Dr. Emily R. Brink was the founding editor of the print journal Reformed Worship until 2006. She served as program director and senior research fellow for the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship beginning in 2002, then in 2014 she transitioned to semi-retirement and became resource development specialist for congregational song until she completely retired in 2021. She was editor of the Psalter Hymnal (1987) and Sing! A New Creation (2001), the first CRC/RCA joint songbook. She is active in the American Guild of Organists, having served in both local and national offices, as well as in the Hymn Society in the United States and Canada, serving as president from 1990-1992; in 2004 she was named a fellow of the Hymn Society in recognition of distinguished service to hymnody and hymnology. Dr. Brink has a graduate degree in organ and church music from the University of Michigan and a PhD in music theory from Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois.
Last Updated: September 10, 2025
If you were to read this issue cover to cover (which most of you probably seldom do!), you would find at least three sets of intersecting themes, along with our regular columns.
This issue includes Ascension and Pentecost resources, but also some reflections on the implications of Pentecost for the mission of the church to the world. The first two articles (pp. 3 and 7) offer both perspective and resources on these two Christian festival days.
A book of liturgical materials for twelve weeks. Each week introduces a different part of the worship service, from Call to Worship (illustration: a bell) to Benediction (an outstretched hand). Each week is scripted for an adult leader, four child readers, and a child to add the symbol for that week. The actual banner kit must be purchased separately.
After introductory information on the liturgical year and celebrating rites and sacraments (from a Roman Catholic perspective), the authors provide helpful chapters on the basics of design and hardware, techniques for quilted fabric panels, block designs, and working from free-form drawings. Appendices include several detailed patterns and colored photographs.
Includes sixteen pages of full-color photos of beautiful worship spaces—interior and exterior, windows, liturgical furniture, and more (also includes ads). Roman Catholics take the relationship between worship and architecture very seriously, and each issue provides teaching to ponder as well as examples of beauty for visually starved Protestants to feast their eyes on.
Every Sunday, and especially on the great festival days of the Christian year, preachers and worship planners search for ways to tell the old, old story in fresh new ways. On the other hand, many congregations cherish longstanding traditions such as a Christmas Eve candlelight service or an Easter sunrise service. Those services may include a few of the same elements year after year.
Click to listen [ separate versions | versions combined ]
One of the best-known and most versatile Easter choruses from the mid-seventies started out as a single anonymous stanza. Typical of many praise choruses, the very structure invited expansion, and the expanded version found here also came from an anonymous source.
Old published an earlier version of this very readable and practical book on Reformed theology of worship in the 1980s. If you missed it then, get it now.
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