"Now Greet the Swiftly Changing Year"

A couple years ago, I noticed some features in "Now Greet the Swiftly Changing Year" (in the "New Year" section of The Lutheran Service Book), and I've been waiting until it was seasonally appropriate to write about.

The hymn is sung to the tune "Sixth Night."  Here's the first phrase:

The first line is "Now greet the swiftly changing year."  "Changing" is sung with a melisma (G F# G), giving something of a sense of its meaning.

In the fourth verse, the text is "His love abundant far exceeds."  Here, "far" is sung with a melisma (G F#), giving a sense of degree.

The first musical phrase is repeated as the second musical phrase, and the fourth verse continues with the line "The volume of a whole year's needs."  Here, "whole" is sung with the same melisma, providing a sense of that entirety.

In the fifth verse, the second line is "In want and in prosperity."  "Prosperity" is sung with a melisma (A G F# G E), providing a sense of that abundance.  Incidentally, "In want and in prosperity" is a merism.