Prophetic Presence in the Halls of Power

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Here is another quote from Conan Doyle’s, The White Company.

The English knights and company while staying with some French nobility hear from the French nobleman how low he thinks of the common people under his rule.  Doyle, as a good Englishman contrasts this with the free heartiness of Englishmen, but then moves on to a powerful scene where an aged priest openly rebukes the French nobleman. In this day such action could only be done at the risk of one’s life.  While this account is fictional it well represents real incidences which occurred in that era as well as before and since. (chapter 29)

“Perchance, my fair lord, the poor folk are sweeter and of a better countenance in England,” laughed the Lady Rochefort. “Mon Dieu! you cannot conceive to yourself how ugly they are! Without hair, without teeth, all twisted and bent; for me, I cannot think how the good God ever came to make such people. I cannot bear it, I, and so my trusty Raoul goes ever before me with a cudgel to drive them from my path.”

“Yet they have souls, fair lady, they have souls!” murmured the chaplain, a white-haired man with a weary, patient face.

“So I have heard you tell them,” said the lord of the castle; “and for myself, father, though I am a true son of holy Church, yet I think that you were better employed in saying your mass and in teaching the children of my men-at-arms, than in going over the country-side to put ideas in these folks’ heads which would never have been there but for you. I have heard that you have said to them that their souls are as good as ours, and that it is likely that in another life they may stand as high as the oldest blood of Auvergne. For my part, I believe that there are so many worthy knights and gallant gentlemen in heaven who know how such things should be arranged, that there is little fear that we shall find ourselves mixed up with base roturiers and swine-herds. Tell your beads, father, and con your psalter, but do not come between me and those whom the king has given to me!”

“God help them!” cried the old priest. “A higher King than yours has given them to me, and I tell you here in your own castle hall, Sir Tristram de Rochefort, that you have sinned deeply in your dealings with these poor folk, and that the hour will come, and may even now be at hand, when God’s hand will be heavy upon you for what you have done.” He rose as he spoke, and walked slowly from the room.

In what follows the boldest knights in the room bear witness to the courage and righteousness of the old priest who well represented his King. May we also be boldly devoted to the truth of our King regardless of the prevailing mood of our day or of the frowns of the powers of the world.

Conan Doyle and Ministry

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Here is another good section from Doyle’s The White Company.  In this section a young lady criticizes a young man who grew up in an abbey, calling for monks to do the world good by entering everyday life rather than remaining cloistered away. Doyle was no orthodox believer but this is a good presentation of the sacredness of daily life.

“And to what end?” she asked sharply. “If you are, as I understand, to shut yourself forever in your cell within the four walls of an abbey, then of what use would it be were your prayer to be answered?”

“The use of my own salvation.”

She turned from him with a pretty shrug and wave. “Is that all?” she said. “Then you are no better than Father Christopher and the rest of them. Your own, your own, ever your own! My father is the king’s man, and when he rides into the press of fight he is not thinking ever of the saving of his own poor body; he recks little enough if he leave it on the field. Why then should you, who are soldiers of the Spirit, be ever moping or hiding in cell or in cave, with minds full of your own concerns, while the world, which you should be mending, is going on its way, and neither sees nor hears you? Were ye all as thoughtless of your own souls as the soldier is of his body, ye would be of more avail to the souls of others.”

“There is sooth in what you say, lady,” Alleyne answered; “and yet I scarce can see what you would have the clergy and the church to do.”

“I would have them live as others and do men’s work in the world, preaching by their lives rather than their words. I would have them come forth from their lonely places, mix with the borel folks, feel the pains and the pleasures, the cares and the rewards, the temptings and the stirrings of the common people. Let them toil and swinken [archaic; synonym for labor], and labor, and plough the land, and take wives to themselves”

“Alas! alas!” cried Alleyne aghast, “you have surely sucked this poison from the man Wicliffe, of whom I have heard such evil things.”

“Nay, I know him not. I have learned it by looking from my own chamber window and marking these poor monks of the priory, their weary life, their profitless round. I have asked myself if the best which can be done with virtue is to shut it within high walls as though it were some savage creature. If the good will lock themselves up, and if the wicked will still wander free, then alas for the world!”

(Chapter 11)

Too Much Bull on the Fourth of July

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The American church’s fascination with gimmicks and shows is well documented as well as deeply distressing.  Too much effort is given to having the biggest/greatest/neatest show and too little is given to actually living out the gospel in healthy relationships where people know one another and hold one another accountable under the word of God.

