Wednesday, November 25, 2009

We Gather Together

Thanksgiving is tomorrow! Many of you will be traveling "over the river and through the woods" to be with family and friends - while others may be just headed "up the road apiece" as my grandmother says.

Prayers for safe travels and a blessed time of family and fellowship -and thanksgiving - during the Thanksgiving holiday! Amen (and pass the creamed onions!)


We Gather Together

Text: Nederlandtsch Gedencklanck; trans. by Theodore Baker
Music: 16th cent. Dutch melody; arr. by Edward Kremser (1838-1914)

Click here to listen an arrangment by pianist Michael Faircloth
used with permission of MDF Music

We gather together
to ask the Lord's blessing;
he chastens and hastens
his will to make known.
The wicked oppressing
now cease from distressing.
Sing praises to his name,
he forgets not his own.

Beside us to guide us,
our God with us joining,
ordaining, maintaining
his kingdom divine;
so from the beginning
the fight we were winning;
thou, Lord, wast at our side,
all glory be thine!

We all do extol thee,
thou leader triumphant,
and pray that thou still
our defender wilt be.
Let thy congregation
escape tribulation;
thy name be ever praised!
O Lord, make us free!

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Sing to the Lord of Harvest

Words: John S. B. Monsell, 1866
Music: St. Edith, Justin H. Knecht, 1799, and Edward Husband, 1871
Alternate Tunes: Blairgowrie, John B. Dykes, 1872 or Lancashire, Henry T. Smart, 1835


Sing to the Lord of harvest,
Sing songs of love and praise;
With joyful hearts and voices
Your alleluias raise.
By Him the rolling seasons
In fruitful order move;
Sing to the Lord of harvest,
A joyous song of love.

By Him the clouds drop fatness,
The deserts bloom and spring,
The hills leap up in gladness,
The valleys laugh and sing.
He filleth with His fullness
All things with large increase,
He crowns the year with goodness,
With plenty and with peace.

Bring to His sacred altar
The gifts His goodness gave,
The golden sheaves of harvest,
The souls He died to save.
Your hearts lay down before Him
When at His feet you fall,
And with your lives adore Him,
Who gave His life for all.

To God the gracious Father,
Who made us “very good,”
To Christ, who, when we wandered,
Restored us with His blood,
And to the Holy Spirit,
Who doth upon us pour
His blessèd dews and sunshine,
Be praise forevermore!

Monday, November 23, 2009

Now Thank We All Our God

Words: Mar tin Rink art, cir ca 1636; trans lat ed from German to English by Cather­ine Winkworth, 1856.
Music: Nun Danket, attributed to Jo hann Crü ger, 1647; harmony by Felix Men­dels sohn, 1840


Click here to listen.


Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices,
Who wondrous things has done, in Whom this world rejoices;
Who from our mothers’ arms has blessed us on our way
With countless gifts of love, and still is ours today.


O may this bounteous God through all our life be near us,
With ever joyful hearts and blessèd peace to cheer us;
And keep us in His grace, and guide us when perplexed;
And free us from all ills, in this world and the next!


All praise and thanks to God the Father now be given;
The Son and Him Who reigns with Them in highest Heaven;
The one eternal God, whom earth and Heaven adore;
For thus it was, is now, and shall be evermore.

Saturday, November 21, 2009

Come, Ye Thankful People, Come

Words: Henry Alford, 1844.
Music: George J. El vey, St. George’s Wind sor 1858



Come, ye thankful people, come, raise the song of harvest home;
All is safely gathered in, ere the winter storms begin.
God our Maker doth provide for our wants to be supplied;
Come to God’s own temple, come, raise the song of harvest home.

All the world is God’s own field, fruit unto His praise to yield;
Wheat and tares together sown unto joy or sorrow grown.
First the blade and then the ear, then the full corn shall appear;
Lord of harvest, grant that we wholesome grain and pure may be.

For the Lord our God shall come, and shall take His harvest home;
From His field shall in that day all offenses purge away,
Giving angels charge at last in the fire the tares to cast;
But the fruitful ears to store in His garner evermore.

