"Writing Case" [Born to Free] — Spotify Links

Here is the Spotify link to this new Christmas tune. 

And here is a Spotify link to the whole TMS discography.

"Writing Case" [Born to Free] — Post 2

So, what is this about a writing case? In Ezekiel 9, the prophet sees a man, a clear Christophany, dressed in linen and carrying a writing case who is told to pass through the city of Jerusalem and mark everyone who sighs (with dismay) over the sins committed in the city; this proto-baptismal mark, like the blood of the Passover lamb at the Exodus, plays a protective function, because the Lord was about to destroy the city, as he did the Egyptian firstborn in the tenth plague (a judgment upon Egypt for Pharoah's destruction of the male children of the Hebrew slaves). In short, those with this protective mark will be spared. Remember how the liturgy of the Sacrament of Baptism says: "child of the covenant, you have been sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked (!) as Christ's own forever." The water is applied, drips off, and dries, but the invisible, spiritual mark is permanent, yes, eternal, because the child of the covenant is now engrafted and incorporated into the very body of the Christ who has conquered death, himself the Resurrection and the Life. Baptism into Christ, in which he marks us as his own, is the death to sin that exempts us from a second, permanent death.

Meanwhile, Revelation (which frequently refers to the imagery we find in the book of Ezekiel) speaks of the Lamb's book of life (Rev 3:5; 13:8; 17:8; 20:12, 15; 21:27), a register of those whose names are written in heaven (Luke 10:20) and thus marked for salvation. [There is, of course, that other mark mentioned in the book of Revelation, i.e., the mark of the beast, universally recognized as the mark of those destined for a very different, unhappy end, but this is the happy opposite of that.]

NOTE (likely to be repeated): Although this track is available on most major streaming services, I actually use very few social media platforms; so, when it says, "Please share with those you love," I would be grateful if you would funnel this musical "Jesus prayer" to your loved ones by way of (copy and paste links to) any social platforms that you happen to use. Thank you for doing so. Thank you, as well, for going the extra mile to support indie authors and musicians by, not just liking, but sharing, purchasing downloads, spreading the word, etc. God bless you. God bless us, everyone.

"Writing Case" [Born to Free] — Post 1

New Christmas songs are not born every minute, nor every day, nor even every year; mostly we just hear the old ones rehashed again and again, some beautifully, some less so. The point is: once upon a time, "Joy to the World" (1719), "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" (1739), "Silent Night" (1816-18), and "O Little Town of Bethlehem" (1868) were brand new. The same is true, of course, of all the secular songs we have come to think of as seasonal staples, of which there is a seemingly endless stream of dumb covers.

This Christmas song, "Writing Case [Born to Free]," is new this year, A.D. 2024. It was written in less than a day, with the guitar setting coming on the evening of December 18, and the lyric in the early hours of the morning of December 19, 2024. A couple of stanzas from Rossetti's reading of Revelation got me started on the lyric, but only one or two of her (p.d.) turns of phrase made it through unaltered; no, by God's grace, it's my lyric. 

The guitar part is quite simple and was recorded in one take on December 19 (though this single take was shortened, since I repeated it more times than necessary). The vocals were recorded later that day, but I revised a few words, so I did a couple of quick retakes on Friday morning, December 20, with video running, as I awaited for the arrival of a contractor. (One does what one can in the comings and goings of life to "make the most of the time.") After another appointment, the guitar videos were done in the late morning and afternoon (but the afternoon shots were unusable for being too dark and badly framed), video edits in the evening, with a few early morning edits on December 21. The track was released on the morning of December 21. Start to finish, from chords to lyrics and melody to recording to editing to mixing to video to track release, less than 72 hours. All this is simply to say that, when the Holy Spirit has something to say, we do well to just go along and enjoy the ride. 

So, Merry Christmas, everyone. Happy birthday, Jesus. And welcome to the world, little song. May you, "Writing Case [Born to Free]," soon find yourself well-known and happily numbered in the beloved repertoire of sacred Christmas music. 

