Hymns to Help Us Through – #51 – “Rise, O Church”...

Hello, everyone!!

Pastor Jack Hayford – the founding pastor of The Church on the Way in Van Nuys, California – has written several beautiful hymns and worship songs. Among them is “Majesty” – one of my all-time favorites. But, perhaps, the most important and theologically impactful hymns he wrote is “Rise, O Church”. It’s an Easter hymn that speaks of Jesus’ triumph in ways that both engage the mind and stir the heart. I look forward to the coming of Easter, knowing that we’ll be able to once again sing this wonderful hymn!

The accompanying Youtube video includes two versions of the audio – one followed by the other. The first is the external audio that picks up both the virtual 1903 Cavaillé-Coll pipe organ and the orchestral voices provided by the Yamaha EL-90 digital organ (the recessional hymn for Mass at Bethany House on the Third Sunday of Easter). The second is the internal audio that only picks up the Cavaillé-Coll virtual pipe organ.

By the way, you’ll definitely want to use headphones. (Be sure to start the volume low.) The words for today’s hymn are below, in case you want to sing along! :)

“Rise, O Church”

Tune: Regent Square

Rise, O Church, and lift your voices,
Christ has conquered death and hell.
Sing as all the earth rejoices;
resurrection anthems swell.
Come and worship, come and worship;
worship Christ, the risen King!

See the tomb where death had laid him;
empty now, its mouth declares:
“Death and I could not contain him,
for the throne of life he shares.”
Come and worship, cone and worship;
worship Christ, the risen King!

Hear the earth protest and tremble;
see the stone removed with pow’r.
All hell’s minions may assemble,
but cannot withstand his hour.
He has conquered, he has conquered;
Christ the Lord, the risen King!

Doubt may lift its head to murmur,
scoffers mock and sinners jeer;
but the truth proclaims a wonder
thoughtful hearts receive with cheer.
Christ is risen, Christ is risen;

(continued in Comments section...)