This all comes back to mind with some of the things that will take place this weekend.  One church’s plans for “special shows” this weekend illustrate this well. The site states:

During the five performances of the Independence Day Celebration at Cornerstone Church, thousands will gather to celebrate America’s freedom with Nashville’s largest indoor fireworks display, state-of-the-art laser light show, and–new this year–an IPRA-sanctioned professional rodeo… all held within the confines of the church sanctuary!

There are two videos on this webpage.

Here is the first one with the basic info:

4th of July Rodeo Commercial from Cornerstone Church on Vimeo.

Is it appropriate to describe your church as “the most dynamic” in your city? Is this verifiable? Is it intended to a factual statement about this church in contrasts to hundreds of others in the city or is it just promotional jargon?

Here is the second video giving a little more background:

This video refers to these performances as shows but then lists as one of the shows the meeting at 10am on Sunday.  This “show” taking place during the time of corporate worship will be a gathering “to celebrate America’s freedom.”  The promotional poster says this will be “a legendary salute to the greatest Country in the World.”

We need to give up on the flashy shows and embrace simple gospel ministry.  We also need to be clear about the distinction between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of man.

Singing Psalm 46

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The Trinity Psalter suggests Psalm 46 be sung to the tune of “America, the Beautiful.”  I have no idea what led the editors to suggest this tune (other than that it fits!), but I find it very fitting.  Our church is planning to sing Psalm 46 to this tune on Sunday (July 4).  On a day when it is sadly common for churches to confuse the worship of God and love of country, we will use a tune associated with country to proclaim that our refuge is in God not in any construct of man.

The metrical version of Psalm 46 from the Trinity Psalter (slightly edited)* is below.

Psalm 46

1 God is our refuge and our strength,
In straits a present aid;
2 and, therefore, tho’ the Earth remove
We will not be afraid;
Tho’ hills amidst the seas be cast,
3 tho’ troubled waters roar,
Yea, tho’ the swelling Billows shake
The mountains on the shore.

4 A river is whose streams make glad
The city of our God,
The holy place wherein the Lord
Most High has His abode.
5 Yea, God is in the midst of her;
Unmoved she stands alway;
And God will surely grant her help
Before the break of day.

6 The nations raged; the
Kingdoms moved;
And when the earth had heard
The mighty voice He sent abroad
It melted at His word.
7 The LORD of hosts is on our side
Our safety to secure;
The God of Jacob is for us
A refuge strong and sure.

8 O come, behold what Wondrous works
Have by the LORD been wrought;
Come, see what desolations great
He on the earth has brought.
9 To utmost ends of all the earth
Wars unto peace He turns;
The bow He breaks, the spear He cuts,
In fire the char-iot burns.

10 Be still and know that I am God;
Among the nations I
Will be exalted; I on earth
Will be exalted high.
11 The LORD of hosts is on our side.
Our safety to secure;
The God of Jacob is for us
A refuge strong and sure.

* I edited the end of the second line in verse 5.  The original had “for aye” and I substituted “alway.”

Patristics, Psalms, and Prayer

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In his book, (which I mentioned previously), Christopher Hall has as useful section on how the church fathers used the Psalms as models for prayer (Craig Blaising spoke on this at the Psalms Project previously).

In this excerpt you see the point of the Psalms shaping our affections and guiding us in what we ought to pray.

“I bring up the issue of models for prayer because the church fathers believed that our dispositions – our deeply habituated thoughts, words and actions – are shaped by those we listen to and imitate.  There are, for instance, some people who really know how to pray.  King David comes to mind.  A principle reason that the ancient church prayed the psalms again and again – early monastic communities would pray all 150 psalms in one day – was a firm belief that the repetition of the psalms nurtured the dispositions that foster prayer.  Through repetition, the dispositions and words of the psalmist, the fathers believe, become those of the one who continually prays the psalms.  Early monastic communities offered this model to the church as a whole.” (89-90)

“The goal of praying the psalms daily, even hourly, is not vain repetition.  It is the forming and shaping of human character. ‘Psalmody gives its rhythm to the life of a monk and each of the faithful ought to practice it to some extent’ (Oliver Clement).  The Holy Spirit desires for us to hear these words, to meditate on them, to speak them with our tongues and hide them in our hearts.  Without doubt the Spirit could have provided a different prayer book for us or no prayer book at all.  Instead, the Spirit has given us the psalms.

