"Regent Square" (TLH #50)

"Come, You Faithful, Raise the Strain"

One of the hymns in church recently was "Come, You Faithful, Raise the Strain," sung to the tune "Gaudeamus pariter" (Latin: "we rejoice together").  The title line is sung to this musical phrase:

The notes to which "raise the strain" is sung ascend, so there's a musical representation of that "rais[ing]."

In the fourth verse, there's the line "His deep peace, which evermore," sung to this same phrase (although later in the verse).  The "peace" is sung to the first of those C notes, which is the lowest pitch in the phrase and even in the whole hymn (in the melody, at least), so while the "deep" of "deep peace" is a metaphorical description, there's a musical impression of it.

LSB #406, 407 "To Jordan Came the Christ, Our Lord"

Biblical citations in the hymnal:  Luke 3:21-22, Acts 2:38, Galatians 3:26-27, Matthew 28:19-20

Luke 3:21-22:  "21 Now when all the people were baptized, and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heavens were opened, 22 and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, 'You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.'"

Acts 2:38:  "And Peter said to them, 'Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.'"

Galatians 3:26-27:  "26 for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.  27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ."

Matthew 28:19-20:  "19 'Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.  And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.'"

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The verses from Luke 3 are the main text used in the hymn, mostly for the first four verses, which describe Jesus' baptism.  Galatians 3:26-27 seems to appear at the end of the second verse, though, specifically: "God's Holy Spirit here avows / Our kinship while bestowing / The Baptism of His blessing."  Both connect baptism to "kinship" or being "sons of God."

The first half of the fifth verse is from Matthew 28:19-20.  The hymn basically just paraphrases the text ("Go out to ev'ry nation, / And bring to them the living Word"), but instead of taking the call to baptize from Matthew 28, the hymn uses Acts 2:38.  (The focus in the two texts is a bit different.  In Matthew 28, Jesus tells the disciples to baptize others; in Acts 2, Peter tells people that they themselves should be baptized.)  The second half of verse five in the hymn has the same structure as "repent and be baptized":

Let ev'ryone abandon sin
And come in true contrition
To be baptized and thereby win
Full pardon and remission
And heav'nly bliss inherit.

"Dundee" (TLH #49)

This is in Eb major, which is not a key I particularly enjoy playing in, but when I tried to transpose it to E major, it was even worse.  I kept it in Eb major, although that means there's some extraneous fret noise as my fingers move to wider intervals than they probably would in a different key.

The bass part is supposed to have a low Eb note, but in standard tuning, basses go down only to E, so I played that Eb an octave higher than it's written.

"This Joyful Eastertide"

One of the hymns in church this week (the Third Sunday of Easter) was "This Joyful Eastertide," sung to the tune "Vruechten."  One of the lines in the refrain is "But now has Christ arisen, arisen, arisen," sung to this phrase:

Each successive "arisen" rises to a higher pitch, giving something of a musical impression of Christ's resurrection.

The last line of the verse is sung to this melody:

In the third verse, the text here is: until the trumpet "Shall wake the dead in number."  "Number" is sung to the last seven notes, so there's a musical sense of that multitude.

LSB #405 "To Jordan's River Came Our Lord"

Biblical citations in the hymnal:  Matthew 3:13-17, Hebrews 2:17, Luke 4:18, 2 Corinthians 5:21

Matthew 3:13-17:  "13 Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him.  14 John would have prevented him, saying, 'I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?'  15 But Jesus answered him, 'Let it be so now, for this it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.'  Then he consented.  16 And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; 17 and behold, a voice from heaven said, 'This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.'"

Hebrews 2:17:  "Therefore he [Jesus] had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people."

Luke 4:18:  "'The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed...'"

2 Corinthians 5:21:  "For our sake he [God] made him [Christ] to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."

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The Matthew 3 text is the basis of the hymn, especially the first four verses, which simply narrate Jesus' baptism.  The line "The God from God, the Light from Light" in the first verse seems to come from the second article of the Nicene Creed, specifically "God of God, Light of Light."

The other Biblical texts cited start to appear in the fifth verse.  The first two lines are "The Father's word, the Spirit's flight / Anointed Christ in glorious sight," which connect to Luke 4:18 (the "anointed" specifically).  Christ is anointed "To save the world and free us all," which could really be drawn from any of the last three Biblical citations.  In the sixth (and last) verse, there's the line "This man is Christ, our substitute," which - again - could come from either Hebrews 2:17 or 2 Corinthians 5:21.

