Come, Ye Thankful People, Come

This week brings Thanksgiving, and we have a special Wednesday night service for the holiday at 7:00.  Many of us spend time this week cleaning, cooking, shopping, and catching up on schoolwork.  But in the midst of that flurry, it's important to take the time to reflect on our blessings and give thanks.  In the same way we gather with family, we should set aside time to gather as a congregation.  It allows us to express thanks for our church and community and God's blessings in our lives.

We'll be singing all the classic hymns of Thanksgiving and praise, including of course "Now Thank We All Our God."  That hymn tells us to praise God with heart and hands and voices.  Singing is explicitly part of the celebration, and I hope we'll have a full church making joyful noise together.

As a special treat, we have David returning to play trumpet.  A BW alumnus and frequent visitor to Bethany, he's back in town to visit family for the holidays.  He's currently studying trumpet performance at the Hartt School of Music at the University of Hartford.  We'll be playing several Baroque trumpet pieces by Telemann, and he'll also be playing along on many of the hymns and liturgy.

The choir will end the service with one of my favorite choral pieces, a setting of the Nunc Dimittis by Robert Scholz.  The text is sometimes referred to as the Song of Simeon, and it comes from the second chapter of Luke.  When Mary and Joseph bring Jesus to the temple, Simeon utters these lines:

Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace according to thy word.
For mine eyes have seen thy salvation,
Which thou hast prepared before all nations,
A light to lighten the gentiles and to be the glory of thy people Israel.

The text has a long tradition as part of compline or night prayer, and we'll be singing a particularly lyrical and beautiful setting of the text.  It will provide a quiet and contemplative ending, in contrast to the big hymns of praise.  I hope that we'll all depart into the dark night pondering the many reasons we have to be thankful this week.

Join us for Thanksgiving worship

Didn't it feel great to have a full church this past Sunday? By having only one service to accomodate the budget meeting, we really packed the pews. That created an energy and vitality in all aspects of the service, and I especially loved to hear the congregation singing with gusto, even on a relatively unfamiliar hymn.

I invite you all to help us fill the church again: tomorrow is our Thanksgiving Eve worship service at 7:00. We have some fantastic music planned, including guest trumpet players and a flashy arrangement of "Now Thank We All Our God" that I hope you'll love to sing.

The choir's anthem will be "Stay With Us" by Egil Hovland. It's a beautiful composition with lush chords and harmonies. The middle section with four-part women's harmonies is sung particularly well by our small group. I hope our congregation realizes that we are blessed to have such strong dedication from our choir (and we're always happy to welcome other to join us, of course!). The text of the anthem is based on the last chapter of Luke's Gospel, when Christ appears on the road to Emmaus and interprets the scriptures for his disciples. The text comes from the moment when Christ appears to be leaving, and they urge "Lord, stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over."

They proceed to eat dinner together, with Jesus blessing the meal. It's a quiet moment in the Gospel story, gathering together to give thanks and to comfort each other. The modern Thanksgiving tradition does similarly tend to be about coming together with family and friends (in contrast with the secural corruption of Christmas). However, don't forget that the true origin of the holiday is a day of prayer and thanks for the many blessings in our lives. Surely, we can take time out from cooking and cleaning to come to church for worship and fellowship!