"God Loved the World So That He Gave"

At the beginning of Worship Anew this week, Eric Kaschinske recited the second verse of "God Loved the World So That He Gave":

Christ Jesus is the ground of faith,

Who was made flesh and suffered death;

All those who trust in Him alone

Are built on this chief cornerstone.

As he was saying these words, I was playing the tune ("St. Crispin") in my head.  I realized that the last syllable of "cornerstone" is sung to the tonic note, and because this is the musical center, there's a sense of that firm foundation.  Here's the musical phrase for the last line:

LSB #571 "God Loved the World So That He Gave"

Biblical citations in the hymnal:  John 3:16, Titus 3:4-7, 2 Timothy 1:9, Matthew 9:2

John 3:16:  "'For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.'"

Titus 3:4-7:  "4 But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, 5 he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life."

2 Timothy 1:9:  "who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began"

Matthew 9:2:  "And behold, some people brought to him a paralytic, lying on a bed.  And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, 'Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven.'"

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The text is public domain:

God loved the world so that He gave

His only Son the lost to save,

That all who would in Him believe

Should everlasting life receive.

Christ Jesus is the ground of faith,

Who was made flesh and suffered death;

All then who trust in Him alone

Are built on this chief cornerstone.

God would not have the sinner die;

His Son with saving grace is nigh;

His Spirit in the Word declares

How we in Christ are heaven's heirs.

Be of good cheer, for God's own Son

Forgives all sins which you have done;

And, justified by Jesus' blood,

Your Baptism grants the highest good.

If you are sick, if death is near,

This truth your troubled heart can cheer;

Christ Jesus saves your soul from death;

That is the firmest ground of faith.

Glory to God the Father, Son,

And Holy Spirit, Three in One!

To You, O blessèd Trinity,

Be praise now and eternally!

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The first verse of the hymn paraphrases John 3:16.  Part of the passage from Titus bears some similarity to this too, although it appears more clearly in the third verse ("His Spirit in the Word declares / How we in Christ are heaven's heirs.").

"Take heart" from Matthew 9:2 is referred to in both the fourth and fifth verses, specifically in the lines "Be of good cheer, for God's own Son / Forgives all sins which you have done" and "This truth your troubled heart can cheer."

2 Timothy 1:9 seems to appear at the beginning of the third verse:  "God would not have the sinner die; / His Son with saving grace is nigh."  For "God would not have the sinner die," I would also cite Ezekiel 18:23, 32; 33:11.

The image of Christ as the cornerstone in the second verse comes from Ephesians 2:19-21:  "19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord."

"God Loved the World So That He Gave"

A couple weeks ago, one of the hymns in church was LSB #571 "God Loved the World So That He Gave."  It was the 2nd Sunday in Lent, and John 3:16 - one of the Biblical sources for the hymn - was in the Gospel reading (John 3:1-17).  While singing the hymn, I noticed something about the pairing of the text and "St. Crispin," the tune to which its sung.  Not only is this specific to "St. Crispin" but also to the particular arrangement the tune has in The Lutheran Service Book (the same arrangement is also in The Lutheran Hymnal).

A couple years ago, I read John Eliot Gardiner's Bach: Music in the Castle of Heaven and learned about the practice of inscribing musical crosses into works.  Here's Gardiner's diagram of some crosses Bach inscribed in BWV 4: III:

Since learning about this, I've found quite a few of these cross inscriptions, and one of them is in the particular arrangement of "St. Crispin" in The Lutheran Service Book.  The second musical phrase - melody and harmony - is:

When isolated, the harmony part in the last two bars has a cross inscription:

Not only is there a cross inscription, but it has relevance when considered with the text.  For the first four verses of the hymn, the words that are sung to the melody above this cross inscription deal with the cross or the crucifixion:  "His only Son the lost to save," "Who was made flesh and suffered death," "His Son with saving grace is nigh," and "Forgives all sins which you have done."  God saves the lost through His Son's crucifixion; Christ "suffered death" on the cross; Christ's crucifixion is an illustration of God's "saving grace"; and it's through Christ's death on the cross that all our sins are forgiven.