Andrew Blackwood on the Public Reading of Scripture

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In my last post I mentioned Andrew Blackwood’s book, The Fine Art of Public Worship.  He has a good chapter on the public reading of Scripture, a historic part of Christian worship rooted in Scripture which is sorely neglected today. Much needs to be said on this aspect of worship, but here I will simply provide a few quotes from Blackwood’s discussion:

The reading of the Scriptures is perhaps the most important part of public worship. (128)

…if the minister knows how to read [publicly], he is likely to be in demand by the congregation which believes what the Book says about its own inspiration. (128)

The reading of the Scriptures ought always to be set in the centre of the service, where the light falls directly upon it.  Compared to it, our own poor bits of sermons are a very trivial affair, a mere footnote in small print.” (132)  [quoting In Christ’s Stead, Warrack Lectures, Doran, 1925, p45.]

In the Christian Church the minister is the man behind the Book. (133)

What a fine art is the worthy reading of the Scriptures! (135)

One need not argue about it [the Bible], or defend it, as though it were in danger of being condemned to death.  One need only interpret, illuminate, and enforce what it says about itself… (137)

Andrew Blackwood on Singing the Psalms

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One of the voices from the past which I have come to appreciate is Andrew Blackwood (1882-1966), pastor and professor for many years at Princeton. He wrote much on pastoral ministry which remains quite helpful today. Because he wrote in a different day some of his points are dated, but also he often exposes blind spots of today.

In his helpful book, The Fine Art of Public Worship (Abingdon Press, 1939), he wrote this about the place of the singing the Psalms:

Many of our noblest hymns are from the Book of Psalms.  “Jesus shall reign where’er the sun” is a modern version of the seventy-second psalm, and “our God, our help in ages past” is a paraphrase of the ninetieth.  In the United Presbyterian book of praise are a hundred and fifty selections from the Psalms, with an equal number of classic hymns.  Perhaps our other denominations would have greater love for the Bible if we sang from the Psalms as often as our fathers did after the Reformation.  Many of those songs came out of the fiery furnace, and so they brought our fathers a mighty sense of God’s holiness, as well as a keen awareness of his laws. (110)

The Psalms as Christian Worship, by Waltke & Houston

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My copy of this book, The Psalms as Christian Worship: A Historical Commentary by Brucke Watlke and James Houston, just came today, and already I am hooked. This is a significant book in so many ways.  In general Waltke provides exegesis of key psalms and Houston provides a history of reception and interpretation. Together they seek to persuade the church to attend again to the rich spiritual resources of the Psalms.

They describe how the Psalms have been so central to Christian (as well as Jewish) worship and spirituality.

“The Psalms were and are of key importance in the daily life of the Christian and in Christian community worship.” (2)

“As ‘the Bible in miniature,’ the Psalms have been uniquely central to the history of the church’s devotion, right up until the eighteenth century.” (13)

They also lament how the Psalter has been drained by overly technical analysis and has been lost to our contemporary worship, both private and corporate.

“So we deplore the confessional reductionism in much contemporary Biblical scholarship, which overlooks two thousand years of Christian devotion and orthodoxy or ‘right worship,’ in the use of the Book of Psalms. It ignores the historical continuity of tradition in the communion of saints. It is like studying the activities of a seaport, and yet ignoring the existence of its hinterland…

“With the loss of their continuity and ‘historical hinterland,’ the psalms then lose their spirituality, and the whole heritage of devotion becomes ignored for both Jews and Christians. As the Jewish scholar James L. Kugel, Harvard professor of Hebrew, has observed: ‘it would not be unfair to say that research into the Psalms in this century has had a largely negative effect on the Psalter’s reputation as the natural focus of Israelite spirituality, and much that was heretofore prized in this domain has undergone a somewhat reluctant re-evaluation.’ Rather than being inspired by the spirituality of the Psalter, critical ‘moderns’ despiritualize the Psalms.” (3)

Waltke and Houston go on to state three of their goals as (10-11) :

1)  To restore the unique role of the Psalms in worship

2)  To restore the role of the Psalms in spiritual formation

3)  To restore the holistic use of a Psalm

On the last point they state:

“Our purpose, therefore, is to recover these losses through accredited exegesis and hearing afresh the rich devotional response of the true church. We are heirs of all the ages, and we are the poorer for our failure to hear and embrace that rich heritage” (11).

