One of my favorite hymns is “For the Beauty of the Earth”. It is found in most modern hymnals of all denominations. In the United Methodist Hymnal, it is page 92. Often, worship planners look at this hymn and suggest that the six verses are just too long for the congregation to sing. But, before we come to that conclusion, let's look at the text to see exactly what we would decide to leave out.

The words were written by Folliott S. Pierpoint, an English poet and hymn writer educated at Queen's College. He was 29 when he wrote these poetic words, which give us a wonderful vision of the many things for which we should be grateful.

Verse one reminds us to be thankful for the beauty of the earth, for the glory of the skies, and for the love that surrounds us from our birth. God created this planet we call home and yes, loves us from our very birth!

Verse two reminds us to look at all creation... for the beauty of each hour of the day and the night, for hill and vale, tree and flower, for the beauty of the sun, moon, and stars... nature all around us.

Verse three tells us to stop and look and listen... for the joy of ear and eye - for the heart and mind’s delight - for the mystic harmony linking sense to sound and sight.

Verse four emphasizes the joy of human love for brother, sister, parent, and child... for friends on earth and friends above - for ALL gentle thoughts and mild.

Verse five is a prayer for the universal church... lifting holy hands above... offering up on every shore her pure sacrifice of love.

And finally, verse six speaks to the most important gift for which we are grateful. For thyself, best gift Divine, to the world so freely given, for that great, great love of thine, peace on earth, and joy in heaven.

Each of the verses is followed by the refrain: “Lord of all, to thee we raise this our hymn of grateful praise!”

Yes, six verses is long for the average hymn, but what would you omit? The reminders in every verse are the important things for which we should be offering our praise and thanksgiving every single day.

Each day our prayer should be exactly that... raising to the Lord our hymns of gratitude and songs of praise.

Lord, as we see the beauty and feel the love that surrounds us, may we be always mindful of and grateful for the many blessings you have given us. We pray for eyes, ears, and hearts that are open to receiving your love and blessings for us, and may we be always aware to share that love and those blessings with others. Amen.

This devotion was written and read by Susan Daves.

Grace for All is a daily devotional podcast produced by the members of the congregation of First United Methodist Church in Maryville, Tennessee. With these devotionals, we want to remind listeners on a daily basis of the love and grace that God extends to all human beings, no matter their location, status, or condition in life.

If you would like to respond to these devotionals in any way, we would enjoy hearing from you. Our email address is: podcasts@1stchurch.org.

First United Methodist Church is a lively, spirit-filled congregation whose goal is to spread the message of love and grace into our community and throughout the world. We are located on the web at https://1stchurch.org/.

(The Message Version)

Each day delivered to my inbox is a quote. I enjoy reading them because of the wide range of people they draw from. I never know if the quote will be from some ancient like Aristotle, a contemporary but from a different faith tradition like the Dali Lama, or someone from pop culture. They are almost all thought provoking in some way. Recently the quote was from Oprah Winfrey. It was “No one is the worst thing then have ever done.”

This quote got me thinking about how we too often let the negatives of life define us. We let past negative events, actions and words color our perspectives on life for a day, for awhile and sometimes even a lifetime. It is hard to not let those negatives moments define us. I have heard people say, “I’ll never forgive them for...” or they say, “I don’t think I will ever get over....” They are letting the worst things that have happened define them or those around them. Oprah is right no one is the worst thing they have ever done or even the worst thing that has happened to them. Our faith talks about forgiveness and renewal.

Paul, in his letter to the Ephesians offers such a perspective. Paul wanted his listeners, and that includes us today, to remember that through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus we are free people. “We are free of penalties and punishments chalked up by all our misdeeds. And not just barely free, either. Abundantly free!” The worst thing we have ever done, is forgiven. It doesn’t define us anymore. It also doesn’t define others. We have to give God the opportunity to work in their lives forgiving and transforming them as well. But it is hard to accept God’s forgiveness for our past and put it behind us. It is hard to forgive others and pray that God transforms them.

