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John Newton was an Anglican clergyman and former slave ship master. It took him a long time to speak out against the Slave Trade but he had an influence on many young evangelical Christians, particularly William Wilberforce. At just 11 years old, Newton went to sea with his father. In 1743 he was on his way to a position as a slave master on a plantation in Jamaica, when he was pressed into naval service. He became a midshipman but after demotion for trying to desert, he requested an exchange to a slave ship bound for West Africa. Eventually he...

O come, O come, Emmanuel, And ransom captive Israel, That mourns in lonely exile here Until the Son of God appear. Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.This hymn, originally in Latin, takes us back over 1,200 years to monastic life in the 8th- or 9th-century. Seven days before Christmas Eve monasteries would sing the “O antiphons” in anticipation of Christmas Eve when the eighth antiphon, “O Virgo virginum” (“O Virgin of virgins”) would be sung before and after Mary’s canticle, the Magnificat (Luke 1:46b-55). The Latin metrical form of the hymn was composed as early as the...

As the Prince of Wales accompanied Meghan towards the altar, where Harry was waiting, Handel’s Eternal Source Of Light Divine played. The spell-binding cantata was sung in Windsor Castle’s St George’s Chapel by Welsh soprano Elin Manahan and featured David Blackadder as the trumpet soloist. The Duke of Sussex has revealed he picked the poignant music his wife walked down the aisle to. Harry, speaking in the audio commentary notes for a new Windsor Castle exhibition about his wedding, said: “I was looking for something completely different and ended up stumbling across this piece of music. “Something that epitomises the...

A Michigan pastor whose columns on the intersection of faith and everyday life has argued that hymns like "Onward, Christian Soldiers" should not be removed from hymnals.Shayne Looper, pastor of the nondenominational Lockwood Community Church of Coldwater, wrote in a syndicated column published Saturday that "there is still a place in our hymnody for hymns and gospel songs that make use of military metaphors, like 'Onward, Christian Soldiers' or 'Soldiers of Christ, Arise.'"Looper argued in part that hymns with military metaphors were acceptable because the New Testament itself is full of such metaphors."Take, for example, the Apostle Paul. He repeatedly...

Four decades ago, when my wife Dianne and I were active Baptists, somehow we ended up with a Baptist hymnal in our home. This same kleptomaniac-like behavior has surfaced on multiple occasions with respect to LDS hymnals. We even have an LDS hymnal embossed with “Joseph Smith Memorial Building.” Our Baptist hymnal is a...once widely-used, 1956-copyrighted edition published by Convention Press... SNIP Recently I searched our current 1985 edition of "Hymns of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints" to determine how many of these hymns are common to our older Baptist hymnal. One might be surprised to learn...

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the E - L - W There is little room for Father, Son, and Spirit this is true But it’s otherwise inclusive so the green book, it is through A new age marches on! Glory, glory, hallelujah M - D - G’s are comin’ to ya Glory, glory hallelujah A new age marches on! The new book has excised the dreaded Gloria Patri And at table, from the “gracious Father” we are now set free Likewise “bondage to sin” vanished thanks to the bless’d Trinity A new age marches on! Glory, glory, hallelujah...