Now thank we all our God
In the closing years of the Thirty Years' War, the Saxon town of Eilenburg lay exhausted beneath the weight of suffering. Refugees crowded its narrow streets, having fled villages and farms devastated by soldiers who had marched across Germany for a generation. Scarcity was everywhere. Harvests had failed, prices had risen beyond the means of ordinary people, and disease spread rapidly among a population already weakened by hunger.
At the centre of this troubled town stood Martin Rinckart, Lutheran pastor of St Nicholas Church. Born in 1586, he had never imagined that his ministry would be shaped by such relentless tragedy. Yet year after year he had watched war draw ever closer until it seemed there was scarcely a family in Eilenburg untouched by grief.
Yet he refused to give into despair. In the midst of the darkness, God remained, God with the suffering, still there in the small acts of compassion from those his grace had touched. Even in the valley of the shadow of death, unseen yet present, they brought countless gifts of love. Everyone who shared their own meagre rations, who held hands and comforted the dying, who prayed for peace was a cause of thanksgiving as they reached out with heart and hands and voices.
Now thank we all our God
with heart and hands and voices,
who wondrous things has done,
in whom his world rejoices;
who from our mothers' arms
has blessed us on our way
with countless gifts of love,
and still is ours today.
From the window of the parsonage, Rinckart could see the rooftops stretching towards the river. Beyond them lay a landscape scarred by conflict, but it was the burdens within the town that weighed most heavily upon him. Thousands had sought refuge behind Eilenburg's walls, hoping to find safety from marauding armies. Instead, overcrowding had helped to bring plague and famine to their doors. Many days began and ended with funerals.
The Eilenburg Church Death Registers were maintained directly by the pastor and reached a peak in 1637 when Rinckart was forced to log 40 to 50 funerals a day. Plague stalked the streets, thousands of names were recorded, so many that they had to be buried in mass graves.
The church bells tolled so often that their sound seemed woven into the fabric of daily life. Where several ministers had once served the town, Rinckart increasingly found himself carrying the responsibility almost alone, comforting the bereaved, caring for the sick, and committing the dead to God's mercy.
Each of the city’s four pastors held ten or more funerals a day. One fled out of fear. One by one, the others died, and Rinckart buried them. Then his own dear wife was taken ill and died of the plague. He preached her funeral sermon just two days later, on May 10, 1637. For his sermon text, he chose Psalm 77, a psalm deeply rooted in agonizing grief and questioning God, which begins "I cry aloud to God... Will the Lord reject forever? Will he never show his favour again? Has his unfailing love vanished forever?"
But that was not the final word, he knew well. God remained faithful, even beyond death, his promises a sure and certain guide for all who were perplexed by so much suffering and loss, even as he himself mourned one so dear to him. Out of that conviction grew words that would sustain generations yet unborn.
O may this bounteous God
through all our life be near us,
with ever joyful hearts
and blessed peace to cheer us,
to keep us in his grace,
and guide us when perplexed,
and free us from all ills
of this world in the next.
Each week seemed darker than the last. Yet even amid such hardship, moments of grace still shone through the gloom. The famine following the 1637 plague was so extreme that historical records note thirty or forty people could be seen openly fighting in Eilenburg’s streets for a dead cat or crow. In response to this utter destitution, Rinckart systematically gave away virtually everything he owned. He divided his household's own meagre food rations to feed his starving neighbours, eventually mortgaging his future pastoral income to purchase basic provisions and clothing for the city's poorest refugees
By the late 1640s, over 8,000 citizens had died, hundreds of homes were completely destroyed, and the town council was reduced to just three surviving members. The population had lost almost every physical possession to plundering soldiers.
The Swedish army surrounded Eilenburg and demanded an unpayable, crushing ransom of 30,000 florins. Knowing the citizens had absolutely nothing left, Rinckart gathered his desperate congregation out in the open. He famously called out to them: “Come, my children, we can find no hearing, no mercy with men; let us take refuge with God.” The entire crowd fell to their knees in fervent prayer and began singing the hymn “Wenn wir in höchsten Nöten sein” (“When in the Hour of Utmost Need”)
Moved by the profound, humble display of faith amidst ruin, the Swedish commander relented and drastically lowered the levy.
One evening Rinckart returned home after another day of pastoral duties. The meal set before his family was modest, but they received it with gratitude. As they sat together, one of his daughters asked whether peace would ever come again to Germany. For a moment he was silent.
No one could know when the war would end. Too many treaties had failed, and too many promises had been broken. Yet as he looked around the table, seeing the faces of those he loved gathered safely beside him, he was reminded that God's gifts were not measured only in prosperity and success. They could also be found in perseverance, in fellowship, and in the quiet courage that carried people through adversity, strengthened by the Holy Spirit.
