Thoughts on the Divine Service
5. The Introit
Dear friends,
You may have noticed in the hymnal that, on a typical Sunday morning at Good Shepherd, you attend three worship services: the Service of Confession and Absolution, the Service of the Word, and the Service of the Sacrament.
The Service of Confession is, by far, the newest of the three: for much of history, those who wished to receive Holy Communion would make private confession during the week, an excellent preparation for the Sacrament of the Altar. For reasons both good and bad in early Lutheran churches, the requirement for individual confession was replaced by a corporate service of confession on Saturday nights. In time, this service faded to replaced by the short Service of Confession that begins Sunday morning.
(Just think! For a time in Lutheranism, “going to church” meant the service of Confession on Saturday night, Matins early Sunday morning, then Divine Service before noon. After lunch, parishioners returned for a catechetical service, another time of worship wherein the sermon resembled a Bible class lecture more than preaching.)
This means that, once upon a time, the Service of the Word was the first part of the Divine Service on a Sunday morning, which sort of explains why we have the Introit. “Introit” comes from the Latin for “enter” or “entrance;” and when the Service of the Word was the first thing to happen, the introit psalm was a processional psalm chanted while the clergy entered the sanctuary. At first, the Introit was an entire psalm; later, it was reduced to a few verses, plus the Gloria Patri.
The introit does far more than just cover for pastors on the move. The selected verses (almost always from the Psalms), are carefully chosen to set the theme of the day: a good introit will summarize an idea that will be woven throughout the rest of the day’s readings, and especially to provide a preview of the gospel reading.
One verse is chanted twice, at the beginning and end: this is called the antiphon, and we offset it at Good Shepherd with the pastor chanting it by himself, then the congregation and cantor/choir alternating for the rest. The antiphon gets double exposure because it is chosen to summarize the introit (which in turn summarizes the theme of the day): therefore, if you want to ponder the meaning of all the readings from a Sunday in one sentence, begin by meditating on the antiphon.
Since I’m starting to put myself to sleep, let’s make this concrete and look at tomorrow. For Reformation Sunday, the verses for the introit are from Psalm 34:1–2,11,22:
I will bless the LORD at all times;
his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
My soul makes its boast in the LORD;
let the humble hear and be glad.
Come, O children, listen to me;
I will teach you the fear of the LORD.
The LORD redeems the life of his servants;
none of those who take refuge in him will be condemned.
With those verses, we’ll declare that it is proper to praise the Lord at all times, because His Word makes our heart glad—so much that we even teach it to our children. Why? Because the Lord redeems us and saves us by His grace. That’s certainly the intended joyful outcome of the Reformation: the Lord provided and preserved a rediscovery of the gospel, and we are glad.
Wrapping a bow around these verses is the antiphon from Psalm 119:46:
I will also speak of your testimonies before kings
and shall not be put to shame.
The antiphon is fitting as we celebrate the Reformation: it may have begun with an obscure monk innocently nailing 95 theses to a door to propose an academic discussion, but four years later he stood before the Holy Roman Emperor, ordered to deny the gospel or suffer martyrdom. Luther refused to recant, but he was also rescued from death: he spoke of the Lord’s testimonies before an emperor and princes that day, and he was not put to shame. The Lord preserved his life, and the message of the true gospel spread.
Thu the antiphon reminds us that the gospel is for all; and even when the powerful oppose it, the Lord continues to make His salvation known. The other three readings will explore facets of this theme: the first reading, Revelation 14:6-7 summarizes the preaching of law and gospel, while announcing that God’s grace is for all nations. Romans 3:19-28, the epistle, clearly articulates that we are saved by grace, not works—it’s a foundational text for understanding the distinction and benefits of law and gospel. Finally in the gospel reading, Matthew 11:12-19, Jesus warns that a sinful world will always oppose the message of salvation, but that He is faithful to save. That was certainly true in 16th-century Germany, and it remains true today.
This also remains true: the Word of the Lord endures forever.
I’m going to get a little nerdy, or nerdier, for a couple of quick comments.
First, it’s an excellent exercise for your personal devotions to meditate on all the Sunday readings and explore how they fit together. You can find the readings listed in the front of the hymnal (pages xiv-xxi) or in the Congregation at Prayer devotional available in the narthex. CPH has two more helpful resources: one is a free calendar in the form of a pdf or an ics (ical) format for your smart phone. The other is a new book by Carl Fickensher called Looking Forward to Sunday Morning: Reflections on the Church Year. For $34.99, Fickensher has done the work for you already.
Second, we make use of four readings on Sunday morning (Introit, Old Testament, Epistle, Gospel), but there’s a fifth: there’s also a longer psalm appointed for the day. We chant this psalm in our Wednesday morning matins service, and it plays a central role in The Congregation at Prayer.
(BTW, if you’ve ever wondered about the difference between singing and chanting, singing fits the words to the tune, and chanting fits the tune to the words. We sing hymns: when we sing “A Mighty Fortress,” every verse has to have the same number of syllables in each line to fit the tune. If you try to force Psalm 146 into the tune, it won’t work. We chant psalms: no matter how many syllables in the verse, it will fit into whatever tone we use. In fact, since we’re fitting the tune to the words, we could chant any hymn to any chant tone. It might get a little tedious after a while, but we could do it.)