Written near the end of the Thirty Years’ War (1618-48) and in the midst of political tensions in Berlin, as leaders forsook Lutheranism for Calvinism, “A Lamb Goes Uncomplaining Forth” details the love of God the Father in offering his Son to die for our salvation. Paul Gerhardt, a well-known Lutheran hymn writer, gives us a descriptive picture of our Savior’s suffering on Good Friday in a way that also brings to mind the sufferings of the times in which he lived. Gerhardt points to our dependence on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ for our salvation.

This hymn is a Good Friday text. Notice the use of the word “Lamb” in stanza 1. We often hear Jesus called the “Lamb of God” (Agnus Dei, for all you Latin scholars out there). This first stanza, then, is detailing the suffering of Jesus. The text is taken from Isaiah 53: “Like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth” (verse 7). The most striking aspect of this stanza is the way in which Jesus suffers all of this for us willingly and “without complaint”. Notice the use of the strong word “slaughter” instead of a word like “death”. In one way, it reminds us of the comparison of Jesus to a sacrificial lamb because we slaughter animals like lambs, but it is also a word that implies violence. Jesus did not merely die, he was mocked, spit upon, beaten, scourged, slaughtered.

But what does Jesus tell us at the conclusion of stanza 1? “All this I gladly suffer.” Gladly. This is our faith: Christ willingly, uncomplainingly, gladly became flesh and suffered and died for us. He is the ultimate sacrificial Lamb, a sacrifice that does not need to be repeated again and again like the Old Testament sacrifices, but rather a sacrifice that atones for our sins once and for all. And our joy is in the conclusion of this story. For Christ did not stay dead but arose on Easter Sunday. The Lamb that was slaughtered has risen and, as Luther tells us in his explanation to the second article of the Creed, “lives and reigns to all eternity”! This is most certainly true!

Review questions:

1. Who wrote the text of this hymn?

2. Which specific day of the Church Year is this text for? (Hint: think Holy Week)

3. Who is the “Lamb”?

4. What is stanza 1 talking about?

5. Stanza 1 seems a little depressing. Why do we still take joy in it?