Later that night, after the household had retired to bed, Rinckart remained by the light of a single candle. Outside, the wind moved through the darkened streets of Eilenburg. Within the room, he took up his pen, shaping words that would become one of Christianity's most enduring hymns of thanksgiving.
"Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices, who wondrous things has done, in whom his world rejoices."
When he finally laid down his pen, the suffering around him had not vanished. The war still raged, and Eilenburg's trials were not yet over. Nevertheless, Martin Rinckart had given the Church a hymn that would outlive both the conflict and the century that produced it.
For generations to come, Christians would sing his words in times of celebration and in seasons of hardship, finding in them the same conviction that had sustained their author: that even in the darkest chapters of history, God's grace remains present, and his blessings continue to accompany his people, yesterday, today, and for evermore.
It would be translated into English in 1858 by Catherine Winkworth as “Now Thank We All Our God.” She believed historic German chorales offered profound spiritual resilience to comfort and strengthen English Christians facing modern suffering.
She lived in Manchester, seeing the industrial boom, but the dark side of that prosperity, with the devastating poverty, gruelling factory conditions, and overcrowding. Following that came the ravages of cholera outbreaks in cities, where there was a climate of grief and anxiety that mirrored the plague-ridden Germany of Martin Rinckart.
Living through the aftermath of the First World War and the rise of Nazi Germany, the theologian Karl Barth explicitly named "Now Thank We All Our God" (Nun danket alle Gott) as his favourite hymn.
To Barth, sin and suffering are real, but they are ultimately defeated by the reality of God's "Yes" to humanity. Just as the hymn's original author Martin Rinckart penned these words of praise while burying dozens of plague victims a day during the Thirty Years' War, Barth lived through the horrors of World War I and the rise of Nazi Germany.
Barth championed the hymn because it models a radical, defiant faith: it chooses to boldly proclaim "Who wondrous things has done, in whom this world rejoices" even when the world around us is in absolute chaos. It would be a hymn of gratitude sung at his funeral.
Across centuries marked by plague, poverty, war and tyranny, each generation discovered anew the truth Rinckart had expressed in song: gratitude is not the denial of suffering, but an act of faith that God's grace is greater than it.
All praise and thanks to God
the Father now be given,
the Son and Spirit blest,
who reign in highest heaven
the one eternal God,
whom heaven and earth adore;
for thus it was, is now,
and shall be evermore.
In the closing years of the Thirty Years' War, the Saxon town of Eilenburg lay exhausted beneath the weight of suffering. Refugees crowded its narrow streets, having fled villages and farms devastated by soldiers who had marched across Germany for a generation. Scarcity was everywhere. Harvests had failed, prices had risen beyond the means of ordinary people, and disease spread rapidly among a population already weakened by hunger.
At the centre of this troubled town stood Martin Rinckart, Lutheran pastor of St Nicholas Church. Born in 1586, he had never imagined that his ministry would be shaped by such relentless tragedy. Yet year after year he had watched war draw ever closer until it seemed there was scarcely a family in Eilenburg untouched by grief.
Yet he refused to give into despair. In the midst of the darkness, God remained, God with the suffering, still there in the small acts of compassion from those his grace had touched. Even in the valley of the shadow of death, unseen yet present, they brought countless gifts of love. Everyone who shared their own meagre rations, who held hands and comforted the dying, who prayed for peace was a cause of thanksgiving as they reached out with heart and hands and voices.
Now thank we all our God
with heart and hands and voices,
who wondrous things has done,
in whom his world rejoices;
who from our mothers' arms
has blessed us on our way
with countless gifts of love,
and still is ours today.
From the window of the parsonage, Rinckart could see the rooftops stretching towards the river. Beyond them lay a landscape scarred by conflict, but it was the burdens within the town that weighed most heavily upon him. Thousands had sought refuge behind Eilenburg's walls, hoping to find safety from marauding armies. Instead, overcrowding had helped to bring plague and famine to their doors. Many days began and ended with funerals.
The Eilenburg Church Death Registers were maintained directly by the pastor and reached a peak in 1637 when Rinckart was forced to log 40 to 50 funerals a day. Plague stalked the streets, thousands of names were recorded, so many that they had to be buried in mass graves.
The church bells tolled so often that their sound seemed woven into the fabric of daily life. Where several ministers had once served the town, Rinckart increasingly found himself carrying the responsibility almost alone, comforting the bereaved, caring for the sick, and committing the dead to God's mercy.
Each of the city’s four pastors held ten or more funerals a day. One fled out of fear. One by one, the others died, and Rinckart buried them. Then his own dear wife was taken ill and died of the plague. He preached her funeral sermon just two days later, on May 10, 1637. For his sermon text, he chose Psalm 77, a psalm deeply rooted in agonizing grief and questioning God, which begins "I cry aloud to God... Will the Lord reject forever? Will he never show his favour again? Has his unfailing love vanished forever?"
