Author Archives: Matthew Sigler

“Lo! He Comes With Clouds, Descending” An Appeal For Advent by Matt Sigler

Last week, while most of us were still engorged on leftovers from Thanksgiving, the church began a new year with the season of Advent. Many congregations marked the season by lighting of the first candle in the Advent wreath and, perhaps, with a few other changes in the liturgy. Some sang Advent hymns, though many immediately began with songs about the Nativity. Yet Advent is primarily about looking through the baby in the manger to see Christ the King coming on the clouds in glory. The problem for Methodists is that, for decades, we did not have a single hymn in the Methodist hymnal that explicitly referenced the Lord’s physical return.

Nolan Harmon, a Methodist bishop who served on several hymnal committees, recalls the debate that ensued in the 1930 hymnal commission about Charles Wesley’s hymn, “Lo! He Comes with Clouds, Descending.” In spite of Harmon’s argument that “the New Testament does teach that the Lord will come again—as does the Creed” the hymn was voted out.[1] Speaking against the hymn, one committee member argued that the final verse, which in the original version ends “Jah, Jehovah, Everlasting God come down,” was “the invocation of an old Hebrew God, and doesn’t belong with us.”[2] Reflecting the predominance of liberal theology of the day, the committee also struck out other references to the second coming of Christ. Another Wesley hymn, “Rejoice, the Lord is King,” was included in the hymnal, but with the traditional closing line “Jesus the judge shall come” omitted.[3] So for nearly thirty years, Methodists had zero hymns in their hymnal that spoke of the sure and certain return of Christ.

The Second Advent

In contrast to our current hymnal, which has an entire section devoted to the “Return and Reign of the Lord,” the 1932 hymnal contains a fairly ambiguous section entitled, “The Everliving Christ.” Similarly, Advent and Nativity were conflated into one section in the hymnal. In practice, this is often the case today.

People are quite comfortable with the meek and mild baby in the manger; but to speak of a returning King with fire in his eyes and a sword in his hand, who comes to judge the living and the dead and to set all things right, is less popular.

Add to this a cultural context that continues to extend the “Christmas” season for commercial reasons, and the Church finds it nearly impossible to speak of the second Advent of Christ in the weeks leading to Christmas. In our silence have we capitulated to the dominant culture?

Lo! He Comes With Clouds, Descending

What was considered passé by the 1930 hymnal commission and by many today is the great hope for those of us who hold to classic Christianity. So, while we can and should sing of Christ’s return throughout the year, Advent presents a key opportunity to declare with clarity this crucial doctrine in our faith. And as Wesleyans we have a gem in Charles’ hymn, “Lo! He Comes With Clouds, Descending.” Here is a quick look at the hymn:

Lo! He comes with clouds descending,
Once for favored sinners slain!
Thousand, thousand saints attending,
Swell the triumph of his train:
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
God appears, on earth to reign!

In this first stanza, Wesley is clear that Christ will physically return in glory. The imagery of thousands upon thousands of saints following in procession is particularly evocative.

Every eye shall now behold him
Robed in dreadful majesty,
Those who set at nought and sold him,
Pierced, and nailed him to the tree,
Deeply wailing, deeply wailing,
Shall the true Messiah see.

All will see the glorified Christ, as this lyrical paraphrase of Revelation 1:7 proclaims. It will be a time of judgment for those who have rejected Him.

The dear tokens of his passion
Still his dazzling body bears,
Cause of endless exultation
To his ransomed worshippers;
With what rapture, with what rapture,
Gaze we on those glorious scars!

For the redeemed, however, this occasion is one of unfathomable joy. The wounds that Christ still bears in His glorified body will be the inspiration for “endless exultation.”

Yea, Amen! Let all adore thee,
High on Thine eternal throne!
Savior, take the power and glory,
Claim the kingdom for Thine own,
O come quickly, o come quickly,
Everlasting God, come down.

Having spent the first three verses depicting the scene of Christ’s return, the final verse centers on the basic cry of the Church which is amplified during Advent, “Come, Lord Jesus!”

A Contemporary Expression?

The standard hymn tune for “Lo! He Comes With Clouds, Descending,” “Helmsley,” works nicely with the text. Some congregations, however, may find the tune difficult to sing. I have found that the hymn tune “St. Thomas (Webbe)” also works well. In fact, I have used a modern arrangement of “St. Thomas” (with bass, drums, keys, and guitar) while inserting the chorus of Chris Tomlin’s “How Great is Our God” in between the stanzas of “Lo! He Comes…” The point is that tune and style need not limit congregations in reclaiming this incredible hymn.