The Holy Spirit knows we need help learning how to pray; the Spirit knows we are apt to stumble and perhaps lose our way if we exclusively rely on our own words and thoughts in prayer.  The point is that it is our thoughts, words and actions that need remolding, reshaping.  We need mentors in prayer, and the psalmist is one of the best.  If we listen carefully, immersing ourselves in his words and life, our own disposition will change, in prayer and out.” (91)

Conan Doyle on Pride

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I have often commented here on the value of broad reading in literature.  One value is that good stories tend to include keen insight into human nature. Currently I am listening to the audio of one of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s lesser known novels, The White Company.  The story is set in 14th century Europe during the Hundred Year’s War. In one section Alleyne, a young man who has just left a monastery, encounters for the first time men of the world in a local tavern.  In the quote below the common woman who runs the tavern corrects Alleyne about the marks of great men as opposed to the pretense of small men.  This is a good word.

“And the other?” asked Alleyne in a whisper. “He is surely some very great man, for he looks as though he scorned those who were about him.”

The landlady looked at him in a motherly way and shook her head. “You have had no great truck with the world,” she said, “or you would have learned that it is the small men and not the great who hold their noses in the air. Look at those shields upon my wall and under my eaves. Each of them is the device of some noble lord or gallant knight who hath slept under my roof at one time or another. Yet milder men or easier to please I have never seen: eating my bacon and drinking my wine with a merry face, and paying my score with some courteous word or jest which was dearer to me than my profit. Those are the true gentles. But your chapman [peddler] or your bearward [keeper of bears] will swear that there is a lime in the wine, and water in the ale, and fling off at the last with a curse instead of a blessing. This youth is a scholar from Cambridge, where men are wont to be blown out by a little knowledge, and lose the use of their hands in learning the laws of the Romans.

Worshiping With the Church Fathers

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I have appreciated so far looking through Christopher Hall’s book, Worshiping With the Church Fathers. In his introduction he provides a good word about engagement with our Christian heritage.  Having been nurtured in the Jesus movement, Hall mentions how he realized the movement had no ecclesiology (still like much of evangelicalism today).  In that context this quote appears:

“I have learned from the fathers that the church is much broader and deeper than I had ever imagined.  My individualistic, evangelical bent has been tempered by a historical, theological and spiritual lengthening of memory.  My listening skills have been enhanced.  Voices that once seemed strange, foreign and occasionally distorted – sometimes because of the historical, cultural, ecclesial and linguistic distances separating them from me – are now old friends.  This is not to say that I always find myself in agreement with the fathers.  We still have our disagreements, but our quarrels now resemble family squabbles and in-house arguments.” (13)

Thiselton on Communion

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I have been perusing Anthony Thiselton’s new book, The Living Paul: An Introduction to the Apostle’s Life and Thought.  I differ with him in various places (he is skeptical of Pauline authorship of Ephesians and the Pastorals for example), but I appreciate much of what he has to say.

His brief chapter on communion was helpful. Here are two quotes which make very useful and important points about communion.

“Participants in the Passover meal were ‘there’, with the generation who came out of Egypt; Christian participants were ‘there’ at the cross, reliving a past event as if it were a present event.  Hence ‘remembrance’ is a dramatic making-present; it is more ‘objective’ than merely mental recollection, but not repeated re-enactment…. Taking and eating is the activity of a participant, who is not a mere spectator.  It is to say: ‘Christ died; and died for me’; and ‘I am part of it.’  But the event which is dramatically ‘remembered’ remains once-for-all (Greek, ephapax).  It is an ‘effective sign’, which gives the assurance of solidarity with Christ and with Christ’s people, in his death and resurrection.”  (124)

“The Lord’s Supper, like baptism, ensures that all Christian experience is anchored in the cross, or in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  It allows the Church, both corporately and individually, to ‘relive’ the event of the cross, and to become intimately involved in it. . . . In moments of doubt, to see, to touch, to share, and to eat and to drink constitute an assurance, a pledge, a promise, and an ‘effective sign’ of covenant grace.” (125)

These are points I have sought to make previously.  Communion helps to anchor us in the cross, and is a tangible, pastoral expression of the reality of Christ’s act and our faith in him.

Fear of YHWH

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In sermon prep for last Sunday I walked through all the biblical references to the fear of the Lord.  One thing that struck me this time was all the blessings that are promised to attend the fear of the Lord.