But that was not the final word, he knew well. God remained faithful, even beyond death, his promises a sure and certain guide for all who were perplexed by so much suffering and loss, even as he himself mourned one so dear to him. Out of that conviction grew words that would sustain generations yet unborn.
O may this bounteous God
through all our life be near us,
with ever joyful hearts
and blessed peace to cheer us,
to keep us in his grace,
and guide us when perplexed,
and free us from all ills
of this world in the next.
Each week seemed darker than the last. Yet even amid such hardship, moments of grace still shone through the gloom. The famine following the 1637 plague was so extreme that historical records note thirty or forty people could be seen openly fighting in Eilenburg’s streets for a dead cat or crow. In response to this utter destitution, Rinckart systematically gave away virtually everything he owned. He divided his household's own meagre food rations to feed his starving neighbours, eventually mortgaging his future pastoral income to purchase basic provisions and clothing for the city's poorest refugees
By the late 1640s, over 8,000 citizens had died, hundreds of homes were completely destroyed, and the town council was reduced to just three surviving members. The population had lost almost every physical possession to plundering soldiers.
The Swedish army surrounded Eilenburg and demanded an unpayable, crushing ransom of 30,000 florins. Knowing the citizens had absolutely nothing left, Rinckart gathered his desperate congregation out in the open. He famously called out to them: “Come, my children, we can find no hearing, no mercy with men; let us take refuge with God.” The entire crowd fell to their knees in fervent prayer and began singing the hymn “Wenn wir in höchsten Nöten sein” (“When in the Hour of Utmost Need”)
Moved by the profound, humble display of faith amidst ruin, the Swedish commander relented and drastically lowered the levy.
One evening Rinckart returned home after another day of pastoral duties. The meal set before his family was modest, but they received it with gratitude. As they sat together, one of his daughters asked whether peace would ever come again to Germany. For a moment he was silent.
No one could know when the war would end. Too many treaties had failed, and too many promises had been broken. Yet as he looked around the table, seeing the faces of those he loved gathered safely beside him, he was reminded that God's gifts were not measured only in prosperity and success. They could also be found in perseverance, in fellowship, and in the quiet courage that carried people through adversity, strengthened by the Holy Spirit.
Later that night, after the household had retired to bed, Rinckart remained by the light of a single candle. Outside, the wind moved through the darkened streets of Eilenburg. Within the room, he took up his pen, shaping words that would become one of Christianity's most enduring hymns of thanksgiving.
"Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices, who wondrous things has done, in whom his world rejoices."
When he finally laid down his pen, the suffering around him had not vanished. The war still raged, and Eilenburg's trials were not yet over. Nevertheless, Martin Rinckart had given the Church a hymn that would outlive both the conflict and the century that produced it.
For generations to come, Christians would sing his words in times of celebration and in seasons of hardship, finding in them the same conviction that had sustained their author: that even in the darkest chapters of history, God's grace remains present, and his blessings continue to accompany his people, yesterday, today, and for evermore.
It would be translated into English in 1858 by Catherine Winkworth as “Now Thank We All Our God.” She believed historic German chorales offered profound spiritual resilience to comfort and strengthen English Christians facing modern suffering.
She lived in Manchester, seeing the industrial boom, but the dark side of that prosperity, with the devastating poverty, gruelling factory conditions, and overcrowding. Following that came the ravages of cholera outbreaks in cities, where there was a climate of grief and anxiety that mirrored the plague-ridden Germany of Martin Rinckart.
Living through the aftermath of the First World War and the rise of Nazi Germany, the theologian Karl Barth explicitly named "Now Thank We All Our God" (Nun danket alle Gott) as his favourite hymn.
To Barth, sin and suffering are real, but they are ultimately defeated by the reality of God's "Yes" to humanity. Just as the hymn's original author Martin Rinckart penned these words of praise while burying dozens of plague victims a day during the Thirty Years' War, Barth lived through the horrors of World War I and the rise of Nazi Germany.
Barth championed the hymn because it models a radical, defiant faith: it chooses to boldly proclaim "Who wondrous things has done, in whom this world rejoices" even when the world around us is in absolute chaos. It would be a hymn of gratitude sung at his funeral.
Across centuries marked by plague, poverty, war and tyranny, each generation discovered anew the truth Rinckart had expressed in song: gratitude is not the denial of suffering, but an act of faith that God's grace is greater than it.
All praise and thanks to God
the Father now be given,
the Son and Spirit blest,
who reign in highest heaven
the one eternal God,
whom heaven and earth adore;
for thus it was, is now,
and shall be evermore.
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