Sunday, April 4th, 2021- Easter Sunday
Music for Sunday, April 4th, 10:30am Eucharist
Easter Sunday
Please arrive to rehearse at 9:15am
Processional Hymn: 207 Jesus Christ is risen today with Brass and handbells.
In place of a Gloria: Christ our Passover, by: Will C. MacFarlane with Brass
First Reading: Acts 10:34-43 or Isaiah 25:6-9
Psalm: Psalm 118, Mark Chaney’s setting
Second Lesson: Col. 3:1-4 or Acts 10:34-43
Before the Gospel: Alleluia 7 with brass and handbells
Gospel: Mark 16:1-8
Offertory Anthem: I was Glad, By: C. H. Parry
Doxology: Hymn 380, stanza 3
Holy: S125, Proulx
Communion Anthem: Alleuia, By: Randall Thomas
Communion Hymn: And Can it Be, with Brass
Recessional Hymn: 473 Lift High the Cross, Hal Hopson Arrangement with handbells
Music Notes By: Ashley Sosis
If you are coming back to church for the first time in a long time, welcome back and please come upstairs to say hi after the organ postlude!
I would like to thank the following musicians for their hard work, patience and dedication throughout Holy Week and Easter. We didn’t have a choir or handbells at Holy Week or Easter last year and this year we were blessed to include a small group of singers and ringers, masked, distanced, and stationary: Stella Acton-Greene, Paul Carotti, Matthew Cox, D Scott Ferguson, Janet Inman Haigh, Nancy Jarrett, Tim Koch, Sandra Lucas-Hyde, Kate McDaniel, Ann Monckton, Courtney Pendleton, George Sanderson, Sara Webb, and Larry Wilson! Many thanks also to our brass players enhancing this morning’s worship: Jason Coker, Jennifer Egan, Stephen Hand, David Howard and Esteban Pope We are also grateful to collaborative pianist Daniel Francis, who joined us for our 6pm Maundy Thursday service.
The organ pieces included in today’s service are an expression of joy!. As we face the closing months of our global pandemic, hopefully today’s postlude, a setting of “a mighty fortress is our God” is encouragement. Here are the words to the first two stanzas of chorale,
“A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing;
our helper he amid the flood of mortal ills prevailing:
for still our ancient foe doth seek to work us woe;
his craft and power are great, and, armed with cruel hate,
on earth is not his equal.
Did we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing;
were not the right man on our side, the man of God’s own choosing:
dost ask who that may be? Christ Jesus, it is he;
Lord Sabaoth his Name, form age to age the same,
and he must win the battle.”
”The Lord of the Dance” is a hymn written by English songwriter Sydney Carter in 1963. The hymn uses the same tune as the hymn, “‘Tis the Gift to be Simple”. The tune appears in the left hand after three pages of wild “dancing” between the right hand and feet. So much fun to learn and fitting for our joyful conclusion to Holy Week. Here are the words to “The Lord of the Dance.”
I danced in the morning when the world was begun
And I danced in the moon and the stars and the sun,
And I came down from heaven and I danced on the earth,
At Bethlehem I had my birth.
Dance, then, wherever you may be,
I am the Lord of the Dance, said he,
And I’ll lead you all, wherever you may be,
And I’ll lead you all in the Dance, said he.
I danced for the scribe and the pharisee,
But they would not dance and they wouldn’t follow me.
I danced for the fishermen, for James and John
They came with me and the Dance went on.
I danced on the Sabbath and I cured the lame;
The holy people said it was a shame.
They whipped and they stripped and they hung me on high,
And they left me there on a Cross to die.
I danced on a Friday when the sky turned black
It’s hard to dance with the devil on your back.
They buried my body and they thought I’d gone,
But I am the Dance, and I still go on.
They cut me down and I leapt up high;
I am the life that’ll never, never die;
I’ll live in you if you’ll live in me-
I am the Lord of the Dance, said he.
Happy, happy Easter and may our gracious God bless you with abundant joy today and throughout the Easter season!