A prayer for year’s end and beginning
December 31, 2006
As my final blog post of 2006, I am reprinting a prayer from The Valley of Vision that we will use in our service tonight:
O God, your love is beyond compare.
You are good when you give,
when you take away,
when the sun shines upon me,
when the night gathers over me.
You have loved me before the foundation of the world,
and in love you have redeemed my soul.
You love me still, in spite of my hard heart, ingratitude, distrust.
Your goodness has been with me during another year,
leading me through a twisting wilderness.
Your goodness will with me in year ahead;
I launch my boat on the unknown waters of this year,
with you, as the pilot of my future, as of my past.
If you appoint storms of tribulation, you will be with me in them.
If you ordain joy and success, you will receive thanks and honor.
If I die, I shall see your face the sooner;
If I live, I shall walk by faith and not by sight.
Only glorify yourself in me whether in comfort or in trial,
as a chosen vessel suitable always for your use.
Give me your grace to sanctify me,
your comforts to cheer,
your wisdom to teach,
your right hand to guide,
your joy to strengthen,
your law to convict,
your presence to stabilize.
May the fear of the Lord keep me in awe of you,
and may the triumphs of your kingdom be my joy. AMEN.
Idea or person?
December 27, 2006
In preparing to preach this coming Lord’s Day on Mark 4:35-41, I have been blessed by J.C. Ryle’s ‘The Ruler of the Waves,’ which appears as a chapter in his book Holiness (which, by the way, is an essential part of any Christian library). Let me quote:
I fear the personality of our Lord is sadly lost sight of by many professors in the present day. Their talk is more about salvation, than about the Saviour; more about redemption, than about the Redeemer; more about justification, than about Jesus; more about Christ’s work, than about Christ’s person. This is a great fault, and one that fully accounts for the dry and sapless character of the religion of many professors.
As ever you would grow in grace, and have joy and peace in believing, beware of falling into this error. Cease to regard the gospel as a mere collection of dry doctrines. Look at it rather as the revelation of a might living Being in whose sight you are daily to live. Cease to regard it as a mere set of abstract propositions and abtruse principles and rules. Look at it as the introduction to a glorious personal Friend. This is the kind of gospel that the apostles preached. They did not go about the world telling men of love and mercy and pardon in the abstract. The leading subject of all their sermons was the loving heart of an actual living Christ. This is the kind of gospel which is most calculated to promote sanctification and meetness for glory. Nothing, surely, is so likely to prepare us for that heaven where we shall meet Christ face to face, as to realize communion with Christ, as an actual living Person here on earth. There is all the difference in the world bewteen an idea and a person.
Blogging the Bible
December 18, 2006
Slate.com deputy editor David Plotz has recently begun a project called Blogging the Bible: What Happens When an Ignoramus Reads the Good Book. Plotz, who calls himself ‘a proud Jew, but never a terribly observant one,’ came upon the idea while bored to tears at a synagogue during his cousin’s bat mitzvah. In despair he picked the Torah on the pew rack and began reading in Genesis and became fascinated at what he thought he knew and what he had never been told. He is now reading through the entire Old Testament and blogging about it as he goes along.
Plotz is no biblical scholar, and his wit borders on irreverence at times, but I find it strangely compelling to read how he reacts to the Old Testament texts. He reads not to point out inconsistencies or prove/disprove a system of belief; rather, in his words,
My goal is pretty simple. I want to find out what happens when an ignorant person actually reads the book on which his religion is based. I think I’m in the same position as many other lazy but faithful people (Christians, Jews, Moslems, Hindus). I love Judaism; I love (most of) the lessons it has taught me about how to live in the world; and yet I realized I am fundamentally ignorant about its foundation, its essential document. So, what will happen if I approach my Bible empty, unmediated by teachers or rabbis or parents? What will delight and horrify me? How will the Bible relate to the religion I practice, and the lessons I thought I learned in synagogue and Hebrew School?
Plotz interacts with readers, Jewish, Christian, and others. It merits checking with from time to time. I’ve known people who have done this sort of thing and found themselves transformed in the process. Reading the Scriptures, even the Old Testament, is like letting a lion out of his cage for a while. You just don’t know what will happen next. When anything really interesting happens, I’ll update you.
