Collects and other Extra$

As I pondered and relished the great content of the Collect for this past Sunday, and as I reflected upon the richness of the Collects that belong to the saints as they have been handed down through the generations, I thought that I would check in LSB to see how the “new” hymnal offers these to those who look to the hymnal for their devotional resource.  To my great dismay I discovered that the new LC—MS hymnal does not make these rich treasures of the Church available to the people.  Rather, the people must purchase them at an additional cost, AND, they must obtain permission to use them.

According to the LC-MS’s highly regarded and praised Pastor Weedon in his post entitled Collects Revisited :

     Live and learn. A good friend told me today that CPH holds the copyright on the collects in LSB, and therefore that I cannot legally publish them on my blog. Sorry about that, folks. I know, it seems utterly silly - how can a publishing house copyright the ancient collects of the Western Church?

He additionally says:

     I am still waiting to see if the collects from TLH are under copyright; again, since most of them are directly out of the Book of Common Prayer, I don't know how they could be.

Well, CPH did copyright TLH and for many years told the people that they were not free to use the material, even though the Preface on page two clearly gives open permission to one and all to use all of the material freely.

What was the LC-MS and CPH thinking?

In the name of the $ and of the $ and of the $!!!

TLH also has all of the Collects listed in the section entitled: “Introits, Collects, and Graduals for the Church Year.”

Why was this done?

Again, this is clearly stated in the Preface on page two, which I shall reproduce again here:

I. N. I.

     The Lutheran Hymnal is intended for use in church, school, and home. The committee entrusted with the task of compiling and editing has earnestly endeavored to produce a hymnal containing the best of the hymnodical treasures of the Church, both as to texts and tunes, in accord with the highest standards of Christian worship. It is our sincere prayer that these treasures may be cherished by God's people wherever the English tongue is used in public or private worship. We have freely used whatever we found of value and, by way of acknowledgment, have carefully indicated all sources. In turn, we freely offer for the use of others all original contributions or translations made by the committee as such or by its individual members.
     "Unto Him that loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father: to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever! Amen."

     THE INTERSYNODICAL COMMITTEE ON HYMNOLOGY AND
     LITURGICS FOR THE EV. LUTH. SYNODICAL CONFERENCE
     OF NORTH AMERICA

In LW the material was copyrighted without any permissions given in the preface, but at least these treasures were included in the hymnal for the use of the people in the regular congregating for the divine service and also in their personal devotions.

But LSB completely omits these, in addition to copyrighting them.  Having thus stolen them from the people they offer to sell them separately for four dollars per copy, here, explaining how generous, thoughtful, and accomodating they are here.  They add this warning and disclaimer:

It has been designed to be of such a size that it could easily fit in the back of a Pew Edition of Lutheran Service Book, but it should be mentioned that doing so may potentially stress and/or break the binding of the Pew Edition itself.

This breaks my heart.  But then, this is exactly what one would expect from the LC-MS and CPH.  It makes me ashamed to have to admit that for most of my life that I was a partaker of the activities of that church body.  Such things as this are why people become disillusioned with the Church and with the precious Gospel that is sold for silver and gold, actually, worse, for fiat money.  I cannot even begin to give an accounting for the number of people that I have met who express such disillusionment and resultant distrust and unbelief on account of such ways of the LC-MS and the mainstream incorporated churches.

Yet the Church’s treasures are still available.  TLH has held them before the world for generations.  CPH has jacked up the price for new copies of TLH, but they can still be purchased.  Moreover, portions are now available for downloading on the Internet.  And once people obtain these for themselves, they are free to use them at will.

Thanks be to God that these treasures are available to us, if only we desire to use them.

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Quinquagesima

The Old Testament Reading appointed for Quinquagesima, the Last Sunday after the Epiphany, is Isaiah 35:3-7.

     Strengthen ye the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees. Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not: behold, your God will come with vengeance, even God with a recompence; he will come and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing: for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert. And the parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water: in the habitation of dragons, where each lay, shall be grass with reeds and rushes.

Especially enlightening is a literal translation of verse 4:

     Say to the hasty of heart, “Be strong! Fear Not! Behold your God! Vengeance will come, recompense of God! He will come and save you!”

Here is what Dr. Luther wrote in his commentary on this passage of Holy Scripture:

