Sun 9:30a Class; 10:30a Worship; 11:35a Communion
Bible Bites
Now Thank We All Our God
The Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648) was a devastating European conflict centered in what is now Germany. It began as a power struggle between Protestants and Catholics within the Holy Roman Empire, and eventually involved most of Europe. Marauding armies looted, plundered and destroyed entire regions.
The human toll was staggering. Up to half of Germany’s male population died, as well as 15-30% of the total population. Some areas lost between half and three-quarters of their populations. Thousands of castles and towns were destroyed, and tens of thousands of villages, many of which disappeared forever. Bubonic plague, scurvy, dysentery, and typhus killed thousands, perhaps millions.
From this miasma of death, disease and destruction emerged Martin Rinkart (1586-1649), a German clergyman. Rinkart spent most of his life in Eilenburg, Saxony (near modern Leipzig in eastern Germany). He was one of four pastors in the city of Eilenburg, which suffered greatly during the war. Plague swept through the region and city in 1637. One pastor left for healthier climes. Rinkart officiated at the funerals of the other two. Rinkart’s wife died in May of that year. Over 4,000 people died that year. Rinkart, at times officiated at the funerals of 40-50 people per day. By year’s end, they simply dug trenches and buried people en masse without any kind of funeral service.
Around this time (ca. 1636), under these circumstances Rinkart wrote a hymn, “Now Thank We All Our God.”
Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices,
Who wondrous things has done, in Whom this world rejoices;
Who from our mothers’ arms has blessed us on our way
With countless gifts of love, and still is ours today.
O may this bounteous God through all our life be near us,
With ever joyful hearts and blessèd peace to cheer us;
And keep us in His grace, and guide us when perplexed;
And free us from all ills, in this world and the next!
All praise and thanks to God the Father now be given;
The Son and Him Who reigns with Them in highest Heaven;
The one eternal God, whom earth and Heaven adore;
For thus it was, is now, and shall be evermore.
All of us have a lot to be thankful for.
