The “Truth”
“O Morning Star, how fair and bright!
You shine with God’s own truth and light,
aglow with grace and mercy…” [LSB 395]
Do you have a favorite season of the Church Year? One has to be Epiphany! The mystery of the Incarnation goes right to the heart of the vocation of the church musician.
“The Word became flesh…the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
Now there’s a word for our time---“Truth” !
What the Wise Men sought is what all humanity eventually seeks---the central question of our existence---as even Pilate would eventually ask of Jesus, “What is truth?”
John proclaimed it (using the word 25 times in his Gospel account) and so did Jesus himself: “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.” (John 14:6)
What starts with the God the Father comes through his incarnate Son and is given to his Church.
“The Father will give you another Counselor to be with you forever---the Spirit of truth.” (John 14:16]
And, as workers in that Church with a “high and holy calling”, it is our task to be custodians of that truth, to embody it in Word, image and music, to engage it with our congregation and the world.
Divine truth acknowledges the full depravity of all humankind and each of us personally. This sinful nature poisons our relationship with God and with each other; it affects families, congregations, society and all the broken world.
The Gospel truth shines the light of God’s unconditional love, mercy, and forgiveness. It brings reconciliation and healing and true joy.
This truth is unchanging; it is not subject to the whims of the age, nor to presumed, arrogant human wisdom; it does not evolve.
Church musicians need to take care that they are not distracted and absorbed by other, related issues. It takes determination and trust in the Word to not let ourselves be pulled away from the main thing. We dare not back down in our worship, in our ministries, nor in the public square.
The hymn of Lutheran pastor Herman G. Stuempfle connects that eternal Truth with all other truth and still rings out clear and strong--
We praise you, God, for truth received from generations past;
for knowledge, gift beyond compare, the ages have amassed.
We offer thanks for patient toil of thinkers who assailed
the ignorance that darkens truth and keeps its presence veiled.
But you have formed the human mind to follow truth beyond
old boundaries and beckon us toward knowledge yet unfound.
Let neither fear nor weariness subvert the ardent quest
that sets our feet on paths untrod and robs our hearts of rest.
O Wisdom, source of human thought, in whom our questing ends;
O Truth, whose endless mystery all human truth transcends:
Teach us that, when we offer you the best our minds have wrought,
we bring but truth your mind has known, the wisdom you have taught.
O Christ, in whom the Truth took flesh and dwelt in time and space,
in whom God’s wisdom walked our ways and wore a human face:
The life you lived, the death you died teach knowledge far above
our own and call our hearts to see the crown of truth is Love.
(Copyright © 1991 the Hymn Society, admin. Hope Publishing Company. All rights reserved. Used by permission. Found in Wondrous Love Has Called Us! Hymns, Songs and Carols. Herman G. Stuempfle, Jr. GIA G-6619. 2006)
[Paul Weber’s strong setting of this text is found in his new hymnary--So Great a Cloud of Witnesses, #83. Augsburg Fortress (2022). ISBN: 978-1-5064-8007-7]
So...
“Sing out! Ring out!
Jubilation! Exultation!
Tell the story!
Great is he, the King of Glory!”
Amen.
Barry Bobb
Director
