Tuesday, March 12, 2024

It is the 12th of March 2024. Welcome to the Christian History Almanac, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org; I’m Dan van Voorhis.

 

In the history of the post-Reformation Lutheran church, there are two men, both named Gerhard/t, who are responsible for shaping much of that church by transmitting both warm piety and hymns, sometimes overlooked elements of Luther’s legacy. The first Johann Gerhard (ending with a ‘d’) is the subject of an article in the next issue of Modern Reformation written by yours truly. The second, Paul Gerhardt (ending with a t), was the prolific hymn writer who was born on this the 12th of March, most likely in 1606 (some sources say 1607, but at his death in 1676, he was listed as 70 years old.)

A plaque in his last church marks his burial and includes a Latin inscription translated as “a theologian experienced in the sieve of Satan.” this reference to Luke 22 refers to the tribulation suffered by Gerhardt in his relatively long life. In his early years, we have few primary source documents. In 1637, amidst the 30-year war, his home village of Gräfenhainichen was burnt down by the Swedes. We learn from later recollections that his parents died when he was young and that he attended the nearby Wittenberg University. He re-entered the public record in 1651, 45 years old, and still a “candidate” in theology. He worked as a tutor in the house of a Berlin lawyer and would later marry the lawyer's daughter. They would have a happy, if not abbreviated, marriage due to her ill health, and 4 of their five children did not survive past infancy.

We know he was proficient in the ancient languages and was a poet. He was also a quiet and pacific type, perhaps why he disappeared from the historical record, but he would make an impact in the hundreds of hymns he wrote. It was Gerhard who adapted a part from Bach’s St. Matthews Passion into the hymn, in English, known as “O Sacred Head Now, Wounded”. From 1651, he took a call to Mittenwalde, just south of Berlin, and in 1656, was called to the famous Nicholaikirche in Berlin, the city's oldest and grandest church.

Gerhardt was beloved by his congregation as we see in the letters written on his behalf to the elector. This was 1666 and the issue was conflict between the citizens of Berlin from the Lutheran and Reformed churches. Reformation era strife was reignited and the elector decreed that all pastors sign a statement of theological agreement to relieve the tension.

Gerhardt, trained in the confessionalism at Wittenberg, could not sign such a document and would thus be forced out. The members of his congregation and members of various guilds wrote to the elector:  “Should a man so pious, so intellectual, so celebrated in many lands leave the town, it would be feared that grave thoughts would be excited in the minds of foreigners and that God would visit them for it.” That is, whether, by a foreign power or God himself, the city would be punished for dismissing the pious pastor and popular hymn writer. The elector would need another letter signed by even more guild members to decide that keeping the peace was worth allowing Gerhardt to be an exception to his decree.

But this was not enough for Gerhardt. His conscience could not abide being “an exception” and upset the elector such that he was relieved of his duties in Berlin. His popularity seems to be attested by the fact that his old congregation took a collection and paid him a salary for three years while he stayed in Berlin and wrote hymns. The fact that he didn’t get another pastorate for three years could be for a number of reasons and doesn’t need to be attributed to his obstinacy or difficulty to work with.  

Nevertheless, his wife Anna was ill and worried about their future. The story goes that upon counseling her, he went outside and wrote the hymn that would become “Give to the Winds Thy Fears,” translated into English by John Wesley. In 1666, Anna died; earlier that year, Gerhardt had written that “the Good Lord might come soon and release her” as she appeared to have chronic suffering. Later that year, he took a call to pastor in Lübben, where he served for eight years before his death. His only surviving son received his last testament in which he told him to “pray diligently… study, and live peaceably….” His last words were reportedly from his own hymn, “Death can never kill us even.” Paul Gerhardt, born on this day in 1606, died in 1676 at the age of 70.

  

The last word for today is from Gerhardt, the hymn translated by Wesley: "Give to the winds thy fears."

Give to the winds thy fears,

hope and be undismayed;

God hears thy sighs and counts thy tears;

God shall lift up thy head.

 

Through waves and clouds and storms,

He gently clears the way;

wait thou His time, so shall this night

soon end in joyous day.

 

Thou seest our weakness, Lord,

our hearts are known to Thee;

O lift Thou up the sinking heart,

confirm the feeble knee.

 

Let us in life, in death,

Thy steadfast truth declare,

and publish with our latest breath

Thy love and guardian care.

  

This has been the Christian History Almanac for the 12th of March 2024, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org.

The show is produced by a man whose favorite “Gerhards” (however spelled) include Paul, Johann, Keegan, the pastry chef, and the Gerhard crime family from TV’s Fargo- he is Christopher Gillespie.

The show is written and read by a man who remembers Stanford Running Back Toby Gerhart; he lost the Heisman to Mark Ingram in the closest ever vote, Dan van Voorhis. 

You can catch us here every day- and remember that the rumors of grace, forgiveness, and the redemption of all things are true…. Everything is going to be ok.