Easter – a celebration of the most earth-shattering event in history! To celebrate this special time when we remember the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, I thought I’d share with you the history of some of the old favourite Easter hymns.

1. Jesus Christ is Risen Today

Although it is becoming less well-known “Jesus Christ is Risen Today” has been a well-loved Easter hymn for many years. It is based on a Latin hymn from the 1300s and has undergone a lot of changes and translations but the most commonly used version is one that was written in 1816. My favourite verse is the second verse which reads:

Hymns of praise then let us sing

Unto Christ our heavenly King,

Who endured the cross and grave,

Sinners to redeem and save.

2. Low in the Grave He Lay

“Low in the Grave He Lay” was written in the 1800s by the American Baptist minister Robert Lowry. Lowry also wrote the beloved hymn “Nothing but the Blood of Jesus”. As well as being an excellent poet and pastor, Lowry was also a composer and wrote the tune for this beautiful hymn. The slow almost sad tune for the verse that contrasts and yet fits so well with the uplifting chorus shows his musical skill. My favourite verse is:

Death cannot keep his prey –

Jesus my Saviour!

He tore the bars away –

Jesus my Lord!

3. There is a Green Hill Faraway

This hymn was written in the 19^th century by Cecil Frances Alexander, the writer of “All things Bright and Beautiful”. Although, as with most of her other hymns, Alexander wrote this one with children in mind, the simple lines contain such deep truths that Christians of all ages can appreciate them. Take, for example, this verse:

We may not know, we cannot tell,

What pains He had to bear,

But we believe it was for us

He hung and suffered there.

4. Thine Be the Glory

Of course, no list of Easter hymns is complete without the magnificent “Thine Be the Glory”. It was originally written by the Swiss minister Edmond L. Budry who published it in 1904. It was translated, not only into English, but into many other languages. Budry wrote it to fit with the tune of George Frederick Handel’s magnificent chorus, ‘See the conquering hero comes’. The last verse is my favourite:

No more we doubt Thee, glorious Prince of life;

Life is nought without Thee: aid us in our strife;

Make us more than conquerors, through Thy deathless love;

Bring us safe through Jordan to Thy home above.

5. When I Survey the Wondrous Cross

Perhaps one of the best-loved Easter hymns, “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross,” was written by Isaac Watts, the ‘Father of English hymnody’. Interestingly, it was one of the first English hymns to use the personal pronoun “I”. Each line is full of rich truth expressed beautifully in Watts’ simple but masterful style. The last verse reads:

Were the whole realm of nature mine,

That were an offering far too small;

Love so amazing, so divine,

Demands my soul, my life, my all.

What are some of your favourite Easter hymns? The other readers and I would love you to share them with us! 🙂

This week we have a guest post written by my brother Calvin Ullrich about a fascinating story that he learned in school. Many of us have heard of Catherine (Katherine) Parr, the sixth wife of Henry VIII, but not many of us know that she was a courageous supporter of the reformation!

Katherine Parr by Calvin Ullrich (age 11)

Katherine couldn’t believe her eyes! The note was signed by the king for her arrest. “Henry how could you?” she gasped.

Katherine was King Henry VIII’s sixth wife. She knew that two of his other wives had been beheaded and two divorced. Katherine was a Protestant and Henry hated the reformers so she had to be careful about what she said.

But lately she had been talking to him about reformation ideas and they were discovered by his counselors and they encouraged him to arrest her for treason.

Katherine became suddenly ill from the shock. She called to her ladies-in-waiting to hide the book she had been writing about reformed ideas. Seeing how ill she looked, they called for the doctor – also a Protestant Christian. He asked how she came to know about her arrest and the lady-in-waiting told how the note seemed to have been dropped accidentally outside the door by the king’s messenger. The doctor realized that the king was probably just trying to scare Katherine out of her reformation ideas and to please the counselors at the same time. He told her this and she said, “And he nearly succeeded!” Now Katherine was faced with a very trying choice.

