New worship resource on video

A new worship music resource that encourages hymn singing and makes ‘the old favourites’ more accessible has been launched.

Produced and published by South Australian Lutheran musicians, Hymnsing is endorsed by the LCA/NZ’s Commission on Worship (CoW). It comprises easy-to-access videos of Lutheran hymns, performed live with the words on screen as they appear in the LCA hymnbook.

Pastor Adrian Kitson, who serves St Petri Lutheran Church Nuriootpa in South Australia and is chair of CoW, is part of the Hymnsing team.

‘For years I’ve known that people across Australia and New Zealand love to sing their faith together in their local church’, Pastor Adrian said. ‘Over recent years this has become increasingly difficult. There are fewer musicians available to support congregations in song. The online hymns available are often presented by churches with very different musical heritage, style, language, order and number of verses, often without words and sometimes with adverts. And COVID-19 restrictions have added another level of difficulty. It’s highlighted the fact that, even without social distancing restrictions, there are many people unable to experience the joy of singing songs of faith together.

‘For all these reasons, the time felt right for this project, which allows people to see and hear talented musicians playing the hymns they love clearly and simply.

‘With the restrictions still in place, we needed to keep it simple and honour the health advice. With the generous support of a few individuals, we were able to fund the filming of the first 16 hymns which we have just launched to the public.’

Pastor Adrian said Hymnsing videos could be used in a variety of settings. These include family members or professional carers who support people with disabilities, forgetfulness, confusion, or other health issues, local faith communities who have no musicians to support community singing, and individuals and families for personal devotion and prayer.

‘We hope this resource will serve the needs of the Australian Lutheran community and beyond, for the building up of people’s faith, as they remember who they are in Jesus’, he said.

Hymnsing is available through www.hymnsing.com.au, where you can also support the project financially so that more hymn videos can be added to the collection.