Happy New Year! Year C, that is. Advent marks the beginning of the Liturgical Year so we have some changes afoot this Sunday. First, we are unveiling a new bulletin format this Sunday. It is in booklet form and will include the Weekly Tidings. We hope you like it. New service music is also planned for this Sunday, with the Trisagion and a mystical Sanctus.
Since it is Advent 1, the readings focus on Christ's second coming. In that vein, the CMG will sing "Since the World Began" at the prelude, which begins with a very descriptive scene:
Oh, that You would burst from the heavens
And how the mountains would quake
You would make the nations tremble
All Your enemies would learn of Your fame
How then shall we be saved?
How can we be saved?
Since the world began
No ear has heard, no eye has seen
A God like You
Oh, a God like You
At the Communion anthem, the choir will sing "Zion Hears the Watchmen Singing". The tune is the Advent classic "Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme", but this anthem is based on an organ voluntary by Johann Walther, first cousin to Johann Sebastian Bach.
Zion hears the watchmen
singing,
And all her heart with joy is springing;
She wakes, she rises from her gloom;
For her Lord comes down all glorious,
The strong in grace, in truth victorious.
Her Star is risen, her Light is come.
Ah come, Thou blessèd One, God’s own belovèd Son:
Alleluia! We follow till the halls we see
Where Thou hast bid us sup with Thee.
During communion we will sing a hymn text found in the supplemental hymnal Wonder, Love and Praise. The hymn, "Signs of Endings All Around Us", conjures up all kinds of images! But it is a perfect hymn for a new year. It is sung to the well known tune, Ebenezer.
Signs of endings all around us--
darkness, death, and winter days
shroud our lives in fear and sadness,
numbing mouths that long to praise.
Come, O Christ, and dwell among us!
Hear our cries, come set us free.
Give us hope and faith and gladness.
Show us what there yet can be.
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