Replacing a Book After Twenty Eight Years

Evangelical Lutheran Worship replaced a book that had served for twenty eight years. The Lutheran Book of Worship, published in 1978, along with its two supplements, the 1991 Hymnal Supplement and the 1995 collection With One Voice, had carried the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's congregations through nearly three decades of Sunday mornings before the denomination decided a single successor volume was needed. The ELCA's own Churchwide Assembly approved moving ahead with the new book in 2005, and Augsburg Fortress, the church's publishing house, released Evangelical Lutheran Worship in October 2006. The 2007 Churchwide Assembly then formally received the finished book with Commended status, the denomination's own seal of approval on what its congregations would now be singing and praying from.

At 1,211 pages, the new book was substantially more comprehensive than what it replaced: 654 hymns, all 150 psalms, and fourteen separate service music settings covering ten different Communion liturgies, one setting for the Service of the Word and three for the Divine Office. It serves not only the ELCA but also the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada, making it a shared resource across two national church bodies rather than a purely American production.