Joyce M. Horton – Ave atque vale
December 14, 2006
Stonewall Jackson considered it a great blessing to die on the Sabbath day. Another valiant saint left the church militant for the church triumphant this past Lord’s Day, Mrs. Joyce M. Horton (1919-2006) of Clinton, Mississippi. She was a great friend of the Christian family. I cannot claim to have known Mrs. Horton well, but in the times I met her, there was always something of the savor of Christ about her. It could be well said of her what was said of Sibbes–that heaven was in her long before she was in heaven. I have friendships in circles that she influenced deeply, and I know that they will agree. Here is a lovely tribute from her obituary in the Jackson Clarion-Ledger:
‘Mrs. Horton’s passion during her years on this earth was to serve the One who created and redeemed her. In addition to the daily instruction of her six children, she taught Bible studies in her home, in local churches, downtown Jackson, in prisons, and through the Christian Women’s Club, in addition to speaking at conferences across the country. She taught the child’s version of the Westminster Shorter Catechism of the Presbyterian Church to two generations of children in her local church, and presented seminars to other churches on how to teach it. In 1979 she published the material of these seminars as How to Teach the Child’s Catechism to Children, widely-used today for training teachers in the US, Britain and Australia. At the age of 60, Mrs. Horton began a thrice-weekly Bible study for female prisoners at the Rankin County Correctional Facility and continued teaching for fifteen years, until ill health forced her retirement. During that time she taught a group study in each building, individually visited each maximum-security inmate, quelled a prison riot, rescued a relapsed ex-offender from a crack house, and by precept and example taught uncountable prisoners to love and obey her Savior. The effect of her teaching and influence on the inmates gained her unlimited access to the prison, even during “lock-down,” when no outside visitors are permitted. In 1999 she received the Presbyterian Church in America’s “Urban and Mercy Women in Leadership” award, which included a grant to her prison ministry.
‘In 1963, Mrs. Horton’s husband became one of the founding board members of Reformed Theological Seminary. For many years she prepared and served a back-to-school spaghetti dinner for students each September, and ministered to the wives of students through Bible studies, annual garden parties, personal counseling, and friendship.
‘Joyce Horton’s survivors include her husband of nearly 65 years, Frank, of Clinton; her children: Beverly Biggs of Crystal Springs; Joyce Herring and her husband Wayne of Memphis, Tenn.; Frank Horton Jr. (Bud) and his wife Jennifer of Brandon; Frosty Howell and her husband Michael of Montgomery, Alabama; Bob Horton and his wife Leigh Anne of Gadsden, Ala.; and Mark Horton of New York; her sister: Sandra Aeschliman and husband Richard of Atlanta, Ga.; her brother: Frank Matthews of Grenada; 19 grandchildren, 10 great-grandchildren, nieces and nephews, grand-nieces and nephews, and her self-proclaimed “black child,” Pauline Rogers of Natchez, one of the beneficiaries of Mrs. Horton’s prison ministry. Her life and her heart also embraced the, “company of the redeemed, whom no man can number.”‘
Mrs. Horton’s book How to Teach the Catechism to Children is still the best book of its kind. Teaching sound doctrine to children was important to her because she had embraced liberalism while she was in college. After she and Frank married, she embraced Reformed theology and never let go. Her life leaves a legacy of teaching ‘the trustworthy message as taught’ to many others. As she wrote in the preface to her book, ‘I take comfort in the fact that God can use a crooked stick to accomplish His purposes.’
And for believers, vale is not the final word. More fitting is the German farewell, auf wiedersehen–’until we see again.’
Better for nothing than for a nuisance
December 14, 2006
It’s Wednesday. There must be another Christmas party to attend. There must be another little gift to buy. Who’s going to be so favoured as to receive one of my signature fruitcakes? I need to credit fellow-laborer for the gospel Brad Mercer of First Presbyterian Church, Jackson, Mississippi, for bringing out the following C.S. Lewis excerpt from his vast and varied studies. It comes from a short essay Lewis wrote for the December 1957 edition of the publication, Twentieth Century. Under the heading, ‘What Christmas Means to Me,’ Lewis launches a scathing attack on the ‘commercial racket’ that overwhelms and undermines the celebration, merry-making, and hospitality that characterize the season.
