A Communion Hymn Meditation: How Sweet and Aweful is the Place

In a few moments we’re going to sing together a favorite Isaac Watts hymn “How Sweet and Aweful is the Place.  It’s a hymn about this great parable –

He opens the first verse by describing the great and admire-able feast of Christ’s Kingdom – It is a feast that is sweet and full of awe … and one that displays the choicest foods from His stores.

And when we join together for that great feast, from our hearts, we will cry out to the Lord – “Why am I a guest?  Why did I hear Your voice inviting me here when so many others choose to starve outside?”

Watts gives us the correct answer.  The Lord replies – “The same sweet love that spread this feast drew you here.  Without it, you also would have refused and perished.”

So Watts finishes the hymn with a prayer for us to sing together.

And it is the application of this Kingdom parable.

After confessing that the only reason we’ve been invited into the Kingdom feast was the sweetness of God’s love toward us, we pray and ask Him to have compassion on the nations and to extend the call of His sweet love to all the earth.  We ask Him to constrain or draw strangers to their true home and to make His Word victorious, that it would triumph in our world.

The fact that unworthies such as we have been invited to Christ’s great banquet-feast fills us with longing to see all of His churches filled with people to join us in singing from our hearts with one voice the hymn of His redeeming grace.

Why did Israel receive the immeasurable blessings of the Covenant?  Why have we received the priceless blessings of the Kingdom?

Not because we earned it.  Not because God knew He’d get a good return on His investment.  In fact, as we’ll see – God-willing – later this season when we get to Lk 17, when we have done all we can, we will still have failed to return God any profit for what He spent on us.

By inviting us to His feast, Christ has been gracious to those who can never repay Him, just as He has called us to do.  And so the Father has exalted Him and will yet still reward Him at the consummation of all things – the resurrection of the just and the wedding feast of the Lamb.

Why and for Whom do we clap?

An incredible video snippet from David Gallo's TED talk "underwater astonishments", one of the top 10 most viewed TED talks of all time.

A simple question: Why did it end in spontaneous applause?  For Whom were these people clapping?  The octopus?  Gallo?  I think not.  Then for Whom? SomeOne else.

Romans 1.20.

Christmas Hymn

Advent Hymn #2: Lo, He Comes with Clouds Descending

A Ralph Vaughan Williams processional Advent Hymn.  Enough Said.

Advent Hymnody #1 - O Savior, Rend the Heavens Wide

... Another beautiful Advent hymn we hear very little of.  It is German from the early 1600's.  And in case you're thinking it is too difficult to learn, here are a bunch of kindergartners who have mastered it.  Enjoy!

"Widerstehe doch der Sünde: Stand strong against sin." BWV 54

Glenn Gould once said that Bach was the greatest architect of sound to ever live.  Here he takes us on a guided tour of Cantata 54.  Written to accompany the Lenten reading for "Oculi Sunday" from Ephesians 5.1-9.  As Gould notes, these are probably the words of our elder brother in the Faith, Johann, himself.  In it we hear and feel the swelling seduction of temptation along with the struggle and tension of dissonant chords, but then, through it all cuts the clear voice of the Spirit calling us to stand strong and overcome our enemy.

“Stand firm against all sinning, or its poison will possess you.. Those who commit sin are of the devil, for he has invented sin, but if one resists his vile shackles with true devotion, sin will straightaway take flight.”

Begbie, Music, and the Problem of Evil

Enjoy

[link: 5809909]

One of the Many Lies Surrounding Divorce in America ...

White Lent

Thanks to Dr Jim Jordan for introducing us to it and the Clerk of Oxford for posting a great recording of the French Carol and Lenten Hymn: White Lent.

1. Now quit your care
And anxious fear and worry;
For schemes are vain
And fretting brings no gain.
To prayer, to prayer!
Bells call and clash and hurry,
In Lent the bells do cry
'Come buy, come buy,
Come buy with love the love most high!'

2. Lent comes in the spring,
And spring is pied with brightness;
The sweetest flowers,
Keen winds, and sun, and showers,
Their health do bring
To make Lent's chastened whiteness;
For life to men brings light
And might, and might,
And might to those whose hearts are right.

3. To bow the head
In sackcloth and in ashes,
Or rend the soul,
Such grief is not Lent's goal;
But to be led
To where God's glory flashes,
His beauty to come nigh,
To fly, to fly,
To fly where truth and light do lie.

4. For is not this
The fast that I have chosen? -
The prophet spoke -
To shatter every yoke,
Of wickedness
The grievous bands to loosen,
Oppression put to flight,
To fight, to fight,
To fight till every wrong's set right.

5. For righteousness
And peace will show their faces
To those who feed
The hungry in their need, 
And wrongs redress,
Who build the old waste places,
And in the darkness shine. 
Divine, divine,
Divine it is when all combine!

6. Then shall your light
Break forth as doth the morning;
Your health shall spring,
The friends you make shall bring 
God's glory bright,
Your way through life adorning
And love shall be the prize.
Arise, arise,
Arise! and make a paradise!

Learning from Bread

Incredible presentation from master artisan breadmaker and E.O. teaching layman, Peter Reinhart.

Pro-Life Living

Here, Greg Koukl from Stand To Reason exemplifies speech seasoned with gracious salt and loving truth. He is an example by his words and actions.  Enjoy.