NOTE (likely to be repeated): Although this track is available on most major streaming services, I actually use very few social media platforms; so, when it says, "Please share with those you love," I would be grateful if you would funnel this musical "Jesus prayer" to your loved ones by way of (copy and paste links to) any social platforms that you happen to use. Thank you for doing so. Thank you, as well, for going the extra mile to support indie authors and musicians by, not just liking, but sharing, purchasing downloads, spreading the word, etc. God bless you. God bless us, everyone.

Oecolampadius, On the Easter Laughter

Benny Grey Schuster evidently issued his German rendering of this multilingual piece in 2019, but without any explicit reference to the Reformer in the title. It was called: Das Osterlachen. Darstellung der Kulturgeschichte und Theologie des Osterlachens sowie ein Essay über die kulturelle, kirchliche und theologische Verwandlung des Lachens. It was translated into German from the Danish version by Eberhard Harbsmeier. 

The English version appeared this year (2024) by Peter Lang, under the title: The History of Easter Laughter: Johannes Oecolampadius' 'De risu paschali' from 1518 with an Introduction, Annotated Translation, and an Account of the Cultural, Ecclesiastical, and Theological Transformation of Laughter.

Oliver Anthony knows which way is up

Which, one would think, ought to be the first qualification for going into ministry. 

[After reading this, my pitiful video play counts all of a sudden don't seem so bad.]

Revenant Psalms, Vol. IV

 

Released November 30, 2024. The video for the final track, Psalm 135 [Maker's Medley] will premiere at noon (CST) today, December 1, 2024. May it help keep you in a worshipful frame of mind, after church, throughout this Lord's Day, and always. [This is not a Christmas album per se, more of an Advent thing, I suppose, as are most of the Revenant Psalms, but ... Merry Christmas anyway. God bless us, everyone.]

Timely advice for small colleges.

 https://instapundit.com/686508/

December 1 is the anniversary of this monumental series and a good day to start reading one sermon per day

... or six sermons per week (leaving out Sundays, if you want to be exact), which will take you to Christmas Eve. 

This December 1 is the 501st anniversary of the beginning of the preaching of the series, which was published in 1524. (So in terms of publication, it is still the 500th, if anyone else is keeping track.)

Here is the hardcover at B&NPress, here is the paperback at Amazon, here is the Kindle, and here is the playlist of introductions to the series. See previous post for the soundtrack to the videos.

Backing tracks for The Reformation of Preaching

If you have enjoyed the soundtrack behind "The Reformation of Preaching," i.e., the 30-minute introduction to Oecolampadius' Sermons on the First Epistle of John, or the music in the short five-minutes introductions to the individual sermons, here is the record from which those instrumental tracks were taken.

The album is called The Great Western Road, named for the three-part guitar suite of the same name. That suite was written in stages in the period 1991-1994. Strange how some gifts come seemingly overnight or in a matter of minutes, while others take years and years. 

Playlist

So here is a growing playlist with all the tracks (five so far) from the forthcoming Revenant Psalms, Vol. IV, i.e., the singles that have been released with videos.  

Oecolampadius' Sermon on Luke 11 (Third Sunday in Lent, 1525)

Just finished translating this sermon preached in Basel in 1525. Here is the first sentence:

"The singular failing in which all misfortune occurs is ignorance of God and of ourselves. But if we knew how good and powerful he is, and indeed how wretched and weak we are, we would have instituted [institueremus] a much different life."

That sounds strikingly similar to the opening sentence of Calvin's Institutes, the first edition of which emerged eleven years later, in the same city. But to be fair, Oecolampadius' sermon was only published by his successor Myconius in 1536, the same year that Calvin's Institutes first appeared in Basel. But until I have time to investigate it, I can only imagine the conversations between the two (Myconius the editor and successor to the Basel reformation and Calvin the second generation Reformer who would make his way to Geneva). 

Here is another line from the sermon that should be instructive to everyone, especially preachers:

"... no one speaks properly who does not treat God as holy."

Amen to that.

Downstream from the great watershed

So they say politics is downstream from culture. OK. So what is upstream of culture, if not faith or some choice of "cult" (in the technical sense)? As Joshua said, "Choose this day whom you will serve." And where does faith emerge? Surely at the great watershed that is everywhere attested, between faith and sin (Romans 14:23b), between the way of the righteous and the way of the wicked (Psalm 1), between the water of life (Ezekiel 47; Revelation 7:17; 21:6; 22:1, 17) and the water or gall of bitterness (Numbers 5; Acts 8:23), etc. And what is upstream of faith? Faith proceeds from the Word, the promise of God; it is a gift of the Holy Spirit.