This forgiveness does come with a challenge. In accepting the free gift of forgiveness we are called to live as new people. Repentance means to change and go in a new direction. It means doing things in a new way as one freed from the past. It means living as one who strives to live as one abundantly free in Christ, which means to follow his words and teachings as much as we can.

So thank you Oprah for reminding me that I am not defined by my past misdeeds. You are not defined by your past deeds. God has forgiven me. God forgives you. I need to let my past go and live the new life God gives me. I will strive to also remember that God is at work in you creating something new as well.

Loving God, thank you for your gift of forgiveness. It is with gratitude we offer our misdeeds to you knowing that you forgive us and the penalties are erased. Remind us as well to see others as we see ourselves, flawed but growing and changing each day through your love and forgiveness. AMEN.

This devotional was written and read by Bill Green.

Grace for All is a daily devotional podcast produced by the members of the congregation of First United Methodist Church in Maryville, Tennessee. With these devotionals, we want to remind listeners on a daily basis of the love and grace that God extends to all human beings, no matter their location, status, or condition in life.

If you would like to respond to these devotionals in any way, we would enjoy hearing from you. Our email address is: podcasts@1stchurch.org.

First United Methodist Church is a lively, spirit-filled congregation whose goal is to spread the message of love and grace into our community and throughout the world. We are located on the web at https://1stchurch.org/.

I am a music appreciator, especially when people are singing to praise God. Recently I heard the choir at our church sing beautiful anthems accompanied by piano and organ. I heard our worship team sing praise songs some of which were converted from old favorite hymns now accompanied by guitar and drums. The children’s choir sang a beautiful song and “sang” it in American Sign Language at the same time. And I listened to a man sing a song of praise he wrote while in prison. As he poured out his heart in song, you could feel his experience of God’s grace as he praised God.

This expression of praising God through song can be found throughout scripture, another great reminder is found in the New Testament in one of Paul’s letters to the church at Ephesus.

What does it mean to be filled with the Holy Spirit, singing psalms and hymns to the Lord? I wish you were there to hear the Voices of Ephesian choir that sang at our church. Now we have a large sanctuary with a high ceiling, but this choir was filled with the Holy Spirit, and they sang with such power that it completely filled our sanctuary and each one of us who experienced it. Why do we sing praises to God? When you feel the depth of God’s love for you; when you know the God who created the heaven and earth also created you because God loves you and wants a relationship with you. Then you will want to be filled with the Holy Spirit and sing out to the Lord with all the power and passion you have.

Will you pray with me….Father God, through the stillness of our prayers we cry out to you. Through the power of our song, we praise you. Fill us with your Holy Spirit so we can praise you and sing to you with all that we have to offer. Amen.

This devotion was written and read by Owen Ragland.

Grace for All is a daily devotional podcast produced by the members of the congregation of First United Methodist Church in Maryville, Tennessee. With these devotionals, we want to remind listeners on a daily basis of the love and grace that God extends to all human beings, no matter their location, status, or condition in life.

If you would like to respond to these devotionals in any way, we would enjoy hearing from you. Our email address is: podcasts@1stchurch.org.

First United Methodist Church is a lively, spirit-filled congregation whose goal is to spread the message of love and grace into our community and throughout the world. We are located on the web at https://1stchurch.org/.

How can you make a joyful noise when your heart is breaking?

In the fall of 2001, my mother came to visit us in Iowa. On April 4 of that year, my dad had tragically collapsed and died in her arms. She was inconsolable. This visit was the first time she had left home since his death. I cast around for something she would enjoy doing. She was a devout Christian and I remembered she had once asked if I knew where ‘The Little Brown Church in the Vale” was located in Iowa. It was the beloved song that prompted her:

“Oh, come to the church in the wildwood

Oh, come to the church in the vale

No spot is so near to my childhood

As the little brown church in the vale.”

