There Is A Future For the Man Of Peace

I have been young, and now am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his children begging for bread. —Psalm 37:24 Many of the hymns we’ll be singing this morning respond to this glorious promise found in Pastor Jamie’s sermon text. We’ll give thanks for God’s providential care throughout the ages with psalms and hymns like O God, Our Help In Ages Past (Psalm 90), He Who Trusts In The Lord (Psalm 125), There’s A Wideness In God’s Mercy, and Great Is Thy Faithfulness. We’ll remind one another that “God never yet forsook in need the soul that trusted Him indeed,” and rest in the comfort that “I know that Thou art with me, wilt be with me to the end.” The closing hymn of the service, Steps A Man Takes (Psalm 37), takes its text from this central portion of Psalm 37, beginning at verse 23 and concluding with verse 31. While we’ve never sung this text at Parish (it’s found in the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America’s Book of Psalms for Worship), we should be familiar with the tune used in this setting, BEACH SPRING. We use this venerable American melody for the text Christ Is Risen! Hallelujah, in an arrangement by former Music Director Gregory Wilbur, which we’ve been singing at the opening of every service in the Easter season. —Henry C. Haffner