Music for the 17th Sunday after Pentecost (Lectionary 25): September 24, 2023

OPENING VOLUNTARY Be Still My Soul (Finlandia)

setting, Franklin D. Ashdown

Few hymns have a more comforting text, or a gentler melody, than this beloved hymn by Catherina Amalia von Schlegel (1697 - 1768), with music by the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius (1865-1957).

Be still my soul, the Lord is on your side. . .

The Holy Spirit gathers us for worship and does not bid us to leave our cares behind or to "give them to Jesus." Rather, we bring them with us knowing that

. . .in every change he faithful will remain.

The hymn does not appear in Lutheran Book of Worship or Evangelical Lutheran Worship. It can be found in Lutheran Service Book, the hymnal of The Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod.

GATHERING HYMN As Saints of Old (Forest Green) ELW 695

HYMN OF THE DAY God's Work, Our Hands (Earth and All Stars) ACS 1000

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America held a contest inviting hymn writers to submit a new hymn for "God's Work. Our Hands" Sunday, September 13, 2019. Wayne Wold wrote the winning hymn, developing the denomination's tagline with other parts of the person God uses, listing concrete ways of manifesting God's presence for the world, confessing God's activity beyond the church's work, and inviting blessing on the church's work on behalf of the gospel. (From Sundays and Seasons)

MUSICAL OFFERING Gracious Spirit, Dwell with Me 

K. Lee Scott

COMMUNION HYMN God Be the Love to Search and Keep Me ACS 1084

Richard Bruxvoort Colligan wrote this hymn as a modern day lorica - a Celtic hymn/prayer for protection sung while putting on armor or clothing. Be Thou My Vision (ELW 793) is the best-known example of this form. The stanzas ask for Christ to be known in what animates life and faith, in the saints, in the elements, in physical space (as in another lorica I Bind Unto Myself This Day ELW 450), and in the people around the singer.
(From Sundays and Seasons)

SENDING HYMN Glorious Things of You Are Spoken (Blaenwern)  ELW 647

CLOSING VOLUNTARY What Is This Place 

setting, Wayne L. Wold  

Sources:

Wikipedia

Lutheran Service Book Companion to the Hymns
Sundays and Seasons