So the first Sunday of the month, I always print the full hymn text as we will eventually sing it. Even though we may not sing all stanzas every Sunday, individuals are offered the chance to take that first insert home and work on memorizing the whole thing.
Of course YOU aren't surprised by the third stanza about battles and fighting and such, since as the people who read hymn blogs, you know almost everything there is to know about hymns already; but the congregation sure was surprised, since mention of Christian-as-warrior, even though it doesn't mean we should literally take up swords to hack our enemies, is removed from most P.C. hymnals. But you knew that.
Here's a little review:
Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart;
naught be all else to me, save that Thou art.
Thou my best Thought by day or by night;
waking or sleeping, Thy presence my Light.
Be Thou my Wisdom and Thou my true Word;
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord;
Thou my great Father, I Thy true son;
Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.
Be Thou my Battle Shield, Sword for the fight;
Be Thou my Dignity, Thou my Delight;
Thou my soul’s Shelter, Thou my high Tower:
raise Thou me heavenward, O Power of my power.
Riches I heed not, nor man's empty praise;
Thou mine Inheritance now and always:
Thou and Thou only, first in my heart;
High King of heaven, my treasure Thou art.
High King of heaven, my victory won,
May I reach heaven's joys, O bright Heaven's Sun!
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
still be my Vision, O Ruler of all.
6 comments:
Hi Rebecca, Bryan Park here. (It's been a while!)
One of the things I love about my current church, Tenth Presbyterian Church (www.tenth.org) (PCA) is that we always sing all the stanzas of hymns. I'm sure I've mentioned this before. Whenever we sing this hymn, I don't have to look at the hymnal for four of the verses, but since our hymnal (Trinity Hymnal) includes five stanzas, I always have to look for that third verse. How are you by the way? I'm well. I've decided to go deeper into the composers I already love, so I've been listening to a lot of Brahms, Bach, and Purcell recently.
Reminds me of the recent foray into "Holy, Holy, Holy" after about 40 years.
I still remember the verses, but what I read in the OCP hymnal was not what I remembered.
V2. Holy, Holy, Holy, all the saints adore thee. Casting down their golden crowns upon a crystal sea.
What I remembered.
V2. Holy, Holy, Holy, all the saints adore thee. Through the eye of sinful man, thy glory may not see.
Quite a change. But it's going back. Sin made its way into the third verse, I believe.
Bryan! Dean and I just prayed for you and a few other college friends yesterday. Is Tenth Presbyterian Philip Ryken's church? PCA people are pretty good about singing all stanzas of hymns--they have a hearty theological tolerance and don't mind a bit of work--and I would venture to guess Leland Ryken's son is aware of the literary flow of stanzas! However, let's keep in mind that you're singing all the PUBLISHED stanzas; perhaps the authors, a la Charles Wesley, have written dozens of stanzas, only a few of which made it into your hymnal.
We're doing well. In a later post, I'll write a little more about getting in depth to Bach.
I'm so glad you checked into this blog. Please do keep in touch. You can also send a personal email sometime to "hymnnotesatyahoodotcom".
Thank you, Tony, from catholicpillowfightdotcom! Yeah, I know that verse about "sin" and "man"; old Heber had a sterner view of God. The Episcopal Hymnal 1982 includes this stanza but alters it to "though the sinful human eye". Sigh.
Hello. I stumbled across your blog while looking for that "lost" stanza in Be thou My Vision that disappeared from my hymnal. My name is David and we are studying church history over the next few weeks. I think that music has been such an important part of church history. As we go along in our study I would like to present some important or historical or just noteworthy hymns along the way. Do you know of a sort of time chart or resource that might help that has hymns arragned by date? Thank you.
Thank you, David, for your comment and interest! Hymnody is so vast that I don't know of any convenient time chart. HOWEVER, one of the better (and simpler) resources for matching hymns to eras of church history is found in "Hymns: A Congregational Study", a notebook by James R. Sydnor. The Student's Edition should be sufficient for your needs. Chapter 4, "The History of Congregational Song", is most pertinent for you. You can call The Hymn Society in Boston (1-800-THE HYMN) for more information.
Personally, I've taught a course for church musicians which explores how different hymns are illustrative of their time periods within church and world history. I would be happy to respond if you want to send me a direct email to hymnnotesatyahoodotcom.
Where are you studying church history? Do you need a couple hymns related to a particular era to get you started?
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