2014 Resolutions

1. Listen to all of Bach's Church Cantatas
2. Complete reading requirements and registration process for Biblical Counseling Certification
3. Begin Master's Coursework
4. Complete either: 1-armed pullup; BP of 225x12; or 300x1
...
5.  No library fines [cough, avert eyes, awkward clearing of throat ...]

The Dangerous Gospel of Jesus Christ

*Pastor's warning! Please note: explicit language warning for the first minute of this video clip!*


While we were busy running around in Sandestin for our annual Family Conference, on the other side of the world [down under], the Festival of Dangerous Ideas was concluding in Sydney.  The highlight of my time in Sandestin was getting to host our Q&A with Douglas and Nancy Wilson.  This morning, Doug posted the link to the Q&A session from FODI, which features his friend and Christian apologist, Peter Hitchens [brother of the late, radical atheist, Christopher Hitchens].
2 things stood out to me.  The first was the clarity and provocative intrigue of Peter Hitchens' articulation of the gospel of Christ Jesus.  The second is the utter disdain of children among the rest of the panelists.  It is often said by Christian Pro-lifers that we are a culture that hates children.  At times that has struck my ears as harsh hyperbole.  But in this clip, the hatred and abandon couldn't be more obvious.

Restoring the "We" to our Vocabulary

As our congregation has been working through Luke's Gospel, we recently came to the Disciples' Prayer [aka "The Lord's Prayer"] in chapter 11 and we took a great deal of time to notice the pronouns.  The only pronouns Christ gave us to pray were You [Thou] to the Father and first person plural [us, we, our].  Here is a great summary of that point from a different angle - the stories of Wendell Barry as described by Eugene Peterson.  Enjoy!

Man, this is Good!

Managing Pain - thoughts for counselors

Dan Ariely on the results of his pain management research.  How might these principles be applied by pastors and Biblical counselors in discipline cases as we think through the "how" of repentance and make plans to move forward while attempting to imitate our Lord Who would not break the bruised reed?

Illustrating the Trinity

This past week, for Trinity Sunday, I preached a sermon on the Trinity from John 8.  During that sermon, I talked about how the common Trinity analogies are actually examples of anti-trinitarian heresies which have long-since been condemned by the Church.  Afterward, I was asked by one of our brightest young theologians if, after all my error bashing, I could go on the affirmative to provide maybe just one helpful analogy or illustration of the Trinity that wasn't, in the end, heretical.
I told her that most theologians teach that no natural analogue exists, but that I'd think and study further.
Well, after more thought and study, the answer is: more of the same.

One of the greatest theologians among the early Church Fathers, Gregory Nazianzen [a 4th-century contemporary of Augustine, who - though he seemed to have been aware of their shortcomings - was a bit more loosey-goosey with Trinitarian analogies] said these words after evaluating several of the common Trinity analogies:

I have concluded that there is no solid ground upon which to stand my mind in these analogies.  In order to consider the Object I am trying to better understand [God], I must completely accept one part of the analogy while rejecting the rest.  In the end, it seems best to me to abandon the images and shadows [analogies], because they are deceitful and fall very short of the truth.  Instead, clinging myself to the holier way of thinking, I rest upon few words and by the guidance of the Holy Ghost  I make the light which I have received from Him my final friend and companion.  

I journey through this world to persuade everyone else, to the best of my ability, to worship Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, the One Godhead and Power.  To Him belongs all glory and honor and might for ever and ever.  Amen.

Both Melanchton and Calvin said: "We do better to adore the mysteries of Diety than to investigate them."  [Servetus take note.]

Form, Content, Design [and Worship]

As we approach the launch of our new church webpage, I have repeatedly been reminded of this fantastic TED talk by Design guru, John Maeda: How art, technology and design inform creative leaders.

Alongside a few other dear souls, I have spent several hours over the past few months agonizing  over font selection, tiny layout details, and nearly-unnoticeable design features.  Why?  Because they are NEARLY unnoticeable ... which is to say: noticeable.  And more important: something we all know instinctively, but somehow often forget, ignore, or even intellectually deny when we come to church life:
FORM SHAPES CONTENT as John Maeda so expertly demonstrates in this video clip.

APPLICATION:  There is more to a worship song than just the lyrics.  The MUSIC matters!  Sometimes how we sing matters more than what we sing [case in point: italics].  Things like instrumentation, the minister's apparel and appearance and demeanor, the lighting, the physical atmosphere [stained glass or neon night club] - all these things matter in our churches.  And all these "external" things shape the content ["words"] of our worship.  Enjoy!

Ascension Cookout Balloon Release

A few years ago after hearing this Ascension sermon, and trying to explain to my little ones what "ascended" means, our family started an Ascension Day tradition of releasing balloons to celebrate our Lord's Ascension to the Father's right hand.  This year we had the joy of continuing that tradition with many friends from Trinity.  Here is a glimpse.

Work, Sleep, and Meetings

When I arrived here a year ago as a new young pastor, Jim Jordan was gracious enough to take me out on a few occasions and let me pick his brain over Asian cuisine.  One of the things he told me stands out.  He said that Greg Bahnsen used to tell him to think of studying like underwater diving.  You had to set it up, prep, and then plunge in and reserve a large block of time for being underwater.  Then, you come up.  Take a break.  Get a bit of air.  Refresh.  And then start it all over again.  This is exactly what Jason Fried's research has found by paralleling work and sleep cycles.  For a pastor or anyone whose vocation involves creative work, this is a GOLDEN NUGGET!  Enjoy!