With her most beautiful royal garments on she respectfully and humbly entered the king’s counsel chamber. In front of all his counselors Katherine meekly pleaded for the king’s pardon for her seeming to be his teacher.

Henry’s face changed. She could see that he had just been testing her and that he still loved her. He solemnly agreed that she had been disrespectful but later when this counselors and soldiers came to arrest her Henry ferociously defended her. Katherine nursed Henry until he died and after his death she got the reward for behaving in a Christian way because she was able to publish her book that we can still read today.

****

In spite of her powerful husband’s aversion to the Reformation, Catherine Parr did her best to convince him of the truth. This nearly cost her life. However, she, unlike some of the king’s other wives, survived and nurtured her two step-children Elizabeth and Edward. It was partially through her influence that Edward became the great ruler that he was. After the king’s death, she published her book The Lamentation or Complaint of a Sinner. She died in 1548.

Source: Withrow, Mindy and Brandon,  Courage and Conviction, Christian Focus Publications, 2008

♦  “Do not have your concert first, and then tune your instrument afterwards. Begin the day with the Word of God and prayer, and get first of all into harmony with Him.” – Hudson Taylor

♦ “…a lowly heart that leans on Thee is happy anywhere” – Anna L. Waring

♦  “The drop of rain maketh a hole in the stone, not by violence, but by oft falling.” – Hugh Latimer

♦ “Whatever motive induces Christ to love you, it was not drawn from yourselves – but it was drawn from His own affectionate heart.” – Thomas Vincent

I hope you enjoyed these! 🙂

♦ “Christ never was in a hurry. There was no rushing forward, no anticipating, no fretting over what might be. Each day’s duties were done as each day brought them, and the rest was left with God.” ~ Mary Slessor

♦ “True humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less.” – C.S. Lewis

♦ “He whose head is in heaven need not fear to put his feet into the grave.” – Matthew Henry

♦ “Christians, is there any person like Christ’s person? Is there any love like Christ’s love? Are there any benefits like Christ’s benefits? No! No! He is incomparable in all.” – Thomas Vincent

I hope you found these quotes as encouraging as I did!

♦  All our experience with history should teach us, when we look back, how badly human wisdom is betrayed when it relies on itself. – Martin Luther

♦  The world’s battlefields have been in the heart chiefly; more heroism has been displayed in the household and the closet, than on the most memorable battlefields in history. – Henry Ward Beecher

♦  All that we call human history–money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery–[is] the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy. – C.S. Lewis

♦ History maketh a young man to be old, without wrinkles or gray hairs, privileging him with the experience of age, without either the infirmities or inconveniences thereof. – Thomas Fuller

I hope you enjoyed these! 🙂

♦ “Having already said, ‘Take my life, for I cannot give it to Thee,’ let us now say with deepened conviction, that without Christ we really can do nothing, – ‘Keep my life, for I cannot keep it for Thee’ “.

♦ “If the hands are indeed moving ‘at the impulse of His love’ the simplest little duties and acts are transfigured into holy service to the Lord.”

♦ “The heart that is not entrusted to Him for searching, will not be undertaken by Him for cleansing; the life that fears to come to the light lest any deed should be reproved, can never know the blessedness and the privileges of walking in the light.”

♦ “We can no more trust and keep on trusting than we can do anything else ourselves. Even in this it must be ‘Jesus only’…”

All quotes except for the last one were taken from Kept for the Master’s Use by Frances Ridley Havergal.

The last quote is from her hymn, Like a River Glorious.

♦ “…None but Christ, none but Christ. In all our perils and dangers, personal or public, …fly to Him…trust in Him…rely on Him. Faithful is He that has promised.”

♦ “Is He faithful? Will He not deceive us? I answer: Had you as many souls as you had hairs on your head, you might venture them all on His bare word.”

♦“I dare challenge all the ages of the world and all the records of time and all the people that ever lived on the face of the earth to produce one instance of one person that made the Lord Jesus Christ his hope, that was disappointed…”

All quotes from:

Henry, Philip, Christ All in All, Reformation Heritage Books, 2016

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