So if we are looking at a political reformation downstream, which many indicators suggest we are, what role do preachers have, what role the church, in guiding the stream of good and godly sources of faith into the formation of a genuine culture that is worth (re)building and preserving? As accountability begins to make its way through the media, the music industry, Hollywood, academe, etc., the church should not fail to supply what is needed — and quickly — from biblical and from the tried and true, the most trustworthy theological sources: the commandments and the covenant, the 3000-year-old "prayerbook of the Bible" (the Psalms), the entire NT, of course, the earliest ecumenical creeds (Apostles' and Nicene), children's catechisms, the Book of Confessions, etc. 

This, by way of reminder, is the vision and purpose of this website. If a corrupt culture is dying off and a corrupt political establishment is about to be banished from the swamp, if things are going to be (metaphorically) slashed and burned back to the very root or stump, remember: "the holy seed is the stump." (Isa 6:13)

Psalms 60 and 108 [Gird Up]

These two psalms overlap with a number of common verses, so I combined them into one track. The unique verses in Psalm 108 seemed to require a fresh and distinct musical section, hence the reggae (with photos of friends from my Jamaican chapter), after which the shared verses from Psalm 60 warranted a return to the previous setting, but a new tempo to set it apart from the first iteration. I hope you like it. Right now this is the leading candidate for the opening track on the forthcoming Revenant Psalms, Vol. IV.

A good reminder after any election, whatever the result

Another new track and video are in the pipe, but this 30+ year-old offspring came to mind this morning. It debuted through the Late Late Service (in something called the rolling magazine tent, if memory serves) at the Greenbelt Festival in 1993. I'm still so very grateful for the use of Andy Thornton's Jump Studio and his patient mixing and his generous addition of the ethereal speech tracks. We are made in the image of God, and the referent for that, we now know, is the Word of God. Among many other things, we are speech creatures or language animals as Charles Taylor puts it. Enjoy.

 

Psalm 28 [Carrier]

Same chord sequence in several different time signatures: 6/4, 4/4, and 5/8. The solo score at the end shows 4/4, but that is overlaid on the 5/8 section. Whatever. Just find the downbeat. 

 

Johannes Zwick's prayer "Before the Children's Service"

O God and Father of all fathers [parents], teach us!

O God and Father of all children, teach us!

O Lord of lords, teach us!

O Spirit, Teacher of Truth, teach us,

that we may join ourselves to the Holy Child Jesus, 

follow his example in all that we do,

grow in spirit, grace, and truth,

for the benefit of all Christians,

that together we children may adorn your Church and your Name.

O Lord God, teach us this!

— Johannes Zwick (1496—1542), translated by TMS from the Alsatian Evangelical Songbook [Evangelisches Gesangbuch für Elsasz] (Lothringen [i.e., Lorraine], 1907) p. 498. 

  

The music of Martha Christian

I had the occasion to speak with this talented singer/songwriter the other day. What a bright light she is. 

Check out her YT channel here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC78JzVBRutJbBRpasjqtEQA

And her Bandcamp site here: https://marthachristian.bandcamp.com/album/all-will-be-well

Suggested Strategies (for Reviving and Growing Your Congregation), Nos. 1-20

1. Read Psalm 127 and pray accordingly.

2. Use the various liturgies for the Reaffirmation of the Baptismal Covenant in the Book of Common Worship. I would suggest doing this every other month, or at least quarterly for the foreseeable future. These can be blended in easily with services that involve a baptism, or that remember Jesus' baptism (the Sunday after Epiphany), but also with services around the seasons of Lent (Ash Wednesday or First Lent) and Easter, as well as Pentecost, Trinity, World Communion, All Saints', etc. 

3. Adapt these services to include foot washing, no, not just at Maundy Thursday, but as often as you can persuade your session to support it, on retreats, in mid-week worship, in small group settings, etc. This is just a suggestion, and you can bet there will be resistance. But read John 13 and convince me that Jesus did not give us foot washing as "the" rite for the renewal of the baptismal covenant. It is simply stunning than no major liturgical resources acknowledge this. If we say we worship biblically, this needs to change.