I am encouraged by this book so far. While quite different, it resonates with the essential aims of the forthcoming book, Forgotten Songs: Reclaiming the Psalms for Worship (B&H), which Richard Wells and I are editing. May these efforts contribute to a re-embracing of the Psalms.

Chrysostom, Benefit of Psalm Singing

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“Nothing, in fact, nothing so uplifts the soul, gives it wings, liberates it from the earth, looses the shackles of the body, promotes its values and its scorn for everything in this world as harmonious music and a divine song rhythmically composed.”

“From profane songs, you see, harm and damage and many dire consequences would be introduced; the more intemperate and lawless of these songs lodge in the parts of the soul, and render it weaker and more remiss. From the psalms, by contrast, being spiritual, there comes great benefit, great advantage and much sanctification, and the basis for every value would be provided, since the words purify the soul and the Holy Spirit quickly alights on the soul singing such things.”

–  John Chrysostom, Homily on Psalm 42; cited in Douglas Sean O’Donnell, God’s Lyrics, 109-110

Why a festival honoring the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible?

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On September 15-17 the R. C. Ryan Center for Biblical Studies at Union University will host the festival, “KJV400: Legacy & Impact.” Some today may wonder why celebrate the 400th anniversary of the King James version.

This festival is not a call for everyone to use only the KJV or an exercise in mere dusty history. It is not reactionary or mere nostalgia. Rather,  It is an opportunity to consider an amazing work of God which occurred 400 years ago this year, a significant chapter in the ongoing struggle to bring the Word of God to people, a powerful moment which continues to shape the world through the English speaking church.  The production of the King James Bible is a moment when the church led the culture instead of the other way around as we often see today.  It was a crowning moment of the effort begun many years before of bringing God’s word to English-speaking people producing a Bible which was taken to the ends of the earth shaping world history in its path.

Join us, then, for an invigorating look at the work of God through His word. The production of the King James Bible was not the final chapter of Bible translation, but it has been a key one with rich lessons for us today.  As we examine the historical setting, with the great suffering endured by many to bring the Bible to the common person we will be reminded of the great privilege of having our own copies of the Bible in our language. As we consider the work of God in the past, may we yearn to see God move amongst us afresh.  As we see how God’s word has impacted the breadth of culture, it is our hope that we will be stirred to engage our world anew for the sake of the gospel.

Because the gospel engages all of life we will have not only lectures and addresses, but also theater, music, dramatic readings, film, art and an amazing Bible exhibit. It is our hope that the festival will be a time of refreshing and renewal. The Bible exhibit will be an amazing opportunity to see in one place all the early English translations as well as many other texts and biblical artifacts. We have been told that this exhibit rivals any other on display in North America this year. This will be a wonderful opportunity to marvel at how God has worked to bring us His word.

I hope you will join us.

Chrysostom on the Value of Scripture Reading

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“Hearken, I entreat you, all ye that are careful for this life, and procure books that will be medicines for the soul. If ye will not any other, yet get you at least the New Testament, the Apostolic Epistles, the acts, the Gospels, for your constant teachers. If grief befall thee, dive into them as into a chest of medicines; take thence comfort of thy trouble, be it loss, or death, or bereavement of relations; or rather dive not into them merely but take them wholly to thee; keep them in thy mind.

This is the cause of all evils, the not knowing the Scriptures. We go into battle without arms, and how ought we to come off safe?”
(Homily 9, on Colossians 3:16-17)

I probably should just let this beautiful statement stand on its own, but here are two small observations.

First, note that individuals at this early date are encouraged to obtain their own copies of the scriptures. Personal, private reading goes back further than is sometimes suggested.

Second, while Chrysostom urges Bible reading as the ultimate medicine, he also encourages the reading of other good books- “If ye will not any other, yet get you at least the New Testament.” The Bible is primary, but the use of other helpful books is commended as well.