From C.S. Lewis’ “What Christmas Means to Me”:
The interchange of presents was a very small ingredient in the older English festivity. Mr. Pickwick took a cod with him to Dingley Dell; the reformed Scrooge ordered a turkey for his clerk; lovers sent love gifts; toys and fruit were given to children. But the idea that not only all friends but even all acquaintances should give one another presents, or at least send one another cards, is quite modern and has been forced upon us by the shopkeepers. Neither of these circumstances is in itself a reason for condemning it. I condemn it on the following grounds.
1. It gives on the whole much more pain than pleasure. You have only to stay over Christmas with a family who seriously try to ‘keep’ it [in the commerical sense] in order to see that the thing is a nightmare. Long before December 25th everyone is worn out—physically worn out by weeks of daily struggle in overcrowded shops, mentally worn out by the effort to remember all the right recipients and to think out suitable gifts for them. They are in no trim for merry-making; much less (if they should want to) to take part in a religious act. They look far more as if there had been a long illness in the house.
2. Most of it is involuntary. The modern rule is that anyone can force you to give him a present by sending you a quite unprovoked present of his own. It is almost a blackmail. Who has not heard the wail of despair, and indeed of resentment, when, at the last moment, just as everyone hoped that the nuisance was over for one more year, the unwanted gift from Mrs. Busy (whom we hardly remember) flops unwelcomed through the letter-box, and back to the dreadful shops one of us has to go?
3. Things are given as presents which no mortal ever bought for himself—gaudy and useless gadgets, ‘novelties’ because no one was ever fool enough to make their like before. Have we really no better use for materials and for human skill and time than to spend them on all this rubbish?
4. The nuisance. For after all, during the racket we still have all our ordinary and necessary shopping to do, and the racket trebles the labour of it. We are told that the whole dreary business must go on because it is good for trade. It is in fact merely one annual symptom of that lunatic condition of our country, and indeed of the world, in which everyone lives by persuading everyone else to buy things. I don’t know the way out. But can it really be my duty to buy and receive masses of junk every winter just to help the shopkeepers? If the worst comes to the worst I’d sooner give them money for nothing and write it off as a charity. For nothing? Why, better for nothing than for a nuisance.
From C.S. Lewis, “What Christmas Means to Me,” in God in the Dock: Essays on Theology and Ethics (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 304-305.
In Evil Long I Took Delight
December 13, 2006
In evil long I took delight, unawed by shame or fear,
Till a new object struck my sight, and stopped my wild career.
I saw one hanging on a tree, in agony and blood,
Who fixed his languid eyes on me, as near his cross I stood.
Sure, never to my latest breath, can I forget that look;
It seemed to charge me with his death, though not a word he spoke.
My conscience felt and owned the guilt, and plunged me in despair,
I saw my sins his blood had spilt, and helped to nail him there.
Alas! I knew not what I did! But now my tears are vain:
Where shall my trembling soul be hid? For I the Lord have slain!
A second look he gave, which said, “I freely all forgive;
This blood is for thy ransom paid; I die that thou mayst live.”
Thus, while his death my sin displays in all its blackest hue,
Such is the mystery of grace, it seals my pardon too.
With pleasing grief, and mournful joy, my spirit now is filled,
That I should such a life destroy, yet live by him I killed!
-John Newton (1725-1807) from OLNEY HYMNS (1779).
You can find a version at www.cyberhymnal.org
Podcast, broadcast, outcast, downcast
December 7, 2006
Just a reminder: you can download sermons from FPC Kosciusko worship services from our church site www.fpckosciusko.org. Or you can subscribe to our weekly podcast and have them automatically downloaded onto your computer via iTunes.
Our Morning Worship service on the Lord’s Day is available by live streaming at www.breezynews.com at 11:00 am, “Mississippi time,” as Jack Cristil would say. That’s CST to everyone else. And if you don’t know who Jack Cristil is, reply to this entry, and I’ll tell you. His photo is below.
Lagniappe update
December 5, 2006
During 2006 FPC Kosciusko sent four teams to work with Lagniappe Presbyterian Church in Bay St. Louis, and some of our folk went down on their own at other times to lend a hand. We’ve also made them an enourmous charcoal grill and sent tools, supplies and money down there. Thanks be to God for how he has blessed us all in 2006.
Don’t forget this work of gospel restoration on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Jean Larroux is asking for ‘prayer tithes’ from supporting churches and individuals, i.e., people who will commit to use 10% of their prayer time interceding for Lagniappe. It’s a good idea. Count me in. Check up on the work by logging on to www.lagniappechurch.com.