Connecting-the-Dots

If corporate worship should connect-the-dots—or tell the story of what God has done, and will do, for us in Christ—then worship is woefully incomplete when we fail to proclaim that Christ will come again. As Wesleyans we have in our lyrical heritage one of the best hymns on this topic in “Lo! He Comes with Clouds, Descending.” Consider this an appeal, then, to reclaim this hymn for the church during this season of Advent. My hope is that what was once lost in the Methodist church for thirty years will become a standard song in the future.

 

 

[1] Nolan B. Harmon, “Creating Official Methodist Hymnals,” Methodist History  16 (July 1978): 239.

[2] Ibid.

[3] (Hymn #171, The Methodist Hymnal 1932)

Fragmented By Age: Liturgy & Families by Matt Sigler

Several weeks ago, as I was running errands, I heard my two-year old son exclaim from the backseat of our car, “Oh my God!” When I paused for a second to consider how to explain the third commandment to a toddler, he continued, “Heavenly Father, You have blessed our congregation with the joy and care of children…” This is the “Collect for Children” that we pray every Sunday in our congregation. What I thought was about to become a moment to teach my son about honoring God in our speech quickly turned into a lesson on the power of liturgy for me.

The predominance of age-level ministries in most of our churches has had a tragic consequence: we’ve become a church fragmented by age on Sundays. In many of our larger churches we can now choose from traditional, college, youth, and “kidz” services. Of course, there are many things that have contributed to this—not the least of which is the fallout from “the worship wars” which made style and taste the driving factors of Sunday worship—but even before this trend most Methodist churches considered childhood a limiting factor to participation in the Sunday service. There is much to be said for appreciating the different ways age influences our participation in worship, but I want to highlight what is lost particularly when we limit our children’s participation in our services.

Shaped by the Liturgy

Whether in a “high” or “low” church, all worship services shape the participant—some better, some worse. More specifically, even the most “free” church service has some pattern to its service and this pattern impacts us in ways we don’t often realize. I had no idea my son was absorbing the prayers we were praying each Sunday until one spilled off of his lips. The songs we sing, the prayers we pray, the bread we taste—even our gestures, all have latent power to form us as we encounter the risen Christ in worship. When we allow children to participate fully in the service we put them in the position to be shaped by the full gamut of the liturgy. This is not to say that there is no place for children’s church, but what is lost when our children our herded off to another room after a couple of hymns are sung?

Integral Members

Jesus reminds us that the kingdom belongs to those who are like children. Are we deprived of a visual reminder of this when our children are merely viewed as an appendage, or obstacle to worship? What does it communicate to our children when we send them out each Sunday? Ron Anderson observed in his case studies of two United Methodist congregations that: “Excluded from corporate worship as children, youth absented themselves from worship except for the occasional ‘Youth Sunday’ and disappeared completely as high school graduation approached and passed.”[1] He adds, “They learned their lessons well.”[2]

The presence of children in worship doesn’t always lend itself to the most solemn experience. We’ve all been there, and it never fails to happen at an important moment in the service: the screaming, squirming child; the heads turning, the eyes rolling, the whispers…the glares. Our churches should consider creative and even alternative opportunities for our children to engage in worship, but it should be done with an utmost concern that our gathered worshipping communities truly reflect what the Body of Christ looks like.

Childlikeness in Worship

Thomas O. Summers, the 19th century Methodist liturgist and theologian, once suggested that the truest test of a worship service was if children enjoyed it. To be clear, Summers was not a product of our modern, consumerist mindset. His question aims at what Jesus meant when he spoke of the link between the kingdom and children. We must not confuse the difference between immaturity and childlikeness in worship. The point is this: when we limit our children’s engagement in the Sunday service we also limit our own creativity and joy in worship. What would worship planning for “big church” look like if the litmus test was if children enjoyed it?

I’ve heard many people make remarks about how much their children teach them about God. Watching my son engage in worship has been no different for me. After he was born, my wife and I wrestled briefly with when he should be allowed to take Communion. We quickly reached the decision that we’d like him to partake as early as possible. While he obviously can’t articulate a theology of the Lord’s Supper, he has clearly been shaped by this means of grace.

Recently during the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, my son was still holding onto the bread when we returned to our pew. As the closing song began, I leaned down to whisper to him to eat the bread. Before I could, he lifted up his piece, as our congregation sang “thank You, thank You, for feeding us!” He sang the lines with everyone and then put the piece of bread in his mouth. It was a powerful moment for our little family.

Of course, there have also been times when he’s thrown the bread on the floor. The presence of children in our worship is often messy. It certainly isn’t predictable. And perhaps that is one of the greatest things our children can teach us in worship: God, by the Spirit, isn’t predictable, but as we come with child-like faith, the Triune God always meets us in our mess.

 

[1] Ron Anderson, Worship and Christian Identity (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 2003), 4.

[2] Ibid.