The Little Brown Church in the Vale is located in Nashua, IA, about two hours from our home at the time in Cedar Rapids. It has a fascinating history, as it came about by a coincidence--- or a miracle. In 1856, a young music teacher named William Pitts happened to travel through the community. He walked down Cedar Street and noticed a beautiful wooded empty lot. The thought came to him that it would be the perfect setting for a church. Inspired, he wrote a poem titled “Church in the Wildwood.” Later, he set it to music. Pitts moved on, married and settled in Wisconsin. In the years following, the community actually built a church on the site with donated products and labor. When they were ready to paint the church, the least expensive paint available was brown. And so, it became a “little brown church in a vale.” In 1864 William Pitt moved back to the area to teach in a local academy and discovered the church on the site. He rushed home to his desk drawer and pulled out his song. Pitts had written a song for a church that didn’t exist until nearly a decade later. In the early years of the 1900s, the song was popularized by a traveling singing group and put the little brown church on the map. With the help of the song, which became famous, the little brown church has achieved the status of a perfect setting for a wedding. In the years since its beginning, over 76,000 weddings have taken place there.

That Fall day, when we arrived, the church site was sunny and peaceful. The church was open, and we went inside and sat in silence. My mom was very quiet, but tears rolled down her face. We walked back outside and ate a picnic lunch on the grounds. And then we sang the song together, “Oh come to the church in the wildwood, Oh come to the church in the vale. No spot is so dear to my childhood as the little brown church in the vale.” We made a joyful noise, and my mom was serene all the way back home. I will always be grateful to the little brown church in the vale.

Pray with me: Dear God, your presence can bring us joy in the most sorrowful times. You remind us that you are our parent and, whenever we enter into the gates of your courtyard, no matter the circumstances in our lives, we are thankful and blessed. Amen.

This devotion was written by Laura Derr and read by Judy Wilson.

Grace for All is a daily devotional podcast produced by the members of the congregation of First United Methodist Church in Maryville, Tennessee. With these devotionals, we want to remind listeners on a daily basis of the love and grace that God extends to all human beings, no matter their location, status, or condition in life.

If you would like to respond to these devotionals in any way, we would enjoy hearing from you. Our email address is: podcasts@1stchurch.org.

First United Methodist Church is a lively, spirit-filled congregation whose goal is to spread the message of love and grace into our community and throughout the world. We are located on the web at https://1stchurch.org/.

In the broader passage from which this is excerpted, Paul is writing to the church in Ephesus about morality and behavior that reflects someone who is following Christ, discussing such heavy issues as sexual morality, greed, purity of the words we speak, and avoiding drunkenness. A person might think that singing together seems kind of frivolous or at least out of place by comparison. On the contrary, singing is an important way we connect with God. Saint Augustine is often attributed with the expression, “To sing is to pray twice.” When we sing rather than just saying the words of our prayers, we often connect more deeply with them. Music has great power to stir our emotions, activating parts of our brains and, I believe, our souls that aren’t as activated when speaking those words alone.

Science confirms this — singing is good for us. It lowers cortisol and blood pressure, and it releases endorphins and oxytocin, reducing stress levels. It’s good for our cognitive health both by focusing our brains through engaging in the activity itself and by quieting the “noise” of our minds. By engaging the lungs, it improves breathing, and by stimulating the vagus nerve, it might even improve digestion! Some studies even suggest that singers have a higher level of the antibody Immunoglobulin A, meaning that it could be good for our immune system. Others suggest it might help with pain management.

Notice, too, that Paul doesn’t say “sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs by yourself.” He specifically encourages us to sing together. When we sing with others, we intensify further that expression of Augustine’s — we not only pray twice, we share in an emotionally intensified prayer with others. This connects us in ways that are crucial to the communal aspect of our lives of faith.