Even so, Lord, quickly come, bring Thy final harvest home;
Gather Thou Thy people in, free from sorrow, free from sin,
There, forever purified, in Thy garner to abide;
Come, with all Thine angels come, raise the glorious harvest home.

Friday, November 20, 2009

For the Beauty of the Earth

Words: Fol li ot S. Pier point
Music: Con rad Koch er

Click here to listen an arrangment by pianist Michael Faircloth
used with permission of MDF Music

For the beauty of the earth
For the glory of the skies,
For the love which from our birth
Over and around us lies.

Refrain
Lord of all, to Thee we raise,This our hymn of grateful praise.

For the beauty of each hour,
Of the day and of the night,
Hill and vale, and tree and flower,
Sun and moon, and stars of light.
Refrain

For the joy of ear and eye,
For the heart and mind’s delight,
For the mystic harmony
Linking sense to sound and sight.
Refrain

For the joy of human love,
Brother, sister, parent, child,
Friends on earth and friends above,
For all gentle thoughts and mild.
Refrain

For Thy Church, that evermore
Lifteth holy hands above,
Offering up on every shore
Her pure sacrifice of love.
Refrain

For each perfect gift of Thine,
To our race so freely given,
Graces human and divine,
Flowers of earth and buds of Heaven.
Refrain

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Let All Things Now Living

Words: Katherine K. Davis, 1892-1980
Music: "The Ash Grove", a traditional Welsh melody.


Let all things now living a song of thanksgiving
To God the creator triumphantly raise.
Who fashioned and made us, protected and stayed us,
Who still guides us on to the end of our days.
God's banners are o'er us, His light goes before us,
A pillar of fire shining forth in the night.
Till shadows have vanished and darkness is banished
As forward we travel from light into light.

His law he enforces, the stars in their courses
And sun in its orbit obediently shine;
The hills and the mountains, the rivers and fountains,
The deeps of the ocean proclaim him divine.
We too should be voicing our love and rejoicing;
With glad adoration a Song let us raise
Till all things now living unite in thanksgiving:
"To God in the highest, Hosanna and praise!"

Click here to watch/listen

Keeping “Thanks” in Thanksgiving

It’s almost Thanksgiving!

In just a few short days – your classroom will be empty, the hallways quiet and the construction paper Thanksgiving decorations (doesn’t every classroom have a “cartoon” turkey abounding with colorful “I am thankful for . . .” feathers?) will be hanging on for just a few more days!

Once you return to school after the Thanksgiving break – it becomes “All Christmas . . all the time!” You will be busy helping your students make gifts for their parents (and trying to keep them a “secret”), planning the classroom party and replacing the brown and orange fall decorations with the red and green of Christmas. During the month of December, you will be intentional about keeping “Christ in Christmas” and teaching your students that “Jesus is the Reason for the Season.”

In the few remaining days before Thanksgiving, I would like to challenge you to be intentional about keeping “Thanks in Thanksgiving.”

  • As you teach the story of the First Thanksgiving, help your students understand the need for DAILY thanksgiving and “thanks-living.”
  • As you teach about God’s provision and protection for the early settlers, help your students understand God’s DAILY provision and protection in their lives.
  • As you teach about Thanksgiving (the event), let your students see you living a life of thanksgiving (the attitude)!
Each day between now and Thanksgiving, we will be posting a Thanksgiving hymn/song for you to use in your classroom! Sing it, read it, display it!

Why hymns? Because . . .

Hymns are “ . . . statements of faith, testimonies of struggle, failure and success, and confident declarations of hope. Carefully and lovingly crafted by their creators, they’ve been used by God’s Holy Spirit to challenge and encourage the souls of generations of believers. Some consider them antiquated and irrelevant to contemporary culture, but I’m confident these cherished expressions of our Christian faith – these hymns of grateful praise – will speak fervently for years to come.” (Michael Faircloth as written on the jacket of the album Grateful Praise: Hymns for Piano).

Enjoy the hymns and let’s keep the THANKS in THANKSGIVING!

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Log In and Listen!

No Greater Joy
2009 MACSA Convention
Keynote Sessions by Dr. Richard Swenson

Click here to download/listen to the three keynote addresses:
Please let me know if you have trouble with the downloads. All files are in MP3 format!