We have three great worship leaders at Redeemer Fellowship. Recently Chris Walke (one of the three) has been digging up the less familiar hymns and sharing them with the church either for corporate singing, or as a meditative song to accompany the sermon. Below is a hymn he sang a few weeks ago during worship called For All The Saints. It was written in the 19th century by Ralph Vaughn Williams William How. The melody here is not the one most commonly used. Chris played acoustic and sang, and one of our musicians, Aaron, accompanied him on the electric guitar. Unfortunately, you can’t really hear Aaron’s subtle work. Anyway, give it a listen below. I love hymns, but had never heard this one.
For All The Saints
For all the saints who from their labours rest,
Who thee by faith before the world confessed,
Thy name, O Jesus, be for ever blessed
Alleluia! Alleluia!Thou wast their rock, their fortress, and their might;
Thou, Lord, their captain in the well-fought fight;
Thou in the darkness drear their one true light:
Alleluia! Alleluia!O may thy soldiers, faithful, true, and bold,
Fight as the saints who nobly fought of old,
And win, with them, the victor’s crown of gold:
Alleluia! Alleluia!Oh, blest communion, fellowship divine,
We feebly struggle, they in glory shine;
Yet all are one within your great design.
Alleluia! Alleluia!And when the strife is fierce, the warfare long,
Steals on the ear the distant triumph-song,
And hearts are brave again, and arms are strong:
Alleluia! Alleluia!The golden evening brightens in the west;
Soon, soon to faithful warriors cometh rest;
Sweet is the calm of paradise the blessed:
Alleluia! Alleluia!But lo there breaks a yet more glorious day;
The saints triumphant rise in bright array:
The King of Glory passes on his way:
Alleluia! Alleluia!From earth’s wide bounds, from ocean’s farthest coast,
Through gates of pearl streams in the countless host,
Singing to Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
Alleluia! Alleluia!
I am the Lead Pastor of Redeemer Fellowship; husband to Jen; Dad to Katherine, Elias, Madeline, and Kilian. If you're in town you can probably find me in the local coffee house or running through the neighborhoods.
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In our Growth Group and in my Sunday school class, we sing hymns. Oh yes we do. And this is one of them. It is great. Vaughn Williams was an atheist if you can believe it. He wrote some great hymns and a hymn book for the Anglican church. I love his music too. You should try singing it to the original tune.
Thrills me to see people discover the beauty of the hymns.
We used to sing that one all the time at the Episcopal school (named “All Saints”) I went to as a kid. I’m getting chills just thinking about it.
This is a wonderful hymn, and I really like the version here.
FYI — Vaughn Williams was a composer, and he wrote the music that this hymn is most commonly sung to. The hymn itself was written by William Walsham How, a 19th century bishop.
I love this hymn! I also love that tune and prefer it much more to the more traditional one. We used to sing it in the youth group I led. You can find this hymn and more “re-tuned” ones at the RUF Hymnbook site — a site put together by the college ministry of my denomination.
Thanks Rob, I messed that up. Fixing the post.
I often use the Ruf Hymnbook page as a resource, and that’s where I found this melody. I changed up the arrangement just a bit, but it is based on Christopher Miner’s version.
As worship music resources go, RUF hymnbook is fairly small in terms of the number of hymns & choruses it offers, but what it lacks in quantity it seems to make up in quality.
We often sing their posted versions of “Come, Christians, Join to Sing” and “the Church’s One Foundation” at Redeemer.
Joe, definitely encourage your peeps to check out not only the RUF hymnbook, but also all of the Indelible Grace resources from Kevin Twit with Reformed University Fellowship of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) in Nashville. He has been rewriting tunes to wonderful old hymns, and along with a few other people, is really responsible for the resurgent movement of recapturing this part of our heritage, updating it, and even writing new hymns from time to time. His writings on worship and the arts are fantastic. (And Kevin Twit’s writing on worship is definitely worth reading.)
The Indelible Grace CD’s are a wonderful collection of some of these songs, recorded by the likes of Derek Webb, Sandra McCracken, Matthew Perryman Jones and others who hang around Scotty Smith’s PCA church in Nashville and do music for Belmont U’s RUF group there as well.
You may know about all of this already, but it’s a great resource. And as a musician, a lover of hymns, and a lover of beautiful prose that captures complex beliefs and emotions at the same time, I’m personally so grateful to them for all of the work they’ve done to capture beautiful songs and make sure that they stick around for another 50 years or so before someone recalibrates them again for another generation.
Their little touring band of lead worshippers has a few dates in IL coming up. Find out more on the indelible grace site.
As an aside, you and Steve M. and many of the reformed baptist types have a whole lot in common with this slice of the PCA. (more than a lot of your SBC brothers). But that’s a whole other topic, isn’t it? Best of luck with your work. I am always interested when you and Steve talk about the intersection of the church and the built environment.
Later.
Yea, Matthew Smith is coming to my church toward the end of August.
Can’t wait. He was really good last year when he was up this way.
Great hymn, and I really like this version. Thanks for posting it!
Hey Joe,
This is actually a favorite hymn of mine. I love how it expresses our continuit with the saints through the ages, how we draw strength from their example, and how we will one day be united as we worship God. Those last several verses- e.g the distant triumph song making us brave again, and the countless host streaming in- move me every time, typically to tears as I consider these glorious truths. The communion of the saints is a wonderful truth.
Came back today just to hear this hymn again. Loving it.
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