And when we sing together, research bears out that pure magic happens. Our heartbeats actually start to sync to others’ with whom we are singing, and our sense of community increases by strengthening our social bonds. Studies have shown singing in groups to be helpful for those with mental illness, creating a sense of inclusion. It has been proven to increase self-confidence and to help us process and cope with emotions, too.

Of course, Paul didn’t have all this data when he wrote his letter. But the placement among these other behaviors seems conspicuous. It turns out that choosing good or “pure” words has physical effects on our bodies. Not engaging in sexual immorality or lots of drunkenness similarly does. Greed destroys our mental health. So, given all of this, it makes perfect sense that Paul placed singing together — an activity that can improve our lives individually and collectively — as an alternative to more harmful ones he’s cautioning against.

So friends, let’s sing.

Thank you God, for the songs we sing, the opportunity to sing them, and the people with whom we share them. May our songs praise you always. Amen.

This devotion was written and read by Dwight Dockery.

Grace for All is a daily devotional podcast produced by the members of the congregation of First United Methodist Church in Maryville, Tennessee. With these devotionals, we want to remind listeners on a daily basis of the love and grace that God extends to all human beings, no matter their location, status, or condition in life.

If you would like to respond to these devotionals in any way, we would enjoy hearing from you. Our email address is: podcasts@1stchurch.org.

First United Methodist Church is a lively, spirit-filled congregation whose goal is to spread the message of love and grace into our community and throughout the world. We are located on the web at https://1stchurch.org/.

Welcome to the Saturday episode of the Grace for All podcast. Thank you for joining us today.

Saturday is a special time when we take a few moments to review the scriptures that we have cited in the episodes this week.

If you missed any of those episodes, you might want to consider listening to them today. And even if you heard them all, there may be one that you might want to listen to again. We hope that each of these scriptures and podcasts will bring you a full measure of joy, peace, and love.

Now, let's listen to the scriptures that have been on our hearts this week.

Grace for All is a daily devotional podcast produced by the members of the congregation of First United Methodist Church in Maryville, Tennessee. With these devotionals, we want to remind listeners on a daily basis of the love and grace that God extends to all human beings, no matter their location, status, or condition in life.

If you would like to respond to these devotionals in any way, we would enjoy hearing from you. Our email address is: podcasts@1stchurch.org.

First United Methodist Church is a lively, spirit-filled congregation whose goal is to spread the message of love and grace into our community and throughout the world. We are located on the web at https://1stchurch.org/.

"Let the sea and its fish give a round of applause, with everything living on earth joining in. Let ocean breakers call out, 'Encore!' as they join the rivers in a standing ovation for God."

I play the guitar. Actually, it is more accurate to say I play at the guitar. I know enough chords to be dangerous, I can fake my way through a few fingerpicking patterns, and I've made peace with the fact that my F chord is more of an aspiration than an achievement. And bar chords? Forget about it.

I love music. Playing guitar gives me somewhere to put my mind that isn't anywhere else. It's a challenge I actually enjoy. And that’s enough. Any proficiency I pick up along the way is gravy on the biscuit.

One Saturday morning, I took my guitar out to the screened porch. I'd been practicing chord changes for weeks, and I thought a few minutes of that might be good.

I was concentrating on my fingers when I noticed it had started to rain. Not a storm, just a soft, steady rain moving through the trees in the yard. I kept playing. And then I noticed something.

My backyard is mostly trees. As the rain fell, it made a particular sound as it hit the layers of branches and leaves. As the rain intensified, the sound got louder.

It sounded like applause.

I stopped playing, and I listened. Then I laughed out loud. The trees were applauding.

Now I know the difference between rain and applause. No confusion there.

But I stood up anyway. I thought that it might be the only time I'd ever get applause for playing the guitar.

I played a C-F-G chord progression. It's the set of chords that underlies half the songs ever written, the musical equivalent of a handshake. And I took a bow.

"Thank you," I said. "Thank you very much."

The trees kept applauding.