4. Build a biblically literate bench of serious disciples of Jesus with a structured and intentional Bible reading plan. Make it fun, and look long term. Here is how I would do it (with a 3-1/2 year scope) using some of the resources I have been working on for the last 25 years or so.

• Gift everyone in the church with a copy of A Phenomenal Llama for Christmas Eve 2024.
• Recommend that everyone, at least your church officers and staff, start reading Sitometrion on Christmas Day and work through it (and the whole Bible, of course), from Christmas Day 2024 to next Christmas Eve 2025.
• Follow that with a reading of Phylakterion (a Kierkegaardian style novel that basically works its way into a commentary on Ecclesiastes, Colossians, and James). Do this between Christmas 2025 and Lent 2065.
• Do a Bible Study in Lent 2026 of Psalms 1 and 137, and read The Secret of Salix Babylonicus using the discussion questions prepared by Story Path. Follow this with a Renewal of the Baptismal Covenant, preferably including foot washing.
• Recommend that everyone, at least your church officers and staff, work through The Word at Work, starting the Second Sunday of Easter 2026 and concluding on Easter Sunday 2027.
• Recommend that everyone, at least your church officers and staff, read Oecolampadius' Sermon on the Vernacular (either in the B&NPress edition or in the back matter of A Short Course in Reformed Worship). Do this in the season of Easter 2027, before Pentecost 2027.
• Recommend that everyone, at least your church officers and staff, work through The Spirit at Work, starting at Pentecost 2027 and going through Trinity 2028.

5. In conjunction with working through the aforementioned reading plans, emphasize praying through the Psalter every 50 days using the skip-fifty sequence in those books. Encourage participants to journal their biblical reflections and even sermon or Bible Study ideas.

6. Set up playlists of Revenant Psalms on YouTube or Spotify or using Songwhip. Remember, you are invoking your Divine Protector according to the covenant and changing the spiritual atmosphere, filling it with psalms to replace the garbage that has been cluttering the culture, defiling the airwaves, and polluting the land for far too long, i.e., to replace it while so many predominant, vile, and overtly corrupt influences are eventually removed (though it may take a while). (We are talking about replacing a sick, collapsing culture here, not just a weak church, and if the culture is to be renewed, that renewal will flow from a renewed church. Yes, church is upstream from culture, which, they say, is upstream from everything else.) Play other arrangements of the psalms, too, of course, but do prioritize the Psalms themselves, as Paul does in Ephesians and Colossians. Hymns are fine, but for now, let the Psalms take priority.

7. Include an Invitation to Discipleship after every sermon for at least one year, starting with The Baptism of the Lord, announcing that catechism classes will be held through the season of Lent and baptism (or at least a renewal of the covenant) at Easter. Study the Lenten texts for Year A looking for (intentional) catechetical themes. Study the Lenten lectionary texts in Years B and C to determine how baptism might be better emphasized in these years. (This was an admitted weakness in the design of the RCL, so perhaps you can adapt or propose better texts for this season, when preaching in this season of preparation for baptism with Easter in view).

8. Study and share "Questions and Answers for the Examination of Children" and "Oecolampadius’ Public Confession of Faith" in Return to God. Integrate these Q&A's into your Children's Sunday school and youth programs, confirmation classes, and the "Public Confession" into your new member's classes. Also, visit the PCUSA's website for the 1998 children's catechism, linked here: https://www.presbyterianmission.org/wp-content/uploads/catechism1.pdf

9. Integrate Heinrich Bullinger, "What Every Christian Should Know," into your confirmation classes. This can be found among the Appendices to A Short Course in Preaching.

10. Design a new member's or confirmation class, or a congregation-wide Bible Study, using Oecolampadius' Sermons on the First Epistle of John (A Handbook for the Christian Life) and the series playlist of introductory videos here. 

11. Preach the whole counsel of God, using RCL + Year D <OR> a lectio continua expository approach.

12. Take or teach a lay ministry course in an area where your growing gifts and interests lie. 

13. Fill the pulpit in a neighboring small church with a scripture message. There are four at the end of Return to God.

14. Give A Coaltrain Bound for Christmas or A Phenomenal Llama to your neighbors in December and invite them to Christmas Eve services.