Luther, Psalms a Manual for Prayer

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Every Christian who would abound in prayer and piety ought, in all reason, to make the Psalter his manual; and, moreover, it were well if every Christian so used it and were so expert in it as to have it word for word by heart, and could have it even in his heart as often as he chanced to be called to speak or act, that he might be able to draw forth or employ some sentence out of it, by way of a proverb. For indeed the truth is, that everything that a pious heart can desire to ask in prayer, it here finds Psalms and words to match, so aptly and sweetly, that no man—no, nor all the men in the world—shall be able to devise forms of words so good and devout. Moreover, the Psalter doth minister such instruction and comfort in the act of supplication; and the Lord’s Prayer doth so run through it, and it through the Lord’s Prayer, that the one helpeth us finely to understand the other, and the two together make a pleasant harmony …

In my opinion, any man who will but make a trial in earnest of the Psalter and the Lord’s Prayer will very soon bid the other pious prayers adieu, and say, Ah, they have not the sap, the strength, the heart, the fire, that I find in the Psalter; they are too cold, too hard, for my taste!

(from his Preface to the Edition of the Psalter in 1545)

The Psalms- Singing as Prayer

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In describing the elements of public worship in the apostolic (1st century) church, Philip Schaaf lists “The SONG, a form of prayer, in the dress of festive poetry and the elevated language of inspiration.” This practice, he writes, “passed immediately, with the psalms of the Old Testament, those inexhaustible treasures of spiritual experience, edification and comfort, from the temple and the synagogue into the Christian church” (History of the Christian Church, vol. 1).

Two things are striking to me in this comment. First, is this beautiful description of the Psalms. How true! What treasures we miss when we fail to appropriate these for our singing and praying as our forebears did.

Second, singing is here seen primarily as a form of prayer. This is a common idea in Judaism, the New Testament (see Acts 16:25), and in the church for centuries. But, it has not been a common idea in my church circles along my journey. We sing to praise God, which is good and biblically based. But what do we miss by failing to consider our corporate singing- at least portions of it- as prayer? What formation do we miss by failing to see the value of prayer “in the dress of festive poetry”?

Chrysostom, Psalm Singing Leads to Happiness

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“Do you wish to be happy? Do you want to know how to spend the day truly blessed? I offer you a drink that is spiritual. This is not a drink for drunkenness that would cut off even meaningful speech. This does not cause us to babble. It does not disturb our vision. Here it is: Learn to sing Psalms! Then you will see pleasure indeed. Those who have learned to sing with the psalms are easily filled with the Holy Spirit.”

(Chrysostom, Homily on Ephesians 19.5.19-21; from Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians (Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture))

Tim Tebow, Through My Eyes

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At my blog on children’s literature, The Children’s Hour, I comment on books we read together as a family giving recommendations or warnings. This is the most recent entry from The Children’s Hour:

Through My Eyes, Tim Tebow with Nathan Whitaker

(Harper Collins, 2011), hb., 260 pp.
Ages 10+
My boys and I really enjoyed reading this book. It is different from the others books we typically read since it is a contemporary autobiography, but it was very beneficial.  We had already been drawn into the Tim Tebow story as we had watched his college career and his clear Christian witness. When I met and served with his father, Bob Tebow, and learned more about his family we were only drawn more to Tebow.  This is a genuine young man with a solid Christian family.
So, when we saw this book I thought I’d give it a try for our reading together.  We were not disappointed. The book was entertaining and exciting. The stories of his adventures and mishaps with his brothers growing up were fun and familiar! The stories of his competiveness- especially of his 300+ curls to win a contest leaving him unable to straighten out his arms for days!- were fun and challenging.  Throughout the book Tebow held up faith in God, the importance of family, hard work and perseverance, and our responsibility to help others, especially those in need.  He speaks of his accomplishments without bragging and is honest about his own shortcomings. In the end I was glad for my boys to hear this story and example of hard work and commitment to God. It provided a current example of many of the characteristics we have read and talked about elsewhere.
I have suggested roughly the age 10 or above for the book since that is probably about the time the details of football games, etc. will be of particular interest. The only thing that arose which was more tricky with my younger guys was the incident where the reporter asked Tebow if he was saving himself for marriage. Tebow addresses the issue but does so very tactfully. Still, it simply did not make sense to some of my younger boys who have no idea what he was talking about. If I knew of it ahead of time I would simply have skipped that portion for reading aloud, so I mention it to you in case that is of help.
We commend the book to you, and even though we are die-hard Packer fans we will be pulling for the Broncos as well when Tim Tebow is on the field.