     3. Strengthen the weak hands. This is wonderful comfort that is to be understood not in a physical but in an internal sense, because it shines under the appearance of the cross. For this church of Christ is extremely poor and wretched in appearance, since its poor, distressed, naked, imprisoned, and dishonored are the refuse of all and loathsome to all men for the sake of Christ’s name. And the members of the church are exposed to all, to Satan and to the craftiness and power of the world and the flesh. They are like “the offscouring of the world” (1 Cor. 4:13). It is as if people were saying: “They are to be regarded as a misfortune and a monster. If we could only be rid of these scoundrels.” With all their might they exert themselves to expel and exterminate this utterly loathsome Christian people. So we see today that all the most criminal people are less disturbed than the members of this church. Therefore the inward joy of the spirit fights with the grief of the body exposed to the cross. Therefore the prophet comforts them with exceedingly great consolations. Strengthen. This is a command. As long as Satan is awake he will not stop attacking us. It is for us to stand in the battle line against his stratagems.
     Weak hands, hands that are so weary. Give medicine to those hands so that you become strong again. For Satan has two ways of fighting. He would gladly cast the faithful down suddenly from their joy and faith and into fear and despair. Secondly, he cunningly strives by long lasting torments and by the unremitting pressure of the torments to tire them out. It is as Cyprian confesses: “Satan did not want the captive brothers to be killed in this life, but he preserved them in a long life and distressed them with unremitting aggravation to the point of exhaustion.” These are extremely powerful attacks. Against Satan’s continuous attack we must set our continuous divine help. The devil is a spirit at leisure and thinks of nothing but to take us by storm. We ought not have slack and idle hands over against his deceptions. Have we not experienced in these ten years how he tried by various forces to frighten us away from faith in the Gospel? First through the terrors of the papists, then through the world’s disgrace, then through murdering tyrants, through the fanatics, the schismatics, and fatherly flatteries. The church must diligently oppose his stratagems.
     4. Say to those who are of a fearful heart. ln Hebrew: “To those who are hasty and speedy in heart,” who are not steady and firm but want to run away and give Satan the victory.
     Be strong. We ought to strengthen ourselves with these words and say, “Though all devils were rolled into one, my God is still greater.” The afflicted must be comforted with such spiritual consolations of the Word, not with any fleshly comfort which does nothing for troubled consciences but with spiritual comfort and with the living Word of God they must be ruled and strengthened. Why? Because
     Behold, our God, etc. By those words he indicates that our God is absent but will come very quickly to avenge and save us. These are words of promise for the future, for God first permits people to condemn and persecute His church, as though He were absent, and then He will come very quickly, visit vengeance upon the adversaries and tumult upon the world, and save His church. This is truly hard for the flesh.
     With the recompense of God. He will come and save you. Do not avenge yourselves. He is the God of vengeance, He will fittingly requite them and save you. Thus we see that vengeance always comes before they carry out their plan. So Jerusalem, opposing the Word, was stormed by the Romans; then Rome perished, and so will our papists. Thus the Spirit comforts us, as if to say, “Remain godly and constant and be lifted up. The Lord will come in time of trial, and He will avenge and save you.” So he comforts the church that is exceedingly hateful to the world and Satan and besides does not shine with outward splendor. On the contrary, it is pressed down by a very heavy cross; it is also beset and harassed by a variety of internal evils, such as weakness of faith and falling into sin. Beyond all these, Satan, the tempter, fights against it.
     5. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened. In that time when the church will flourish in the midst of drought and will be cultivated in the desert, the blind will see plainly, etc. This is taken literally with reference to the miracles of Christ and the church, as we read in the last chapter of Mark (Mark 16:17, 18), signs that were necessary to confirm the new Word, signs that were added to the glory of the church, signs that are not done physically in the last time of the church, now that Christ is no longer weak. They were necessary then as a witness to the Jews, who ought to have recognized the church of God. Allegorically, in the time of the Gospel there were opened (1) the eyes of the blind, or ignorant, as we see happening today; (2) the ears of the deaf, who now accept the Gospel; (3) the lame walking in their own superstitions, as Isaiah calls all idolators lame, people who walk around in some sect of their own. They limp on one leg. They do not walk in an upright faith. Then, however, when they accept the Word by faith, they walk upright and leap for spiritual joy in Christ.
     (4) And the tongue of the dumb sing for joy, namely, it will glory in a strong confession, and the mercy of the Lord shown to us is proclaimed and boasted; and they will say: “See how God has rescued us from the darkness!”
     For waters shall break forth, that is, they are parted and distributed. As a spring flows forth in moistening streams, so this church, which was desert, should gush out in streams of the teachings of the Gospel, always one stream leaping from another into one city and then another, although in the eyes of the world it might seem forever desert.
     7. The burning sand shall become a pool, that is, where formerly there was total dryness, there will now be not only streams but also pools and springs. Thus the church will grow in such a way that elsewhere and in other places our streams will become springs. The Word of God will come in abundance.
     In the haunt, that is, where formerly the serpent was and the dragon reclined.
     The grass shall become reeds and rushes. Dragons and serpents like above all to be in dry places, as we see from experience today. As this was formerly a desert, most dreadful in dryness, but now because of the exceeding abundance of moisture has become a place where reeds and rushes grow, so there was nothing but heat, dryness, and ungodliness as long as the Word was absent, but now with the preaching of the Word it is moist and joyful. The serpents and dragons are those who teach ungodly things and with their most pestilential teachings take possession of men’s souls and consciences, like Erasmus, Zwingli, and Oecolampadius, whom also Christ calls a brood of vipers (Matt. 23:33). Our lazy bishops and clerics are not worthy of this name, yes, they are scarcely dung and vomit. In the haunts there will be the highest fruitfulness of the Gospel and of fertile hearts, which, having come to faith, are made fruitful by the Word, teach others with their gifts and help others participate. This is the fruitfulness and abundance of the Spirit.


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Quoted from:
     Luther, M. (1999, c1969). Vol. 16: Luther's works, vol. 16 : Lectures on Isaiah: Chapters 1-39 (J. J. Pelikan, H. C. Oswald & H. T. Lehmann, Ed.). Luther's Works (16:300). Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House.

Thanksgiving and the last singing of the Gloria in Excelsis

Yesterday, during the divine service, I had the nagging awareness that this would be the last time that we would be singing the Gloria in Excelsis (Glory to God on high) until Christmas Eve. This is the song of the announcement of the birth of the Savior that the angels shared with the shepherds in the region of Bethlehem. The words of the angels begin with the pastor chanting: “Glory be to God on high.” The congregation completes the announcement, chanting: “And on earth peace, good will toward men. . . .” It is the glorious announcement that with the birth of the Prince of Peace, peace now resides upon the earth in accord with God’s good will toward men, the great love of God that moved Him to provide Jesus as the Savior of sinful mankind.

The season of Advent is penitential and preparatory for the advent/coming of the promised Savior. Thus, the Gloria in Excelsis is omitted during this season to help us remember what is missing apart from being Baptized into the Holy Communion of the Christ. He is the one who comes to restore what sin has stolen away from mankind.

The Church Year is designed to carry us through the promises of the Holy Scriptures, beginning with the Advent of Jesus and ending with His return at the Last Day. Thus Advent is a preparatory time, reminding us that Jesus was promised as the cure for sin and its consequences and came to the world in the fullness of time, born of the virgin in Bethlehem. He continues to come to His Church on Earth with the healing of forgiveness and the renewal of reconciliation into His Holy Communion through the Holy Supper. And He will come again at the Last Day to bring to completion all that He began in the garden with the promise to the first two needy sinners, as He comes to separate those who refused His grace from those whom the Holy Spirit through faith has gathered into the Holy Communion of the body of Christ.

Therefore, though I always feel a bit of a sting with the departure of the Gloria in Excelsis from the liturgy, I benefit from what it teaches me concerning my great need and God’s greater fulfillment of that need, not only for me, but for all of mankind. It moves me to never ending thanksgiving and it reminds me that this proclamation for all the world needs to be proclaimed today so that those for whom God has provided His peace may be brought into it through the working of the Holy Spirit in connection with the Word.

Advent is a wonderful time as we prepare for the joyous announcement of “Peace on earth, good will toward men.”

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By the way, yesterday’s sermon has been posted.

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Laetare

Laetare is the Fourth Sunday in Lent. Below is the Collect of the Day for Laetare:

Grant, we beseech Thee, Almighty God, that we, who for our evil deeds do worthily deserve to be punished, by the comfort of Thy grace may mercifully be relieved; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end.

As I observe the historic liturgy of the Church, with the depth of riches that we have received through it, I often find myself wondering whether anyone really pays attention to what the Lord gives to us and declares to us through it.

This marvelous prayer holds before us the reason for Laetare, that is, for a Sunday within the season of Lent in which we are called together with the theme: Rejoice!

Lent is a season of the Church Year in which we direct special attention to our need for the repentance or turning that the Lord works for us and within us. It is a season of deep awareness of the proper contrition that we should experience on account of our sinfulness and also for our actual sins both of commission and omission. It is a season in which the Law of God is held before us in ways that cannot easily be ignored, showing us the horrible depths of our lost condition. It is a season in which our need for salvation, for forgiveness, for reconciliation, for justification and sanctification, is made paramount. It is a season for looking to the great mercy of God in Christ displayed and brought to fulfillment in the suffering, death, and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Collect for Laetare very powerfully directs our hearts, minds, and souls to this ever needful awareness. It also produces in us Laetare, the rejoicing that is not deceptive, but founded in and upon the very foundation of the one true faith by which we have true cause for rejoicing. The comfort of God’s grace is truly our one reliable source of relief, relief that produces endless rejoicing in the Lord.

It certainly seems to be worthy of continual reflection throughout this week, praying it again and again so as to built up in the answer that God has promised and most assuredly bestows in Christ.

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The Reason for the Season - Revisited

With the Season of Christmas upon us, my thoughts ran once again to the saying: “Jesus is the Reason for the Season!” In 2006 I wrote on this in the post: The Reason for the Season.

This year I have revisited those thoughts, yesterday even as I climbed and trimmed a large oak tree, and I realized something more. Previously I had concluded that Jesus is not the reason for the season, but we are, as I explain in my 2006 post. But as I pondered this anew, reflecting in part upon the fact that most people do not even know when the season of Christmas begins, as well as the good intentioned invention of the misguided slogan that Jesus is the reason for the season, I came to realize that Jesus IS the Season!

Much more can be said in this regard, but for now, it is worthy of pondering that Jesus is the season and we are the reason.