15. Do a sermon series or design and lead a Bible study based on a word study of the word "multiply/multiplication."

16. Examine your congregation's mission statement: Does it bear any relation to the Great Commission? Is there any chance that it substitutes the Great Commandment for the Great Commission? [Hint: A lot of churches have done just that. Oops.] Consider proposing to your church session that they experimentally and prayerfully suspend their congregation's mission statement for one, two, or three years and replace it with The Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20). Combine this with a preaching focus on baptism, catechesis, outreach, and renewal of the covenant. Revisit the mission statement after a significant period devoted to Matthew 28 (!) and consider extending this emphasis.

17. Study Micah 6 in light of Deuteronomy 10. How does Deuteronomy 10 supplement or flesh out Micah 6?

18. Read Matthew 25 (oracle of the sheep and the goats) from the perspective of the least brother. How does drawing a more honest distinction between siblings of Christ and unbelievers (those who are judged by their treatment of the siblings of Christ) cast a new light on your church's mission and prayer? Read "The Leverage of the Least," in The Good Confession. Isn't it liberating know that we are saved by grace through faith, not by works? Isn't it great to be a biped and a sibling to the King of kings and Lord of lords? Isn't it wonderful to have so much to be thankful for, including kindnesses shown to you by unbelievers? Foster a culture that gives thanks for these kindnesses, not affirming a lack of Christian faith or aberrant theology among unbelievers, but simply giving thanks for those who are peace-loving and kind.

19. Study the founding documents and figures of your congregation. How closely do your session's priorities reflect the original theology, mission, and vision for which the congregation was founded? What adjustments might need to be made?

20. Read Psalm 127 and pray accordingly.

Drop me a line and let me know how it's going. All of these resources have been mentioned repeatedly at various points in this blog, so feel free to use the search box to locate handy links. For my part, I will pray for any and all who undertake even a fraction of these suggestions and steward any proceeds (as I now do) in good faith (subject to the Lord of the conscience and in keeping with the Spirit of the Great Commission). God bless us everyone. 

Psalm 140 [Halleseni]

Psalm 140 [Halleseni] is the latest track from the forthcoming Revenant Psalms, Vol. IV. 

Use this link for streaming this and other tracks: https://songwhip.com/timslemmons

And here it is on video:

YouTube channels

There is some overlap between these two channels, but time does not permit consolidating them. If you like the Psalms settings or other guitar pieces, you know the drill: like, bookmark, subscribe, and share.

https://www.youtube.com/@timslemmons8474

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVQ-nVtSS1mawJCInwDacAA

Many thanks.—T

P.S. Also, please note whether playing a video registers in the YT play count. Color me suspicious. 

At the headwaters of the Reformed tradition

 ... we have this summary statement from Karl Barth's colleague on the Divinity faculty at the University of Basel: 

Luther becomes a reformer because he cannot reach the assurance of salvation in the system of the Roman Catholic church; Oecolampadius becomes a reformer because, in the Roman Catholic church, he does not find the new creature in Christ sufficiently realized. For Luther it is about justification; Oecolampadius says in connection with 1Thessalonians 4:3, “God’s will is our sanctification.” With Luther, faith stands in the foreground, with Oecolampadius, that which flows from faith, the “piety,” the “sanctity,” the “charity,” both individually and in the totality of the “mystical body of Christ.” Luther represents a Christianity more strongly characterized by Paul, Oecolampadius by John. 

—Ernst Staehelin, Breakthrough to the Reformation, pp. 128-129.

In case you were ever wondering what it means to belong to the Reformed tradition, this, I would suggest, is what it originally meant.

Otherwise known as "the immortality of the soul"

 ... which makes saving faith in the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ important in the extreme.

https://instapundit.com/676489/

A couple of articles on Zwingli's congregation-based Prophezei

 ... a version of which would seem to make good sense today in a seminary town.

https://adfontesjournal.com/pulpit-and-pew/scholarship-at-prayer-zwinglis-prophezei-and-the-pastoral-task/

https://bencrosby.substack.com/p/bring-back-the-prophezei 

Psalm 74 [Habbeth Labberith]

Here is the second single released from the forthcoming album, Revenant Psalms, Vol. IV.

