Sermon: An Attitude of Gratitude

Thanks for the Memory

My family's sole brush with celebrity is Shirley Ross (1913-1975), my mother's second cousin. She was born Bernice Gaunt, and everyone called her Bea, apparently; rarely has a name change been more appropriate. The stories about her were cherished in our household, retold as they were with the same reverence afforded to Luke's nativity scriptures. One year at Christmastime, Shirley/Bea came to visit my maternal grandparents. She said to my mom, who was 12 at the time, "Jeannie, come over and sit with me at the piano – I want to play you a song that I think is going to be big hit."

And thus, according to sacred Dake lore, my mom heard the song Thanks For the Memory before just about anyone else in the entire world, with the exception of Bob Hope, with whom Shirley sang it in The Big Broadcast of 1938. The following year, she went on to star in the follow-up film, Thanks for the Memory, and while her career faded rather quickly, the song became Bob Hope's theme for the remainder of his life, and our family's lone claim to fame.

Autumn is truly the season of memories and sweet melancholy which that song captures so well. Likewise, the repertoire for this Thursday evening's Concert a la Carte, Comes Autumn Time brims with nostalgia-laden remembrances of loves lost and days gone by. It is a universally accepted fact that the most beautiful music is sad, so break out the Prozac and join us for gorgeous works by Fauré, Mahler, Copland, Barber, Kurt Weill, along with evocative Broadway and cabaret songs.

Today I'm feeling grateful for many things. I'm grateful for the veterans who have defended my freedom and for the fact that I have been spared having to fight. This morning I have been listening to the majestic sound of bagpipers warming up on 29th street, and in an era when parade floats are stacked with pulsating loudspeakers I'm feeling grateful that there is still some live, un-amplified music. This week I'm grateful for the Yankees – especially players like Jeter, Posada and Rivera who have bucked the trend and remained the consistent core of their team for years; we will look back on this as a golden era in Yankees history. Most of all I'm feeling grateful for my two amazing Godsons, Josh and Hudson, born one year ago today, and for their incredible parents Dale and Caroline Kent.

It's easy to be thankful for cherished memories and past blessings. However, I believe that as people of faith we are also called to have a form of gratitude for the future, trusting that God will continue to provide for us in ways large and small. Perhaps this is the difference between feeling grateful and adopting an attitude of gratitude. One is a retroactive acknowledgement of God's grace in our life, but the other involves actively stepping into unknown tomorrows in full faith that we will be taken care of. The old spiritual says it best: "I can't believe He's brought me this far just to leave me." This week I'm going to work on letting my gratitude for the past spill over into the future, believing the word of the Lord through the prophet Jeremiah: "For surely I know the plans I have for you, plans for welfare, to give you a future with hope." (Jeremiah 29:11)

Nun Danket Alle Gott

Prelude: Now Thank We All Our God by J. S. Bach (1685-1750) In 1708 Bach was appointed court organist and chamber musician for Wilhelm Ernst, the Duke of Weimar, and it was a post he held until moving to Cöthen in 1717. In Weimar Bach's duties were relatively light and he had plenty of time for teaching and performing. His reputation as a legendary organist and improviser spread rapidly throughout Germany. During this time Bach wrote many of his preludes and fugues, including the Well-Tempered Clavier books, as well as the so-called Eighteen Chorales, in which this chorale-prelude no Now Thank We All Our God appears. Each phrase of the famous hymn is introduced in an elaborate 3-voice counterpoint; traces of the melody are clearly heard in the entrance of each voice. The cantus firmus (fixed voice) – what we call the melody – then follows a few bars later in the soprano part, registered here with a trumpet stop on the organ. Bach's true love of the Lutheran chorale as a musical form is evidenced in this masterful treatment.

Got Breath? Then Praise

Introit: Psalm 150 by Louie White (1921-1979) A native of Spartanburg, South Carolina, LOUIE WHITE attended Converse College School of Music, majoring in voice with a minor in composition. His studies there were interrupted by World War II, during which time White served with the 332nd Air Force Fighter Control Squadron in China, Africa, and India, and was decorated with the Bronze Star and Purple Heart. Upon returning he earned a Master of Music from Syracuse University in 1949 and, settling in New York, became bass soloist at the Church of the Ascension under the direction of Vernon de Tar. He went on to hold several faculty positions at Syracuse University, Greenwich Academy, Union Theological Seminary and Rutgers University. White received nationwide recognition when his Psalm 150 was sung by Leontyne Price during a televised recital from the White House.

Psalm 150 is heard this Sunday in a choral arrangement from a larger work, Hymn of the World's Creator. In it White makes pervasive use of hemiola, the musical term for taking 2 measures of 3 beats and reorganizing them into 3 groupings of 2 beats. A famous example of hemiola is from West Side Story: 'I want to live in A-me-ri-ca,' with 'me-ri-ca' being the hemiola. In this piece, however, White makes the unusual move of beginning with the hemiola: 'Praise – ye – the.' At the end of the piece he makes the even more unusual move of staggering the choir's hemiola and the organ's hemiola, making for either a big mess or an exhilarating burst of rhythmic complexity as the piece surges to its climax. (Come Sunday to find out which it is!)

Even Before We Ask, God Hears

Anthem: Pilgrims' Hymn from the opera The Three Hermits by Stephen Paulus (b. 1940) Stephen Paulus is one of today's pre-eminent composers of opera, with eight works for the dramatic stage, including The Postman Always Rings Twice, the first American production to be presented at the Edinburgh Festival. Part of a musical family, he was born in New Jersey and raised in Minnesota, where his father was a church organist by avocation. Paulus earned his Ph.D. in composition from the University of Minnesota, and while in graduate school he co-founded The Minnesota Composer's Forum with Libby Larson. His prolific output includes commissioned works for many of the nation's leading orchestras, choirs, and solo artists. Pilgrims' Hymn is the moving finale to Paulus' one-act church opera, The Three Hermits (1997), which was inspired by a story of Leo Tolstoy. The premiere took place at the House of Hope Presbyterian Church in St. Paul, and since then, the opera's poignant conclusion has taken on a life of its own.

Gratitude, Sung

Offertory: My Tribute by Andrae Crouch (b. 1942), arr. Kenneth Dake As I pondered Dr. Brown's sermon title, my heart lit upon this great gospel song, and I was inspired to create a special arrangement for this week's Commitment Celebration Sunday. Andrae Crouch's father was the pastor of Christ Memorial Church of God in Christ in Los Angeles. In 1965 young Andrae founded his performing group, the Disciples, and throughout the 60's and 70's they toured in 68 countries, played everywhere from the Hollywood Bowl to Carnegie Hall, and won several GMA Dove Awards. Crouch's music is a contemporary blend of gospel which speaks to racially and musically diverse audiences. However, the profound message of My Tribute is universal, for it encompasses the experience of anyone who has a testimony to tell of God's grace in their life:

How can I say thanks for the things
You have done for me,
Things so undeserved,
Yet You give to prove your love for me,
The voices of a million angels could not express my gratitude,
All that I am and ever hope to be,
I owe it all to Thee.