Dr. Uwe Steinmetz
Editor
“Crossing Bridges” is the title of the logo on the cover which is made up of four interwoven bridges that leave eight different ways to walk on and building a cross together.
Stemming from manifold experiences of encountering the power of song in transcultural worship, the Global Lutheran Songbook is intended as a bridge on which one can walk two ways and gather new perspectives in many directions by crossing it either way.
When we walk on a bridge we go from A to B. While standing in the middle of the bridge we see A, where we come from and B, where we are going, from a new perspective: a little further away but also in a broader perspective:
We cross bridges between places, but also cultures, cultural traditions and denominational differences and reach out to God through prayers and songs seeking a connection be- tween us and the divine.
In our interconnected multicultural world, we need those views and songs from a bridge perspective that help us to understand our global interconnectedness with each other and with all of God ́s creation. This enables us to discover afresh what the global corpus Christi means for us locally and in helping to create justice and peace for all creation.
In this way, when we engage with a song from another congregation and even different musical and worship cultures, our songs travel and grow on the bridge between one distinct tradition of giving sound to Christian faith and the other. This process creates the blood vessels and muscles that vitalize the whole body of Christ to pray and act as one. Hence, the Global Lutheran Songbook is not meant to copy or encourage to simply perform musical styles from other countries, but to integrate them liturgically as gifts from God for local worship with global perspectives.
This is not unlike what Paul the Apostle shares as his experience in 1 Corinthians 9:19-20.
“Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law.”
Paul leaves temporarily some of his cultural roots and mother tongue to share the Gospel in fresh ways to reach people outside of his own cultural tradition by “getting on and speaking from the bridge.” This is an act of faith, freedom and choice and not a compromise between his own roots or a foreign cultural tradition – it’s the bridge perspective between and beyond those two.
