WC – 1.27.08 – Let the AMEN…
WORSHIP CONFESSIONAL
yesterday, we sang “Praise to the Lord, the Almighty” at church (with TWO powerful key changes with the last two verses, rising from C to D to E). my favorite line of this song is:
“Let the AMEN sound from His people again”
i explained to our congregation that, in Hebrew, “amen” means: so be it, i agree, YES!, ‘ain’t NO doubt about it’, etc… this word is a STRONG STRONG affirmation of something.
and i asked them, as we sang the words to this powerful hymn, to sing it with a heart of affirmation to the truth of the lyrics. a heart of agreement. a heart of AMEN.
some had “amen” written all over their faces during the song.
Order of Worship:
Not To Us – Chris Tomlin
Congregation greets one another
Welcome and Announcements
Praise to the Lord, the Almighty (Passion’s version w/ key changes added) – Joachim Neander, Catherine Winkworth, Christy Nockels, & Nathan Nockels
Mighty is the Power of the Cross – Tomlin
When I Survey the Wondrous Cross (hymnal, alternate melody) – Watts/Mason
Offering
Special Music – I Boast No More – Derek Webb
Doxology
Scripture Reading
Sermon
Knowing You – Graham Kendrick
Knowing You is one of my old faves, for sure!
You spoke perfectly to Praise To The Lord The Almighty. It is one of our favorite hymns to sing. The end of the 4th verse says Gladly for aye we adore Him” The old pronunciation of the word “aye” was “a”. But that always confused me, so we sing it as “I”. Furthering the idea that we are in agreement with what we are singing and in agreement with who our God is.
Sounds like fun. I hope I get to worship with you and your congregation sometime in the future.
Peter: come on!!!
inWorship: our ‘modernized’ hymnal changed the lyric to “gladly forever adore him”… it rolls off the tongue a little easier
fred: you know i couldn’t get Kim D outta my head when i was preparing this song!!!!! can you ship her my way?!
inWorship: now that i’m thinking through your version of the lyric, is “gladly for I we adore Him”? how does that work?
Hey Mandy, the word “aye” is often pronounced as the letter “a”. If you listen to the Christi Nockels/Passion version, you’ll hear her pronounce it this way.
But, if you were in a voting session and given the chance to say “ney”(disagree) or “aye”(agree), you can see then how it would be pronounced as if you were saying “I”. When we vote, we don’t say “I” we say “aye”.
Aye is defined as always, continually or ever. So “gladly for “always” we adore Him” Is how we are singing it…using the word aye.
make sense
aye matey
gotcha… so “gladly forever” is a decent update to the lyric (gladly for aye) that also maintains the original meaning as well!
good stuff!!
As a Navy veteran, that verse always had strong meaning for me. The word “aye” is an affirmation that I have heard, and I will obey. To say “Aye, Aye, sir,” is to acknowledge a command and to say that I will carry out that order to the best of my ability. So, when I sing “Gladly for aye we adore Him” I am saying, “I heard Your command to adore, I understand and I will carry out that command as best I can, Lord”
And either pronunciation, “A” or “I” is ok, but modern usage is the latter.