​There would I find a settled rest, while others go and come,
No more a stranger or a guest, but like a child at home.

— Isaac Watts
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Psalm 23 is perhaps the most beloved and well known of all psalms. Martin Luther summarizes the content of this Psalm:

The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men
And be crucified and on the third day rise.
                                                                                                -- St. Luke 24:7

As the Church transitions from the forty penitential days of Lent to the Fifty Great Days of Easter, the word of the resurrection once again rings true: "Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!" Perhaps in no other sacred choral work do they ring more clearly or gloriously than in the Et resurrexit ​movement of Bach's Mass in B Minor. 

— Paul Gerhardt (1607-1676)
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On this Holy Saturday, the Faithful remember the connection between the incarnation (Christmas) and the cross (Good Friday). Christ cannot redeem what He has not assumed, as we see in the following exploration of two complimentary movements in The Mass in B Minor by J. S. Bach (1685-1750): Et incarnatus (“And was incarnate”) and Crucifixus (“And was crucified”).
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With the inclusion of the hymns “Now, My Tongue, the Mystery Telling” (Lutheran Service Book 630) and “Thee We Adore, O Hidden Savior” (LSB 640) in the 2006 hymnal of the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, it would appear that St. Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225-1274) is gaining a foothold in his contribution to Lutheran sacramental piety. Still missing from our hymnic repertoire, however, is perhaps his finest contribution, “O Sacred Feast”:

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Confirmation Sermon, March 13, 1932
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On Sunday, April 8, 1945, in an abandoned schoolhouse in the village of Schönberg, the Lutheran pastor and prisoner, Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945), celebrated the first Sunday after Easter (hereafter “Easter I”) with a short service of preaching, prayer, and praise. Bonhoeffer had been imprisoned since April 5, 1943, charged with collaboration in a failed plot to assassinate Hitler. Hitler, whose army was reduced to young boys and old men, was handing out death sentences aplenty. On this solemn occasion, Bonhoeffer read from a devotional book known in German as the Losungen (“watchword”), which appointed Isaiah 53:3 as the Old Testament watchword for the day and I Peter 1:3 as the New Testament counterpart (Eric Metaxas, Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Prophet, Martyr, Spy, pp. 527-529). The traditional Communion propers for this Sunday, especially the Introit and the Gospel Lesson, were certainly on his mind, if not included in his sermon. Inspired by these events, this issue of “Lifted Voice” will focus on musical settings of the aforementioned devotional readings and appointed propers for Easter I. 
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—Liturgy of Evening Prayer
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All Saints’ Day is the most comprehensive festival among days of commemoration. Indeed, the Feast of All Saints encompasses the entirety of the great cloud of witnesses with which we are surrounded (Heb. 12:1). It holds before our eyes a great multitude which no man can number, of every nation, tribe, and language, who have come “out of the great tribulation [and] washed their robes . . . in the blood of the Lamb” (Rev. 7:9, 14). All Saints’ Day shares with Easter Sunday an emphasis on the resurrection. It overlaps with Pentecost in its emphasis on the ingathering of the church in its universality. Finally, and especially fitting for church year from November 1st through the Last Sunday in the Church Year, it shares with the last three Sundays of the church year an end-times focus on the life everlasting. This connection between All Saints’ Day and the end of the church year has not been lost on the great composers for the church. Three sacred choral works, arranged in biblical order, are fitting for the Bride on All Saints’ Day and through the end of the church year.
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Buxtehude + Bach + Brahms

 Faith clings to Jesus’ cross alone / And rests in Him unceasing.

​—Paul Speratus (1484–1551)
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The text of the hymn “Salvation Unto Us Has Come” hails from Paul Speratus. In a progression that is remarkably similar to Luther’s life, Speratus was forced to leave two parishes in Roman Catholic territories for preaching the right doctrine of justification by grace through faith in Christ. He received his doctorate from a major university and later became one of the first priests to openly marry. Speratus was condemned by the Catholic faculty at Vienna, imprisoned for a time under King Ludwig, and in 1523 came to Wittenberg, where he assisted in the preparation of the first Lutheran hymnal. It is no surprise, then, that the first Lutheran hymnal, the Achtliederbuch (“Eight Song Book”), contains the earliest hymns of both Luther and Speratus.

— Invitatory for the Common of Holy Angels

The name of the archangel St. Michael means “Who is like God?” He is mentioned in the book of Daniel (12:1), Jude (v. 9), and Revelation (12:7). He serves as the angelic helper of Israel in the battle against all forces of evil. The narrative in the Epistle for The Feast of St. Michael and All Angels (hereafter “Michaelmas”) describes Michael’s final casting down of Satan, the enemy of God’s people, an end-times victory made possible by Christ’s victory on the cross. St. Michael is often associated with Gabriel and Raphael, the other chief angels who surround the throne of God, although only Michael is specifically described in the Scriptures as “the archangel.” Since Michael and all angels are “charter members” of the heavenly choir, there is no shortage of sacred music for Michaelmas, including choral works by Bach, Mendelssohn, and Willan.
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— Jeremiah 31:15

During the past three years as Command Chaplain at Naval Air Station Lemoore, CA, I have had the pleasure of participating in the annual Candle Lighting Ceremony, sponsored by our Pregnancy and Infant Loss Support Group (hereafter “Child Loss Group”). Every October, as part of Child Loss Month, these wounded healers gather in our chapel to light a candle, to tell their intensely personal stories of loss, and to listen to sacred music for the occasion. With my forthcoming transfer to Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, my association with this group will soon end. As I look back on all that they have shared with our Navy family, I would like to broaden the audience and pay tribute to them by sharing with you, the reader, the three sacred choral works that I shared with them over the past three years. Each work was originally written as a trumpet in the darkness for those who weep for their children.

— St. Jerome

​Psalm 90 (please see the text below the video link) is the only Psalm attributed to Moses, perhaps written after the people sinned in the wilderness, or possibly at the end of his life. Martin Luther summarizes the theology of this Psalm: