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I was flipping through an old hymnal recently and found a hymn called “A Student’s Prayer” by a man named John W. Peterson. I find it fascinating for two reasons:
- It expresses a bold desire to conquer the intellectual frontier in submission to the Word of God. It’s not every day you find a Jesus-loving battle song for cerebral expansion. I like it.
- It warns of the dangers of academic pride. In other words, it calls for a big mind and not a big head. That’s rare.
Here are the words.
God, the all-wise, and Creator
Of the human intellect,
Guide our search for truth and knowledge,
All our thoughts and ways direct.
Help us build the tow’rs of learning
That would make us wise, astute,
On the rock of Holy Scripture:
Truth revealed and absolute.
O how vast the shores of learning–
There are still uncharted seas,
And they call to bold adventure
Those who turn from sloth and ease.
But we need Your hand to guide us
In the studies we pursue,
And the presence of Your Spirit
To illumine all we do.
May the things we learn, so meager,
Never lift our hearts in pride
Till in foolish self-reliance
We would wander from Your side.
Let them only bind us closer,
Lord, to You, in whom we find
Very fountainhead of wisdom,
Light and life of all mankind.
Words copyright Singspiration 1965. From Praise! Our Songs and Hymns, ed. Norman Johnson (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1979), #145.
My dog died yesterday. She had to be put to sleep because of old age and failing health. Her name was Mandy and she would have been 13 years old in a couple weeks or so. My brother and I got her as a gift on Christmas Day 1995. She was a fluffy golden retriever puppy and her breath smelled like graham crackers. That was fitting, because that’s exactly how I would describe what Mandy was like. A graham cracker. Brown and sweet.
She was my friend. Actually, she was a friend to the whole family. She nuzzled her way into our hearts with her big wet nose and just kind of laid down there for thirteen years, smiling, patient, gentle. And then she left. It’s hard to explain what that feels like. My heart feels like a couch where somebody’s gotten up after sitting there a spell. You can still feel the warmth and see the depression of the cushions, but no one’s there.
Of course, I wonder if I’ll see Mandy again. I know she was a dog and dogs don’t have immortal souls like humans, but I just can’t shake feeling like Mandy was more than a tomato plant. I tried looking up the word “dog” in the Bible, but I don’t think dogs were highly thought of then. Revelation 22 says that dogs will be outside the heavenly city along with the sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters. I think, though, that the dogs there are people, so I’m left with a hopeful ambiguity.
Will our favorite pets be on the new earth? Perhaps. I don’t think we can know for sure, but I do know that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God (Romans 8:21). God will release his saints from decay and he will do the same with his creation. Maybe that will include my sweet smiling friend. I sure hope so. Either way, I can’t wait to be with Jesus. He was the one Mandy was pointing me to all along, anyway.
I’d like to share with you part of a poem by John Piper from the book Future Grace. Whenever I read it, it makes me long for the day when God will restore all things in Christ. Mom mentioned it to me this morning on the phone. Piper is talking from the perspective of someone experiencing the birth of the new creation:
And as I knelt beside the brook
To drink eternal life, I took
A glance across the golden grass,
And saw my dog, old Blackie, fast
As she could come. She leaped the stream –
Almost — and what a happy gleam
Was in her eye. I knelt to drink,
And knew that I was on the brink
Of endless joy. And everywhere
I turned I saw a wonder there.
A big man running on the lawn:
That’s old John Younge with both legs on.
The blind can see a bird on wing,
The dumb can lift their voice and sing.
The diabetic eats at will,
The coronary runs uphill.
The lame can walk, the deaf can hear,
The cancer-ridden bone is clear.
Arthritic joints are lithe and free,
And every pain has ceased to be.
And every sorrow deep within,
And every trace of lingering sin
Is gone. And all that’s left is joy,
And endless ages to employ
The mind and heart, and understand,
And love the sovereign Lord who planned
That it should take eternity
To lavish all his grace on me.
O, God of wonder, God of might,
Grant us some elevated sight,
Of endless days. And let us see
The joy of what is yet to be.
And may your future make us free,
And guard us by the hope that we,
Through grace on lands that you restore,
Are justified for evermore.
(pages 381-382)
Justin Taylor mentioned that ChristianAudio.com is offering “Pilgrim’s Progress” as their free audiobook for the month of June. If you haven’t had a chance to download it, I would highly recommend it. It’s probably my favorite book. I downloaded it before going on a 12-hour road trip to Ohio, and listening to it again was like visiting an old friend. Unfortunately, my battery ran out after a few hours of listening, so the nostalgia was lamentably short-lived. I’m eager to continue through the story as I have opportunity.
Here are six reasons I love Pilgrim’s Progress:
1. It was written in prison.
Bunyan wrote at least the first part of the allegory while he was imprisoned in a jail in Bedford, England. It adds grit to the tale that may not have been present had he written it in his study.
2. It is doused with Scripture.
Pilgrim’s Progress is stuffed with so many Scripture citations and allusions that listening to it for a time has the effect of washing my soul in the Word.
3. Bunyan is a poet.
Here is a sample. Christian, the main character, spends the early segment of the narrative weighed down with a heavy burden until he comes to a hill where stands a cross. On seeing the cross, the burden falls off his back and rolls down into a sepulchre (tomb) at the bottom of the hill. Christian explodes in metered praise:
“Thus far did I come laden with my sin,
Nor could aught ease the grief I was in,
Till I came hither. What a place is this!
Must here be the beginning of my bliss?
Must here the burden fall from off my back?
Must here the strings that bound it to me crack?
Blest cross! blest sepulchre! blest rather be
The Man that there was put to shame for me!”
4. It demonstrates that truth must not only be described, but painted.
This is one way Scripture is applied to the heart. Paul describes conversion in Romans 6 as a change in bondages and then writes, “I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations” (verse 19). Allegory is a biblically-warranted accommodation to the limitations of human nature. Bunyan employs the medium masterfully.
5. It addresses virtually every temptation a believer can face in this age.
Legalism, sloth, fear, greed, lust, despair. You name it, it’s there, and it’s described in such a way as to give backdoor pastoral counsel for the storm-tossed soul.
6. It’s older than the United States of America.
It’s good for me to get outside of my contemporary context and hear sound words from an older saint’s pen. It helps to guard me from infatuation with trendiness.
I was unable to post last night because we were barreling northward in a church bus. There is nothing quite like being stuck with thirteen other guys in a rolling rectangle for hours on end. We had lively conversations about Biblical inerrancy, slept in odd positions, and watched the Bourne Ultimatum on a borrowed laptop. All three were very enjoyable. I am happy to be home and to see my lovely wife.
John Piper preached yesterday morning. His message was titled, “How the Supremacy of Christ Creates Radical Christian Sacrifice.” His text was Hebrews 13:13 - “Therefore let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured.” He referenced other texts in Hebrews to demonstrate that the surpassing value of having Christ impels us to risk-taking ministry. It was a deeply moving message. Piper pled with us to not spend our lives accumulating endless possessions and cultivating churches that idolize ease. Rather, he said, we ought to embrace suffering because of the promise of eternal, deeply-satisfying fellowship with Jesus.
Here’s an excerpt from early in the message:
“My desire and prayer to God is that your life and your ministry would have a radical flavor. A risk-taking flavor. A gutsy, counter-cultural, wartime flavor that makes average American people in your church uncomfortable. A strange mixture of tenderness and toughness that keeps people a little bit off-balance, a pervasive summons to something more, something hazardous, something wonderful. A saltiness and a brightness about your life and about your church. Something like Jesus.”
Finally, a closing ballad:
Amid the sweeping tide of ease and leather La-Z-Boys,
John Piper bellowed, “These are not the most enduring joys!
The fellowship of Jesus blazes hotly like a lamp
And beckons us to join him on the hill outside the camp.”
John Piper bellowed, “These are not the most enduring joys!
The fellowship of Jesus blazes hotly like a lamp
And beckons us to join him on the hill outside the camp.”
If I had to choose a favorite message from today’s lineup at T4G, my vote would be R.C. Sproul. In a word, he was magisterial. His text was Galatians 3:10-14, and he spent nearly sixty spellbound minutes explaining with calculated precision what it meant for Christ to become a curse for us.
He sat in a chair while he preached (on account of recent struggles with vertigo) and, aside from the characteristic upper body swivel, made little use of exaggerated gesture. But his words…..his words were like clubs. Heavy. Round. Blunt. Powerful. He beat the air with the agony of the cross until the room sizzled with the majesty of God. I thank God for the gospel and for men like R.C. Sproul who tell it so well.
Here is my balladified recap of the session:
He perched atop a wooden chair and with his eyebrows arched,
The raspy voice of R.C. Sproul was anything but parched;
Instead it flowed with springs of gospel richness like a flood,
And swept us up to Calvary where hung the cursed God.
The audio is already posted.
Well, I was hoping to post something last night after getting back to the hotel room, but I couldn’t get the internet to work. On the positive side, I was able to offer a cold piece of pizza to Tim Challies in the elevator. He rejected my offer, but I haven’t lost heart.
Around lunchtime yesterday, a group called the Band of Bloggers met to discuss various issues related to blogging. The main feature of the gathering was a panel featuring Abraham Piper, Thabiti Anabwile, Phil Johnson, and Tim Challies. I felt like the discussion was profitable, and we all received some free books. Not a bad deal.
Here is the mini-ballad I wrote for the event. Actually, it’s just one stanza. It feels better to call it a mini-ballad, though:
The Band of Bloggers met for lunch and chatted ’bout the craft,
A moderated panel quipped about the perfect draft;
Four men (Thabiti, Challies, Phil, and DG’s Abraham)
Arrested our attention for a sixty-minute span.
A moderated panel quipped about the perfect draft;
Four men (Thabiti, Challies, Phil, and DG’s Abraham)
Arrested our attention for a sixty-minute span.
If anyone is feeling adventuresome and would like to put this verse to music, I would love to hear it.
Off to the conference.
The other day, I was reading in Numbers 21. Verse 26 says, “For Heshbon was the city of Sihon the king of the Amorites, who had fought against the former king of Moab and taken all his land out of his hand, as far as the Arnon.”
Now, verse 27 says, “Therefore the ballad singers say, ‘Come to Heshbon, let it be built; let the city of Sihon be established. For fire came out from Heshbon, flame from the city of Sihon. It devoured Ar of Moab, and swallowed the heights of Arnon.”
Sometime between verses 26 and 27, history was translated into ballad. Prose became poetry. Victory donned the cloak of verse.
I want to learn from that.
I’m here in Louisville for Together for the Gospel. Rather than report on each day’s events, which others will do much better, I thought it would be interesting to try my hand at a little historical balladification.
More to come……
