2 Samuel 23.1-5 The Spirit of the Lord speaks by me; his word is on my tongue. The God of Israel has spoken.
Ephesians 1.15-end The Father put all things under Christ’s
feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, 23 which
is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.
Anthem text
God is gone up with a
triumphant shout:
The Lord with sounding Trumpets' melodies:
Sing Praise, sing Praise, sing Praise, sing Praises out,
Unto our King sing praise seraphicwise!
Lift up your Heads, ye lasting Doors, they sing,
And let the King of Glory enter in.
Methinks I see
Heaven's sparkling courtiers fly,
In flakes of Glory down him to attend,
And hear Heart-cramping notes of Melody
Surround his Chariot as it did ascend;
Mixing their Music, making ev'ry string
More to enravish as they this tune sing.
Therefore God
has highly exalted Jesus Christ and bestowed on him the name that is
above every name. Philippians 2:9
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This evening’s anthem – and you have the text before you -
is both packed full of theology, rich scriptural imagery and the most delicious
language.
God is gone up with a triumphant
shout: the Lord with sounding Trumpets’ melodies
It speaks so well of the Ascension of the Lord that we
celebrated last Thursday, Ascension Day.
It draws from the psalms of David, the shepherd-king
described in the first lesson as ‘the sweet psalmist of Israel’ (2 Samuel 23.1)
The ascent, the going up, with the ‘trumpets’ melodies’ is a
beautiful rendering of Psalm 47.5
Sing praise to the king.
The Ascension of the Lord is the triumph of the kingship of
Christ, not as an earthbound king, in the model of David, who is his prototype,
but the King of the Universe, sovereign in all times and places.
In the Ascension Jesus Christ, brings his earthly kingdom into
his heavenly kingdom, human flesh into the courts of heaven.
No wonder language gives out and goes into the celestial.
Where else can a word like ‘seraphicwise’ be used.
Seraphicwise certainly gets your spell checker going.
The word speaks of the things of heaven, the domain of
seraphs who with the cherubim are described amongst the heavenly host.
Christ arrives and we are to praise him seraphicwise as the
king of glory enters in.
There the text draws on the closing verses of Psalm 24:
Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lift up, ye
everlasting doors : and the King of glory shall come in.
Who is the King of glory : it is the Lord strong and
mighty, even the Lord mighty in battle.
Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lift up, ye
everlasting doors : and the King of glory shall come in.
Who is the King of glory : even
the Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory. (Psalm 24.7-10)
And that psalm asks in a preceding verse:
Who shall ascend into the hill of
the Lord : or who shall rise up in his holy place? (Psalm 24.3)
Who can? Can you, can I? The psalm answers its own question:
Even he that hath clean hands,
and a pure heart : and that hath not lift up his mind unto vanity, nor sworn to
deceive his neighbour. (Psalm 24.4)
Our conduct on earth connects to our entrance to heaven:
lives lived in purity of action and heart; lives of humility and not proud
vanity; lives lived with integrity with our neighbour.
Christianity is rooted in action that anticipates the realities
of heaven: ‘thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven’.
But the anthem took us to the threshold of heaven
Methinks I see
Heaven's sparkling courtiers fly,
In flakes of Glory down him to attend,
And hear Heart-cramping notes of Melody
Surround his Chariot as it did ascend;
Mixing their Music, making ev'ry string
More to enravish as they this tune sing.
Where to start with the beauty of that language, language
that speaks of heaven, of ‘Heaven’s sparkling courtiers’, ‘flakes of glory’?
‘Flakes of glory’: what does it mean?
Does it matter if we don’t know what it literally mean?
Let’s not try to overdefine: we see flakes of glory; we
hear, ‘Heart-cramping notes of melody’.
‘Heart-cramping’ we might say that this vision of heaven is
a heart stopper, and that surrounds the ascending king in his chariot.
That itself echoes Elijah’s assumption into heaven, as he was
parted from his fellow prophet Elisha and was taken up into heaven:
And as they still went on and
talked, behold, chariots of fire and horses of fire separated the two of
them. And Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. (2 Kings 2.11)
How else do we describe ascent into heaven, especially that
of the king:
Mixing their Music,
making ev'ry string
More to enravish as they this tune sing.
The heavenly music enravishes; ravish, in this context, meaning
to be filled with an intense joy, we are enravished as the king of glory enters
in.
Christ is exalted and given a name that is above every name.
He enters heaven, and, at
the same time, no longer bound by time and space, promises to be present
with us until the end of the age, enters the temple of the human body in his
real presence.
This is surely the ‘glorious inheritance in the saints’ that
St Paul writing to the Ephesians speaks of:
and what is the immeasurable
greatness of his power towards us who believe, according to the working
of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him
from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly
places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and
above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the
one to come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him
as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the
fullness of him who fills all in all. (Ephesians 1.19-23)
Let us pray
Grant, we pray, almighty God,
that as we believe your
only-begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ
to have ascended into the heavens,
so we in heart and mind may also
ascend
and with him continually dwell;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Lord God,
we believe that the Saviour of all
is enthroned with you in majesty.
Listen to our prayer,
and, according to his promise,
let us feel his presence among us
to the end of time.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ,
your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in
the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever.
Giving thanks for our fellowship with saints in heaven and
earth we say the Grace…
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