You can select your favorite streamer here: https://songwhip.com/timslemmons/psalm-74-habbeth-labberith

Revenant Psalms, Vol. III

Here is a link to the eight-song playlist for the newly released Revenant Psalms, Vol. III.

Here is where you can stream or purchase it through your favorite streaming service:

https://songwhip.com/timslemmons/revenant-psalms-vol-iii

Psalms rendered on this volume are:

Psalms 7, 61, 94, 101, 102, 136, 141

NB: The even more newly-released Psalm 73 is the first single from the (Lord willing) forthcoming Volume IV. More on the way ...

"The God of peace be with you all."

Psalm 73 [Asaph's Dance]

 Stream or purchase Psalm 73 [Asaph's Dance] at:

 https://songwhip.com/timslemmons/psalm-73-asaphs-dance

A bookmark for the ages

With this bookmark, a number of aggregated posts pertaining to free speech (which is rather important for the integrity of preaching) and others that bear on the prophetic voice of preaching (specifically on whether preachers are fully informed of contrarian perspectives and certain demonstrable facts, whether they are aware of the need for social criticism that can reach above and beyond the categories we normally associate with that enterprise, etc.) ... these posts have at this juncture "reverted to draft" (as least back to the short essay on why it is important for preachers to "monitor" counter-narratives on current events).

The reach of this website is not sufficiently broad to warrant keeping up material that may distract those who wish to consult it for its foundational reason for being. But I will mark the occasion by putting a hypothetical scenario to the preacher/reader (even though I don't closely monitor comments here, so I cannot promise a reply): 

Imagine a sermon based on the following texts: 

• Ezekiel 3:16-21 (the prophet will be held accountable for failure to warn)
• John 16:12-15 (Jesus says there are some things his disciples are simply not ready to hear)

What would you call such a sermon? What would its focus statement be? What would you try to achieve by way of a sermon function? What would your main points be or your outline look like?

Psalm 7 [Shiggaion Chadash]

This psalm is designated a "Shiggaion" in its superscription, whatever that is. Strong's Concordance suggests it is "perhaps a wild passionate song with rapid changes of rhythm." Admittedly, this new setting—("Chadash" simply means "new")—has no dramatic rhythmic changes, but the intervals are a bit wild, and the sassy Dsus4/D trill (I'm talking chord shapes here, not actual notes) lends it a feel that seems worthy of the designation: shiggy. [But, please, let's not confuse it with the "shig" that is going on in west coast cities right now. Lord, have mercy.] 

Year D, by the way, recommends Psalm 7 for the Great Vigil of Holy Saturday and for 11th Ordinary.

5th Sunday in Lent

Here is the "official video" — that sounds so impressive, doesn't it? — for a new setting of Psalm 101 (my paraphrase), the setting of which I have entitled, "Royal Resolve." The instrumental sections are punctuated by a roll call—inspired by the line: "and the blameless I shall choose for my close companions"—naming those 24 worship leaders who are listed in 1Chronicles 25. Notice who appoints them and then ask yourself: Just how important is this business of singing the psalms? 

As a matter of historical (and perhaps even ominous and prophetic) interest, the short, blurry video clips of a sundog were taken on Sunday morning, January 3, 2021.

Year D recommends this psalm for the Fifth Sunday of Lent. 

Ash Wednesday Psalm (Year D)

Psalm 102 is one of the seven penitential psalms, three of which are unused by RCL, four if you count Psalm 143 as unused, which is only read at the Easter Vigil (ABC). Since Psalm 102 employs the imagery of ashes (for bread) and tears (for drink), it seemed an obvious choice for use on Ash Wednesday (which comes early this year, on February 14, 2024). 

Here, once again, is the new musical setting (with my paraphrase and chords), but this time with a few images and the text for congregational singing, if you and your flock are so inclined. 

This, BTW, is one of several singles released in advance of the forthcoming Revenant Psalms, Vol. III. That, eventually, is where (I hope) you will find it one day soon, but other duties call and there is no telling when a final grouping will be ready to go. So I'm floating these out there one at a time, for now. I hope you and yours find ample comfort and inspiration here.