The psalmist noticed the same thing: oceans giving a round of applause and rivers joining in a standing ovation. This has apparently been going on a lot longer than I realized.

And maybe that's how grace works. You're not trying to have a holy moment. You're just sitting on a porch with a cup of coffee and a guitar. The rain comes, and something you weren't looking for finds you anyway.

I don't know what the trees thought of my chord progression, especially my F chord. But I know they were paying attention long before I was.

Lord, thank you for rain. Thank you for Saturday mornings and screened porches and the particular mercy of having somewhere to put my mind that isn't anywhere else. And thank you for the trees — who apparently have been paying attention all along. Amen.

This devotional was written and read by Cliff McCartney.

Grace for All is a daily devotional podcast produced by the members of the congregation of First United Methodist Church in Maryville, Tennessee. With these devotionals, we want to remind listeners on a daily basis of the love and grace that God extends to all human beings, no matter their location, status, or condition in life.

If you would like to respond to these devotionals in any way, we would enjoy hearing from you. Our email address is: podcasts@1stchurch.org.

First United Methodist Church is a lively, spirit-filled congregation whose goal is to spread the message of love and grace into our community and throughout the world. We are located on the web at https://1stchurch.org/.

We have all heard it said that "talk is cheap." And so it is. Words flow easily from our lips, often without much thought about where they are going or what they will do when they get there. We talk constantly — to each other, at each other, sometimes simply into the air — and much of what we say costs us nothing at all.

The writer of Hebrews has something different in mind. In this passage, he invites us to think of our speech as something far more significant than idle chatter. He calls it a sacrifice — specifically, a sacrifice of praise. For ancient readers steeped in the Jewish tradition, the word sacrifice carried enormous weight. Sacrifice was costly. It required something of you. And here, the writer says, is your sacrifice: the fruit of your lips.

But notice the word that changes everything: continually. The writer does not say to offer this sacrifice on Sundays, or during our prayers, or in moments of particular devotion. He says continually — through all things, at all times. This is not an occasional offering. It is meant to be the ongoing texture of how we use our voices every single day.

That is a quiet but radical challenge. If our speech is meant to be a continual sacrifice of praise, then the question we must honestly ask ourselves is sometimes an uncomfortable one: Is what we are saying worthy of being an offering to God? Or are we simply filling the air with words that serve no one but ourselves?

The writer is careful about what makes speech a true sacrifice. He says it must be offered through Jesus and must openly profess his name. Talk that is channeled through Christ — that points toward him, that lifts others in his name — is the offering. Talk that does not do that, however plentiful, is simply noise.

And then verse 16 completes the thought in a way we might not expect. Do not forget to do good and to share with others, the writer says, for with such sacrifices God is pleased. The sacrifice of praise does not stay in the mouth. When our words are truly offered through Christ, they become action. They move us toward doing good, toward sharing what we have. Word and deed turn out to be the same sacrifice, simply expressed two different ways.

So perhaps we need to rethink that old saying. Talk is not cheap — or at least, it does not have to be. Offered through Christ, acknowledged in his name, expressed continually in how we speak to and about one another, our words can become something of genuine worth. They can become, in the truest sense, an offering to God.

Our Father, help us to take seriously the gift of speech you have given us. May the fruit of our lips be a worthy offering to you — offered continually, channeled through Christ, and made real in the way we treat one another. Amen.

This devotion was written and read by Jim Stovall.

Grace for All is a daily devotional podcast produced by the members of the congregation of First United Methodist Church in Maryville, Tennessee. With these devotionals, we want to remind listeners on a daily basis of the love and grace that God extends to all human beings, no matter their location, status, or condition in life.

If you would like to respond to these devotionals in any way, we would enjoy hearing from you. Our email address is: podcasts@1stchurch.org.

First United Methodist Church is a lively, spirit-filled congregation whose goal is to spread the message of love and grace into our community and throughout the world. We are located on the web at https://1stchurch.org/.