I tried to pull these references together to summarize what the Bible promises to us as we fear God in order  to be more deeply impacted by this call.  Here is what I came up with:

The fear of YHWH is the beginning of wisdom (Ps111:10; Prov 9:10), the beginning of knowledge (Prov 1:7). It is instruction in wisdom (Prov 15:33). It keeps you from sin (Leviticus, various passages), causes you to turn away from sin (Prov 3:7); in fact, by the Fear of the Lord you turn away from evil (Prov 16:6).  It is “the hatred of evil” (Prov 8:13).

“The fear of the Lord is Zion’s treasure” (Isa 33:6)

It prolongs life (Prov 10:27) and brings riches and honor and life (Prov 22:4). In fact “The fear of the Lord leads to life, and whoever has it rests satisfied; he will not be visited by harm” (Prov 19:23). “It will be well with those who fear God” (Eccl 8:12). The eye of the Lord is on the one who fears Him (Ps 33:18) and the angel of the Lord encamps around him (Ps 34:7). The fear of the Lord gives one a strong confidence and provides a refuge for such a man’s children (Prov 14:26).

The Lord takes pleasure in the one who fears him (Ps 147:11) and will show fatherly compassion to him (Ps 103:13). The Lord’s mercy “is for those who fear him” (Luke 1:50).

“For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him-

the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him,
and his righteousness to children’s children,
to those who keep his covenant
and remember to do his commandments.” (Ps 103:11, 17-18)

The Lord will fulfill the desires of the one who fears him (Ps 145:19). God provides food for the ones who fears him (Ps 111:5).

“Blessed is the man who fears the Lord,
who greatly delights in his commandments!
His offspring will be mighty in the land;
the generation of the upright will be blessed.” (Ps 112:1-2)

Don’t you want the fear of the Lord?  It brings his mercy, compassion & care. It produces wisdom and brings blessing even to your children.

We ought to pray with David:

“Teach me your way, O LORD,
that I may walk in your truth;
unite my heart to fear your name.” (Ps 86:11)

Preaching Psalm 128, Resources

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My purpose in this post is simply to give my own opinion on what resources I found most helpful in preparing to preach Psalm 128.  I am not addressing which resources are the best on the Psalms in general.

On Psalm 128, the overall most helpful source I found was Spurgeon’s Treasury of David.  I enjoy reading my hard copy, but the full text is available online.  In terms of theological reflection and pastoral application (not to mention use of language!), Spurgeon is superb.  His treatment of Psalm 128 is really good and quite quotable.

Leupold was also very good and useful.  I do not hear as much about this commentary but I regularly find it helpful.  On Psalm 128 he is quite expressive with good theological application nicely phrased.

Kidner, though brief, as always gave helpful connections to the New Testament. He was not as helpful on this Psalm as on some others.

Among modern commentators Van Gemeren and Goldingay were most helpful.  Goldingay provided helpful technical information, more precise understanding of some key words and specifics on some of the metaphors (e.g. vine and olive shoots).  He also gave some pithy comments on how countercultural this text is in affirming the value of children. For example he writes:

The stress on wives and children is a stumbling block to ancient commentators for whom celibacy was a key value.  Amusingly, it can also be a stumbling block to modern commentators for whom a wife is more than a womb and daughters count as much as sons. Once more, when Scripture is saying something that we do not like, we do well to pay attention – we would be wise to reflect on the significance (for men and women) of having children, particularly if we are a people inclined to downplay it.  The Psalm also speaks to modern Western attitudes by inviting men and women to value what happens inside the house and not to think that value attaches only to what happens outside, in the community, business, society, and politics. (p. 513)

There is much to apply here.

Van Gemeren also was helpful in providing reliable, more recent information on background and metaphor.

I have not always found the Ancient Christian Commentary Series to be helpful because it has just small snippets, but in this case it was very useful.  One of the Patristic sources pointed out the connection between v. 1 and Peter’s speech in Acts 10, showing the universal call of the gospel here in Psalm 128.

Also, because I had just received a copy, I investigated Goldingay’s third volume of his Old Testament Theology.  Since “fear of the LORD” is prominent in this psalm I consulted his section “Reverencing Yhwh” which was quite good.  It was rich.  I thought it might be overly technical or less hardy theologically, but I was delightfully mistaken on both counts.