"Min Själ og Aand" (TLH #48)

"Oh, for a Faith That Will Not Shrink"

One of the hymns in a church service last year (I think it was the Tenth Sunday after Pentecost) was "Oh, for a Faith That Will Not Shrink" (#396 in The Lutheran Hymnal).  The last verse is:

Lord, give us such a faith as this;
And then, what'er may come,
We'll taste e'en now the hallowed bliss
Of an eternal home.

The last line is sung to this musical phrase (from the tune "St. Peter"):

The tune is in Eb major, and the last note is an Eb.  This is the tonic - or "home" - note of that key, so "home" in the text is sung to the musical home of the tune.

LSB #404 "Jesus, Once with Sinners Numbered"

Biblical citations in the hymnal:  Isaiah 53:12; Matthew 3:13-17; John 1:29, 36; Galatians 4:4-5

Isaiah 53:12:  "Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors."

Matthew 3:13-17:  "13 Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him.  14 John would have prevented him, saying, 'I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?'  15 But Jesus answered him, 'Let it be so now, for this it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.'  Then he consented.  16 And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; 17 and behold, a voice from heaven said, 'This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.'"

John 1:29:  "The next day he [John the Baptist] saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, 'Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!'"

John 1:36:  "and he [John the Baptist] looked at Jesus as he walked by and said, 'Behold, the Lamb of God!'"

Galatians 4:4-5:  "4 But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons."

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The line "Jesus, once with sinners numbered" (which appears in the first and fourth verses) comes from Isaiah 53:12 ("he... was numbered with the transgressors").  The rest of the first verse describes Jesus' baptism, related in Matthew 3:13-17.

John 1:29 and John 1:36 seem to be combined in the first two lines of the second verse: "John confessed Him as the Savior - / 'Look, the sinless Lamb of God!'"  However, the hymn goes on to reference John 1:26-27:  "26 John answered them ["priests and Levites from Jerusalem"], 'I baptize with water, but among you stands one you do not know, 27 even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.'"  In the hymn, this is rendered as "Yet he dared not loose the sandals / Of the One God's love had shod."  The hymn continues this feet theme in the next two lines: "Oh, how fair the feet of Jesus, / Bringing news of peace to us," which comes from Isaiah 52:7:  "How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, 'Your God reigns.'"

Galatians 4:4-5 is in the third verse, specifically "He, the chosen and anointed / Son of God, sent to redeem."

The second line of the fourth verse ("Full obedience was Your path") might come from Philippians 2:8, which also talks about Jesus' obedience:  "And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross."

"Ellers" (TLH #47)

This is in Ab major in the hymnal, but I transposed it to A major because that's a better key for mandolin.

"Word of God, Come Down on Earth"

Between transcribing "Word of God, Come Down on Earth" and recording the tune to which it's sung ("Liebster Jesu, wir sind hier"), I found a couple instances where the melody mirrors the text.

The first two lines of the first verse are "Word of God, come down on earth, / Living rain from heav'n descending."  For both of these lines, the melody (or a section of it) descends, giving a musical impression of that "com[ing] down" and "descending":

The first line of the second verse is "Word eternal, throned on high," in which "eternal" is sung with a melisma.  That there are four syllables rather than two gives something of an idea of that long period of time.

The last line of the second verse is "Speak to us, Your love outpouring."  Similar to the first two phrases, the melody here descends, musically representing that "outpouring":

LSB #403 "O Savior of Our Fallen Race"

Biblical citations in the hymnal:  John 1:1-5, 14; 2 Corinthians 4:6; John 14:6

John 1:1-5:  "1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  2 He was in the beginning with God.  3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.  4 In him was life, and the life was the light of men.  5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it."

John 1:14:  "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth."

2 Corinthians 4:6:  "For God, who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,' has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."

John 14:6:  "Jesus said to him [Thomas], 'I am the way, and the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.'"

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The first verse comes from John 1:1-5.  Both mention Jesus as a "light [that] shines in the darkness" (or simply "Brightness" in the hymn) and who was "in the beginning with God" ("Before the world knew day or night").

2 Corinthians 4:6 seems to be in the second verse.  Again, there's an image of light ("O Jesus, very Light of Light, / Our constant star in sin's deep night"), and while this - like the first verse - could be from John 1:4-5, there's an additional element of guiding or direction, which also seems to be the case with 2 Corinthians 4:6.

The third verse comes from John 1:14, specifically "Your put our human vesture on / And came to us as Mary's son," and John 14:6 is in the fourth verse, specifically "Salvation comes from You alone."

"Darwall's 148th" (TLH #46)