September 1996

That I wholeheartedly agree with Missy Simpson's lecture about over-sentimentalizing Christmas, that I laud her annual efforts on our church's nativity pageant, and that I know no one more determined to put Spring Arbor Church on the map—none of that alters the fact that Missy Simpson is not my favorite human being.

So I understand why my daughter was owly when I picked her up from church a few nights ago. She had to listen to the lecture. I heard it too, rehearsal having gone about ten minutes late.

Excerpt

ADVENT BANNER: "FOR TO US A CHILD IS GIVEN"

The banner's purpose is to enhance and complement the bulletin covers for this series and to create a festive atmosphere in the worship space. The covers and the banner visually hint at the content of the sermons: dreams that week after week unveil more of the baby, making the advent of Christ's birth clearer and clearer.

After last year's highly appreciated Advent series about angels (RW 37), we have become much more aware of God's messengers and our guardians both in Scripture and in our lives. But that series also started us wondering about what other means God uses to communicate his message to people.

And God turned to his angel. And God said, "Gabriel."

And the angel answered, "Yes, Lord?"

And the Lord God said, "Go down. All of the people must know what I am doing. Tired and lonely and scattered and scared, all of the people must hear it. Go, good Gabriel. Go down again. Go tell a few to tell the others, till every child has heard it. Go!"

A few weeks ago, Bruce Klanderman, organist at the Rochester (N.Y.) Christian Reformed Church, sent me a chart of the number of Psalter Hymnal songs that have moved in his congregation from "red" to "green."

Now for the translation: Two other organists in western Michigan prepared a color-coded chart of the entire 1987 Psalter Hymnal when it first came out.

They marked every song either

The Pilgrim Press, 1995. Editions for pew ($16.95), pulpit ($34.95), accompanist ($39.95), and large print ($24.95).

An Introduction to the Liturgical Year. Text by Inos Biffi, Illustrations by Franco Vignazia. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995. 98 pp. $ 17.00

In God's House, compiled and with an introduction by Robert Coles. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996. 30 pp. $15.00

Here are two small books that will delight children as well as adults. In both, the full-colorillustrations are not incidental but at least equal to the written text in concept as well as space.

Joy Patterson is one of several contemporary women hymn writers whose hymns are included in recent hymnals. In fact, no fewer than six women writers have had their works collected and published in the past few years (see box on p. 29). On the pages that follow Joy Patterson introduces her own work and that of three other living female hymn writers.

Brass Prelude

Opening Hymn: "O Come, All Ye Faithful" PsH 340, PH 41, 42, RL 195, TH 208

Opening Prayer

Hymn: "O Come, Let Us Adore Him"

God's Greeting

Hymn: "I Love to Tell the Story" stanza 1 PsH 530, TH 478

Prelude

Praise the Lord, O My Soul

Call to Worship: Psalm 103:1

Hymn: "Praise, My Soul, the King of Heaven" PSH 475, PH 478, RL 144,TH 76,77

God's Greeting

Forget Not All His Benefits

Responsive Reading: Psalm 103:2-5

Reflection: The Blessings of the Past Year

Roll Call of the Newborn, New Confessors, and New Members