I have been hearing and singing hymns the entirety of my memory. These hymns that were sung out of hymnals helped form my love of music and an expression of the faith I was raised within. The old hymns are and always will be a major part of my life.
The vast majority of hymns that I grew up learning and singing were from the Baptist Hymnal. It was a blue canvas hardback with gold inlay on the front identifying the book as such. From my research I believe the hymnal my church used was published in 1956, the year of my birth. The 1956 copyright of this hymnal pretty much coincides with the creation of Ruskin Heights Baptist Church where I attended. This was the hymnal that I was raised on.
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| Baptist Hymnal (1956) |
I came to know this book very well. In the back it contained "The Church Covenant". This covenant spelled out an oath of sorts in what the church's role was in relation to it's members and what the members role was to the church. It also had around a hundred or so responsive readings that were designed as a way for the church as a whole to read scripture together about a Biblical topic. These were in the format of the leader reading a paragraph with the congregation responding by reading the next paragraph.
There were many hymns in this book that I don't think were ever sung by the church. Then there were hymns that were THE hymns. The classics. The hymns that Christians of every protestant religion knew. The Christmas carols and the songs for Easter that were mainly sung once a year. The hymns that had been around for a hundred years or more. Softly and Tenderly, Sweet Hour of Prayer, Blessed Assurance and so many others.
We usually sang only three verses of a hymn for some reason. Most hymns have four verses and a chorus. We more often than not sang the first two verses, skipped the third and sang the fourth. I have no idea why. I knew this book so well I knew the number associated with the hymn. Hymn number 188 was Amazing Grace. Hymn number 1 was Holy, Holy Holy and so on. Overtime I unknowingly memorized the verses from these hymns, memorize every word and this is what I want to write about.
As I grew into my teenage years without realizing it these hymns became almost meaningless in an unconsciousness kind of way. I knew the words. Honestly for most of the songs we sang, the hymnal was not required. Back in those day, they didn't have a big screen in front of the church with the words spelled out. If you wanted to sing in church, you either knew the song, or if it was an odd song that didn't get sung very often you need to open up the hymnal. You kind of had to make an effort in those days to know the words that were supposed to be sung.
Over the last 15 or 20 years in many churches the hymnal has disappeared. In the modern day church the old classic hymns are not sung very often. (As an aside, in the modern day church, most do not even have choirs, which I feel is a loss to the worship experience.) Hymns have been replaced by "choruses". These are modern day songs written fairly often. They do seem to present the basic foundation for the theology of the church, but unlike the old hymns, they have not stood the test of time yet. It is this new form of hymn that has dislodged choirs from the church being replaced by a band, for lack of a better term, consisting of whatever instruments the church members who are willing to perform can play. Usually there is a guitar and a piano, more than likely a bass and sometimes drums are included. The church organ is not found in these new churches and I find that very sad. The sound of a Sunday morning organ playing old hymns resides in my mind as one of the most beautiful sounds there is.
Now the moment I experienced that brings about this writing.
The church that I now attend sings these new choruses a lot and they use the big screen in front of the church to display the words of the songs. One thing I do appreciate about this church though is that they consistently sing one of the "old hymns" from days gone by. Sometimes they sing two but most of the time it is a single one. I look forward to that moment in the service when I hear the old familiar tune of a song from my entire life start to be played. I do not have to look at the screen for the words as they are still etched in my memory and it feels like a service from long ago.
April 15, 2022 was Good Friday. The church had a Good Friday service that night. They have these special services every year on Christmas Eve and Good Friday. It is a time to set aside and focus totally on the Christian meaning and significance of the holiday we are about to celebrate.
The sanctuary was darkened with the lights turned down low as the pianist played quietly in a smoothing manner. I sat in my place on the back row as I usually do and on this night I did some deep looking into myself meditating on where life had led me over the last 65 years. I thought about where I was in life and how I got here and the role that God had played for me during that journey.
After everyone had settled down and the sanctuary had quieted the piano came to a soft silence. The music director stood up and and asked everyone to join him as we began our worship. As always the words to the first song for the evening went up on the big screen.
The words were the lyrics to one of my old favorite hymns When I Survey the Wondrous Cross. The piano began an intro to the song and the people began to sing this beautiful hymn. For me, though, my eyes landed and stuck to that screen and the words that were on it. Ordinarily in a case like this I would close my eyes, sway to the music and sing the words I knew oh so well. Not that night. I read the words for probably the first time in who knows how many years. I put the words together in my mind and for the first time in a very long time found myself searching for the meaning of those words. This song told a powerful message. It was a testimonial of the faith and belief of the writer. The writer of this hymn had given his testimony to possibly a billion people over the years. His testimony was strong. It was meaningful. It set out a blueprint for how I should look at the significance of this moment, I read each and every word of that old hymn and realized I had lost all meaning to what it was saying over the years. This hymn, one of my childhood favorites and through the rest of my life, had become just words. The meaning of those words had faded with time. As I re-interpreted the words and what they meant I felt a familiar feeling from my childhood when that hymn had become special to me. I felt a lump in my throat, I felt a gratefulness and a thankfulness for the testimony that the writer was relaying and felt the old familiar meaning of it deep within myself.
That night they sang only the old hymns that I had grown up with. I did not sing a word. I stared at the screen during every song breaking down the meaning and the message of each of them. They were all familiar songs from my childhood. The Old Rugged Cross, In the Garden, Low in the Grave He Lay and with each of these songs I found the meaning and message that I had found as a child and had lost through being too familiar with the song. The words had come back to life. The songs re-emerged into my mind as something of the essence of my belief and my faith.
I look at that big screen at church very differently on Sunday mornings now. I search the words to find each individual message that each song is telling. I even do that for the choruses.
Good Friday 2022 was an eye opening experience for me. It was one of the most important Good Friday's I have experienced. I am so thankful for all of the songwriters who give their testimony in song to more people than they could ever possibly imagine.
