He Is Risen!

March 27, 2022

He is Risen! He is Risen!
Tell it out with joyful voice.
He has burst his three days’ prison;
Let the whole wide earth rejoice.
Death is conquered; man is free.
Christ has won the victory.

I love this hymn. There is so much in this song that speaks to me in this day and age, and yet it is also tied into an older and eternal world.

I have recently been called to be the choir director in my ward. We have a performance for Easter, in two weeks. No pressure. So I chose this as one of the songs we'll be singing.

Here's what I love about it:
– The jubilant feeling. I don't know if the world does “Jubilation” any more, we are too saturated in low-grade “I'm okay I guess” to really be jubilant. This song is a massive wave of unbounded joy from being set free from a fate quite literally worse than death.
– The gratitude built into every line of this song. Any mention of ourselves is in a passive voice, we are celebrating the victory of our God, our Lord, who has done these great things for us.

Come with high and holy hymning;
Chant our Lord’s triumphant lay.
Not one darksome cloud is dimming
Yonder glorious morning ray,
Breaking o’er the purple east,
Symbol of our Easter feast.

As members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints we don't have the concepts of “feats” and “fasts” the way the Catholic church understands them. But feast days aren't just like, Thanksgiving, they are a time to celebrate a great good that has happened by re-creating a smaller good and spending time with one another in one of mankind's oldest and most joyful pastimes, a shared meal.

He is risen! He is risen!
He hath opened heaven’s gate.
We are free from sin’s dark prison,
Risen to a holier state.
And a brighter Easter beam
On our longing eyes shall stream.

The last point (and the last verse) is such deep allegory. We have been in prison, we have been in the valley of the shadow of death, but now, this pure, brighter Easter beam cuts through the gloom and darkness that surrounds us, and we are, without any virtue or merit on our part, risen to a holier state, freed from dark prison, and given a path to heaven.