Pronoun Police Butcher Hymns at a Lutheran Church

(The following was written a number of weeks ago by Rev. Tom Brock of pastorsstudy.org. You can follow Pastor Brock on Facebook - here and twitter - here.)
 
Tonight I attended a worship service at a congregation of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.  Sadly, this congregation uses the ELCA's newest hymnal which changes hymns and Scripture in order to eliminate masculine pronouns for God.  Some in church leadership believe that using exclusively masculine language for God is sexist and oppressive.  So all the Psalms in the ELCA hymnal have been changed to get rid of "He" for God.  Tonight we sang a wonderful hymn, but I stumbled as I tried to sing it.  The hymn is "Earth and all stars" which originally read "He has done marvelous things, I too shall praise Him with a new song."  Can't have that.  It was desexed to "GOD has done marvelous things, I too will PRAISE GOD with a new song."  The ELCA has also changed the Apostle's Creed.  The pronoun police changed Jesus being "His only Son" to "God's only Son."  And Jesus "descending into Hell" has been changed to "descending to the dead."
 
So, getting rid of the mention of Hell, getting rid of the Bible's language for God made for an unsettling worship service.
 
May we unashamedly continue to worship God the way Jesus has revealed Him to us:   Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
 
In Him,
 
Pastor Tom Brock
pastorsstudy.org