Write Your Blessed Name

Anthem for Sunday, 09/09/2012

Text: Thomas a’ Kempis (1380-1471)

Music and arrangement by K. Lee Scott

MSCL#0208

The music of this moving anthem is composed by University of Alabama graduate, K. Lee Scott.  Scott, born in 1950 is recognized as one of America’s foremost composers of church music.  Currently he is published in 8 different hymnals.  Among his 300 published works are anthems, hymns, works for solo voice, organ, brass and major works which include a Christmas cantata.  He has served as adjunct faculty for The University of Alabama School of Music, and Samford University School of Music.  

The light airy nature of the music of this piece subtly reinforces the prayerful nature of the text.  Even as a prayer rises from our lips to heaven, so the music rises and floats and calls on a light touch for instrumentalist and vocalist alike.  There are a multitude of beautiful things happening simultaneously through the piece, yet none of them draw attention to themselves but rather add to the whole.  The unison section beginning at measure 26 emphasizes the call for Christ to be our strong tower of defense.  Without a key change, Scott masterfully paints  minor textures into the section from measure 35 to 45 meshing music and text together so that we can feel the, “temptations and dangers of this life.”  Lastly, before returning to the original themes and repeating the first half of the text of the prayer, Scott throws in the most startling element of the piece.  Right in the middle of the light airy accompaniment and minor textures the piece all but stops as the composer tips his hat to the cloister where the prayer originated.  In plainsong the choir calls out to the only hope of salvation, “Jesu”, the Latinized name of Jesus. 

The text is an often used modern translation of a prayer credited to Thomas a’ Kempis (1380-1471).  Kempis is recognized as the author of a number of works which survive to today and are still held in high esteem.  The prayer, rendered in this anthem as…

Write Your blessed name, O Lord, upon my heart,

there to remain so indelibly engraved

that no prosperity, that no adversity shall ever ever move me from Your love.

Be to me a strong tower of defense,

a comforter in tribulation, a deliverer in distress,

and a faithful guide to the courts of heaven

through the many temptations and dangers of this life.

O Jesu, my only Savior!

…comes from a prayer found in Kempis’ book, Prayers and Meditations on the Life of Christ.  A more scholarly translation of the prayer can be found on page two of the 1904 edition of this book, translated by W. Duthoit, D.C. I. (Kindle Edition Location#705)

O most sweet Jesus, my one hope of salvation, write, I beseech Thee, Thy Name upon my heart, not in the letter but in the spirit; and grant that by Thy Grace it may be so strongly there impressed, and may there remain, that neither prosperity nor adversity may ever dim my love for Thee.  Be Thou to me a strong tower from the face of the enemy, my comforter in tribulation, my counselor when I am in doubt, my refuge in distress, my lifter-up when I fall, the model of my life, my restorer when I go astray, and my ever-faithful guide through all the dangers and temptations of this mortal life to my home which is above.

This pre-reformation prayer by the cloistered copyist-priest is rich in bibilical themes and ideas which speak to the rich spiritual life of Kempis.  Note that he calls on the Lord to write His blessed Name on his heart.  The author of the text was obviously well acquainted with the power God demonstrated throughout scripture to alter, change, influence and imprint on the hearts of men.  Even as pharaoh and others had their hearts hardened by God, the scriptures speak of God replacing hearts of stone.  God holds the hearts of men in his hands.  The Hebrew concept of ones name can also be identified.  A person’s name was much more than a proper noun.  The name was the character of the person, who he really is.  The heart in scriptures refers to the seat of the mind and intellect.  This portion of the prayer is a call to God to change our thinking.  The cry is for God to stamp on our minds the character and the mind of Christ.  “Let us think and be like You!”

Furthermore, the prayer goes on to implore of the Lord that this transition of our hearts be so permanent that nothing ever distracts or impedes the stamp of Christ upon our mind.  “No prosperity….no adversity shall  ever move me from Your love.”  Deuteronomy 8:13-15 warns of the power prosperity yields to cause us to wander.  

“13 and when your herds and flocks multiply and your silver and gold is multiplied and all that you have is multiplied, 14 then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, 15 who led you through the great and terrifying wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water, who brought you water out of the flinty rock,”

It is a cruel truth that blessings and prosperity usually cause us to wander and feel there is no need for God in our lives.  By the same token, horrid adversity has often been blamed for driving weak professors of faith from their piety.  Kempis prayer calls on God to so imprint the character of Christ upon us that these corrosive influences cannot weaken or cause us to wander.

The last half of the prayer utilizes imagery from the Psalms calling upon the Lord to be a defender, comforter, deliverer, and guide as we move through the challenges and pitfalls of life.  We are on a journey.  There is a final destination we are headed for and there is only One who can provide us with the spiritual GPS to get us there.  The way there is not gong to be easy and it will be filled with tribulation, distress, temptation and danger.  There is no insistence that we avoid or be spared these challenges.  The prayer is that God provide what we need as we face each trial.

Lastly, the prayer acknowledges Jesus as the only possible source of salvation.  Notice Jesus is the “only savior” or as stated in the other version of the prayer, “My one hope of salvation.”  There is salvation in no other.  

Following the example set for us in the prayer of a monk over 500 years ago, we call upon Christ to write His blessed name on our hearts.