The Music & the Spoken Word broadcast airs live via TV, radio, and internet stream on Sunday at 9:30 a.m. mountain time. For information on other airtimes, visit “Airing Schedules” at musicandthespokenword.org.

This encore performance of Music & the Spoken Word has been specially selected for airing while the Choir and Orchestra are practicing social distancing. It contains a new Spoken Word, written and delivered by Lloyd Newell. 

Music

Conductors: Mack Wilberg and Ryan Murphy
Organist: Richard Elliott
Narrator: Lloyd Newell

“Let All the World in Every Corner Sing”
Music: Ryan Murphy
Lyrics: George Herbert

“The King of Love My Shepherd Is”
Music: Ryan Murphy
Lyrics: Henry W. Baker

“Sinfonia to Cantata XXIX” (organ solo)
Music: Johann Sebastian Bach
Arrangement: Robert Hebbel

“All Things Bright and Beautiful”¹
Music: English melody
Lyrics: Cecil Frances Alexander
Arrangement: Mack Wilberg

“What a Wonderful World”
Music and Lyrics: George David Weiss and Bob Thiele
Arrangement: Mack Wilberg

“How Firm a Foundation”^1,2
Music: Attributed to J. Ellis
Lyrics: Attributed to Robert Keen
Arrangement: Mack Wilberg

1. On the CD Then Sings My Soul.
2. On the CD Called to Serve and in the CD set The Missionary Collection.

The Spoken Word

Seek Out the True and Trustworthy

In our day, finding answers to questions has never been easier. When we have questions, we simply search the internet—which is now as simple as talking to a handheld device—and we expect immediate responses. And we often get them! But how often do we stop to consider if we are asking the right questions of the right sources—and if we are getting the right answers? 

In the information age, our problem isn’t that we have too many unanswered questions; it’s that our questions have too many answers. How can we discern between good and bad information, between truth and error, between fact and fiction? It’s one question that the internet isn’t really equipped to answer—the same question the Roman governor Pilate asked Jesus of Nazareth thousands of years ago: “What is truth?” (John 18:38).

Sam Wineburg, a respected Stanford history professor, has noted that in previous generations, research meant going to a library and reading countless books that had been carefully vetted by editors and respected publishers. Today, for many people research means typing a phrase in a search engine and clicking on the first web page that appears—one that may not have undergone the scrutiny or peer review that was once associated with being published. Now anyone can create a website or write a blog and appear to have authority or expertise that they might not have. 

Professor Wineburg observes: “What once fell on the shoulders of editors, fact-checkers, and subject matter experts now falls on the shoulders of each and every one of us.” The internet has saved us the trouble of finding information but reserves for us the responsibility of evaluating that information. So we check and double-check sources, assess the author’s motive, and consider context. And then, when it comes to our deepest questions, regarding eternity and matters of the soul, we remember Jesus’s words to Pilate: “To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth” (John 18:37). For all questions—but especially those questions whose answers matter the most—we seek out the best and most trustworthy sources.

1. See “Why Historical Thinking Is Not about History,” History News, spring 2016, 13–16.
   
2. “Why Historical Thinking Is Not about History,” 16.