Hymn of the Day: “Lord of All Nations, Grant Me Grace” (ELW 716)
Text: Olive Wise Spannaus, 1916-2018, alt.
Tune: BEATUS VIR, Šamotulský Kancionál, 1561.

With Philippians 2:1-18 as its basis, Olive Wise Spannaus wrote this hymn in 1960. She was living in Elmhurst, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago that, like many cities at that time, was experiencing racial tensions. She says that “the first stanza practically wrote itself. The lines came to me in the midst of ironing, and I quickly picked up a pencil to write them down. The rest of the hymn was done by snatches, and before too long I knew I was writing the hymn for the Lutheran Human Relations Association, a group which my husband and I actively supported. I sent it to them with a note that I hoped they would have some use for it. If not, then I at least shall have had the fun of writing it.”

The Lutheran Human Relations Association did have a use for it. They sang it at their Eleventh Annual Institute at Valparaiso University, 1960. In the same year it appeared in Christians, Awake, the record of their proceedings. In 1965 Edgar Reinke of Valparaiso University brought the hymn to the attention of the Commission on Worship of the Lutheran Church- Missouri Synod (LCMS), and in October 1967 it was published in the supplement to This Day magazine called A New Song and then in the Worship Supplement (1969) to The Lutheran Hymnal (1941). The original language was updated for inclusivity in Lutheran Book of Worship (1978), but Elizabethan English was retained. Evangelical Lutheran Worship duplicates that version. Three things might be noted. 1) It expresses the always radically-new message of Christian behavior with archaic English that sounds new. 2) The word "erred" in stanza 3 is not a slant rhyme. It actually rhymes with "word." 3) The author has resisted requests to change singular constructions to plural ones on the ground that "personal relations are and ought to be personal and therefore an individual concern and responsibility."

The hymn was published in This Day magazine with the tune BEATUS VIR. Jaro-slav Vajda was the editor of This Day. One has to assume that, with his knowledge of the Slovak repertoire, he made this match. The tune comes from the Samotulsky Kancionál (1561), where it went with "O blahoslaveny dovek." Psalm 1 was the basis for the original text, so the editors of the Worship Supplement named it with the Latin of Psalm 1, "Beatus vir." In the Duchovna Citara (1933), the tune is attributed to Matthias Kunwaldsky (1442 or 1460-1500). Matthias Kunwaldsky was a Bohemian Brethren bishop. Four of his hymns are in the first known Bohemian Brethren hymnal of 1501 and five more in the Samotulksy Kancionál of 1561.

Offertory Anthem: “O Bread of Life from Heaven” David Ashley White

This text was from the Latin hymn O Esca Viatorum from the Maintzich Gesangbuch which was published in 1661. It was translated to English by Philip Schaff (1819-1893).

This composition by David Ashley White incorporates a 17th-century Latin hymn and has a plainsong feeling.

O Bread of Life from heaven,
To saints and angels given;
O Manna from above!
The souls that hunger feed thou,
The hearts that seek thee, lead thou,
With thy sweet, tender love.

Opening Voluntary “Spirit of God, Descend Upon My Heart” Joe Utterback (1944).

This tune, MORECAMBE, was written in 1870 by Frederick C. Atkinson. The jazz musician, Joe Utterback beautifully captures this serene hymn tune with his jazz-inspired harmonies. He has published nearly 400 works for piano, choir and organ.

Closing Voluntary “Lead Us, Heavenly Father” Robert J Powell (1932)

Robert J. Powell is an American composer, organist, and choir director. He earned a Bachelor of Music degree from Louisiana State University with a focus on organ and composition. He studied with Alec Wyton at Union Theological Seminary in New York, and he was also Wyton's assistant at The Episcopal Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Powell's conservative, neo-Romantic style stems from his practical approach to composition. According to Powell himself, he writes for "choirs of twenty-five because that's what most choirs are. When you come right down to it, most choirs are not of cathedral ability or size. My pieces are all practical things and useful for specific occasions." His publications appear in The Hymnal 1982 as well as in the catalogs of most of the significant American publishers of church music. Powell is a composer whose output bridges denominational boundaries and who is able to serve the larger Church. He has made ecumenical sharing a reality–-and always with a genteel touch.