atonement for sin,
And opened the life gate that all may go in.

Praise the Lord, praise the Lord,
Let the earth hear His voice!
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord,
Let the people rejoice!
O come to the Father, through Jesus the Son,
And give Him the glory, great things He has done.

O perfect redemption, the purchase of blood,
To every believer the promise of God;
The vilest offender who truly believes,
That moment from Jesus a pardon receives.

Praise the Lord, praise the Lord,
Let the earth hear His voice!
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord,
Let the people rejoice!
O come to the Father, through Jesus the Son,
And give Him the glory, great things He has done.

Great things He has taught us, great things He has done,
And great our rejoicing through Jesus the Son;
But purer, and higher, and greater will be
Our wonder, our transport, when Jesus we see.

Praise the Lord, praise the Lord,
Let the earth hear His voice!
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord,
Let the people rejoice!
O come to the Father, through Jesus the Son,
And give Him the glory, great things He has done.
(HT: Net Hymnal)

I’m glad I found a good version of it on YouTube — I thought I would have to search through a bunch of icky ones before I found one that wasn’t stupid-sounding.

Lent 2013: “Guide Me, O Thou Great Redeemer”

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This particular hymn is also known as “Guide me, O thou great Jehovah” but as Jehovah isn’t an actual word, a number of hymnals have it as “Guide me, O thou great redeemer” instead. It’s the hymn that most think of when they think of Wales (at least in my experience) and Net Hymnal has the words in Welsh.

Guide me, O Thou great Redeemer
Pilgrim through this barren land.
I am weak, but Thou art mighty;
Hold me with Thy powerful hand.
Bread of Heaven, Bread of Heaven,
Feed me till I want no more;
Feed me till I want no more.

Open now the crystal fountain,
Whence the healing stream doth flow;
Let the fire and cloudy pillar
Lead me all my journey through.
Strong Deliverer, strong Deliverer,
Be Thou still my Strength and Shield;
Be Thou still my Strength and Shield.

Lord, I trust Thy mighty power,
Wondrous are Thy works of old;
Thou deliver??st Thine from thralldom,
Who for naught themselves had sold:
Thou didst conquer, Thou didst conquer,
Sin, and Satan and the grave,
Sin, and Satan and the grave.

When I tread the verge of Jordan,
Bid my anxious fears subside;
Death of deaths, and hell??s destruction,
Land me safe on Canaan??s side.
Songs of praises, songs of praises,
I will ever give to Thee;
I will ever give to Thee.

Musing on my habitation,
Musing on my heav??nly home,
Fills my soul with holy longings:
Come, my Jesus, quickly come;
Vanity is all I see;
Lord, I long to be with Thee!
Lord, I long to be with Thee!

The tune is “Cwm Rhondda” and I’m borrowing the video that Unapologetically Episcopalian posted earlier.

Lent 2013: “O the Deep, Deep Love of Jesus”

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I learned the tune before I learned this hymn. The first time I sang it was with my cousin Erik on Christmas night of 1996. Erik had a really turbulent life and that Christmas was the first time I had seen him in 4 years. In that span of time, he got religion and he and I were sitting in the living room singing while he played guitar. He died in June of 2011 and it’s one of my happy memories of him.

O the deep, deep love of Jesus, vast, unmeasured, boundless, free!
Rolling as a mighty ocean in its fullness over me!
Underneath me, all around me, is the current of Thy love
Leading onward, leading homeward to Thy glorious rest above!

O the deep, deep love of Jesus, spread His praise from shore to shore!
How He loveth, ever loveth, changeth never, nevermore!
How He watches o??er His loved ones, died to call them all His own;
How for them He intercedeth, watcheth o??er them from the throne!

O the deep, deep love of Jesus, love of every love the best!
??Tis an ocean full of blessing, ??tis a haven giving rest!
O the deep, deep love of Jesus, ??tis a heaven of heavens to me;
And it lifts me up to glory, for it lifts me up to Thee!
(HT: Net Hymnal)

The group Selah did a recording of the song (which is the most popular result if you do a search on YouTube) but I prefer congregational singing. In this particular video, it’s the Moody Men’s Choir singing as part of a worship service and I love the deep voices of the men which are slightly audible over the congregation’s singing.