Have you heard there’s a new hymnal coming out? Maybe your church has already decided you’re getting it, maybe not. Either way, want to try it out? Starting Sunday, September 19, it’s WELS National Hymnal Week (NHW). For the whole week, you and your congregation can explore the new hymnal by making use of a special service, a hymn sing, a series of brief video presentations, and an online concert. You won’t need to have actual new hymnals in hand. Whether as a group at church or on your own at home, we’ll provide the resources you need to make it happen.
You can follow along to see resources as they become available by clicking or tapping the button below to visit the WELS Congregational Services website.
The Service
There’s no better way to try the new hymnal than in worship.
What better way to try the hymnal than in worship? Want to involve your local musicians in this service? We’ll get you everything you need. No musicians? If you have a digital playback device and a speaker, we’ve got you covered. Fast forward to September 19th, 2021, and it’s time for church. Service theme and content are based on the new lectionary readings for the day. The bulletin looks like the kind produced by Christian Worship: Service Builder, personalized for your church. Some music is familiar, some new. We’ve helped you make all of it easy for your congregation to participate, so that from start to finish, the focus is on our Savior: his love for us, our new life in him.
The Hymn Sing
Sample even more hymns with featured choirs from WELS churches and schools.
There are only so many hymns you can sing in a church service. Are you interested in sampling more? Turn your Sunday Bible class into a hymn sing, and we’ll give you the video (or just audio) content you need to make it happen. Led by recorded choirs of gifted kids, teens, and adults, your congregation will be able to hear and sing along with great new Christ-centered hymns from each season of the church year. Just plug and play. And sing!
Approximate length: 52 minutes
Featured artists:
Children’s Choir from Christ the Lord, Brookfield, WI (Lisa Uttech, director)
LPS Prep Singers (Prof. Randy Bode, director)
MLC College Choir (Prof. Adrian Smith, director)
The Presentations
Pastors, teachers, musicians, and laypeople will benefit from a variety of presentations.
Several helpful presentations will be available for National Hymnal Week. Some presentations are meant for anyone, some for musicians and pastors. Some focus on new hymnal resources; some are on general worship topics. These presentations are designed for a widely varied audience: 1) people in churches that have already decided to begin using the new hymnal in Advent 2021, 2) people in churches that are undecided, 3) people in churches that won’t realistically consider the new hymnal until 2022 or later, and 4) individuals wanting to learn more about new hymnal resources or about some broader worship topics.
As indicated above, various groups might meet together midweek to view one or more videos and then discuss them. Such groups could be:
A general audience with discussion following each video. Various resources at christianworship.com can help to prepare a discussion leader for moderating the discussion and answering questions.
A team of worship planners (pastors and musicians) who want to begin thinking together about implementing new hymnal resources.
A study committee wanting to evaluate new hymnal resources before making a recommendation about purchase to the Board of Elders or Church Council.
The Concert
Enjoy the hymnal and all it has to offer in a showcase concert
Hymns provide a unique opportunity for exploring God’s gifts in the musical arts. The National Hymnal Week concert offers relaxation and refreshment as some of the best musicians in WELS present arrangements of hymns old and new via an online concert. The program will familiarize you with new texts and tunes from Christian Worship as well as feature cherished hymns, all utilizing a diverse spectrum of God’s musical gifts to his church. Whether at an organized watch event or in the comfort of your own home, sit back and drink in the truths of God’s Word in song.
Approximate length: 65 minutes
Featured artists:
Children’s Choir from Christ the Lord, Brookfield, WI (Lisa Uttech, director)
WELS chamber choir Canticum Novum (Jonathan Laabs, artistic director)
MLC College Choir (Prof. Adrian Smith, director)
Liturgical ensemble Trinitas from Trinity, Waukesha, WI
Why are we doing this?
We pray our new hymnal brings extraordinary blessings to many for years to come, but National Hymnal Week is about more than a new hymnal. It’s about proclaiming the praise of the Lord our Savior in that eternal activity of God’s people called worship. NHW provides our whole church body an opportunity to be refreshed in why we do what we do in worship from week to week, so that more and more thirsty souls may find relief and renewal in Jesus, our living water.
To learn more and participate
Resource Request
Due to permissions restrictions, some support resources (such as worship accompaniment music and hymn-sing and concert programs) for National Hymnal Week cannot be posted publicly. However, we can send them to you directly via email. Please take this two-minute survey to indicate your plans for participating in National Hymnal Week. We will email a tailored set of resources to the email address you specify based on your responses. Please respond to this survey by Friday, August 6.
Sign up to receive reminders at welscongregationalservices.net/subscriptions/. This does not commit a congregation to participation. It only allows the NHW planners to send reminders about the timeline and newly posted resources.
Pastors, please share this opportunity and link with members. This will help to build interest and participation.
The first deadline for signing up is May 13. But you are welcome to join this effort at any time, especially if you are participating as an individual rather than as a congregation. The May 13 deadline assures that interested congregations will be on track for the first two targets:
May 31: Congregational leadership has learned about WELS National Hymnal Week (NHW)
June 30: Congregational leadership has decided to participate in NHW
More details are in the NHW Local Planner timeline at the WELS Congregational Services website. Tap or click the button below to visit the resources.