Christ The Lord Is Risen Today

Travis Cottrell's recording of Charles Wesley's 1739 Easter hymn keeps the text's structure intact — three verses, each line answered by its own "Alleluia," the repetition acting almost like a congregational response built into the meter itself. "Where, O death, is now thy sting... where thy victory, O grave" quotes 1 Corinthians 15:55 almost word for word, Paul's own taunt aimed at death after describing the resurrection in the verses just before it.

The hymn's third verse, "made like him, like him we rise, ours the cross, the grave, the skies," reaches for Romans 6:5's claim that believers who have "become united with him in the likeness of his death... will also be part of his resurrection" — the same pattern Christ went through becoming, in Wesley's phrase, something the singer goes through as well rather than something only watched from a distance.