Christ the King Sunday Mediation

Today is Christ the King Sunday, which is the last Sunday in the liturgical year for Christians who keep the liturgical calendar (some denominations ignore everything except Christmas, Easter and Pentecost).

This is the Sunday where we celebrate something that, in some sense, has not happened yet. Christ has triumphed over the grave, he has ascended into heaven, the gates of death and hell are broken, but we still live in a sinful world. The Kingdom of Heaven may have  broken in on the world, but we are not yet living in the new Heaven and new Earth.

Christ the King Sunday looks forward to the day that we are living in the new Heaven and the new Earth. The time when God shall dwell among us once again, when the lion shall lie down with the lamb, when the swords shall be beaten into plowshares and the faithful live in the City of God.

The life of a Christian can feel as futile as raking leaves in the fall. No matter how hard you try, you know you are always going to sin. You are never going to feed everyone. You can never bring everyone to Christ. You can never live up to your own expectations, let alone the expectations of God.

This Sunday reminds us of our goal. We are running a race, and this reminds us of the finish line. It's out there, and it will be wonderful. No more sickness, no more death, no more tears. It lets us end our year on a high note, and then we slide gently back into the hope and expectation of Advent.

~PhysicsGal

"Just as I am, without one plea": A meditation

Have you ever had the feeling that you need a word, a song, a something, but can't quite put your mental finger on what you are looking for? I've been having that feeling for the past week or so. There was a hymn somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew it was there, but I couldn't for the life of me remember what it was enough to sing it or even look it up. I have felt a calmness the past couple of days, and I know this was somehow a part of it, but I just couldn't dreg it up out of my subconscious. Hymnary is an amazing and indispensable tool for many things, but it is especially good for when I know I want a hymn, but have only an inkling of what I want. (It is also the only tool I know of where you can search by melody fragment). 

All of that is by way of saying "Just as I am, without one plea" is what has been flitting on the edge of my mind recently. It is one of those songs I have a very hard time singing without crying, but fortunately that is not an impedance to writing about it. If there were a dictionary of descriptive terms, under 'simple and plaintive' would be this hymn. Written by Charlotte Elliot around 1833, it was written as a mediation on how she came to Christ and as a statement of faith. It was first published in The Invalid's Hymnbook (Elliot was herself semi-invalid after a severe illness when she was 32), and according to Hymnary's count has been included in 1,408 hymnals to date. In four short stanzas of 4 verses each*, she lays out every Christian's walk of faith.

Just as I am, without one plea,
but that thy blood was shed for me,
and that thou bidd'st me come to thee,
O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

Just as I am, and waiting not
to rid my soul of one dark blot,
to thee, whose blood can cleanse each spot,
O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

Just as I am, though tossed about
with many a conflict, many a doubt,
fightings and fears within, without,
O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

Just as I am, thou wilt receive,
wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve;
because thy promise I believe,
O Lamb of God, I come, I come. 

The first stanza reminds us of something we often forget--we have absolutely no claim on God except through the blood of Christ. "Good people don't go to heaven. Forgiven sinners do" is the short reminder I sometimes see on cars around here. "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— not the result of works, so that no one may boast." (Ephesians 2:8-9). There is nothing we bring to the table, except the name of Jesus. But Elliot also reminds us that Christ has not only washed us in His blood, but "bidd'st [us] come". He invites the little children to come to him, and tells his disciples that the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as them (Matthew 19:14). Over and over, Christ invites people, bids them come to him. Our God is a welcoming God. All we have to do is 'come'. 

The second stanza places special emphasis on the cleansing power of Christ's blood. It is one of those images that is somewhat paradoxical. Normally, we think of blood as staining. Its right up there with wine and ketchup on those commercials touting the cleaning power of a detergent. We think of it staining the hands of a murder. Think of the scene in Macbeth where we witness Lady Macbeth's sleepwalking, wringing her hands and trying to wash out the blood. And yet as Christians we constantly use this image of being washed white in  the blood of the Lamb. It is of course a metaphor, but its still a little strange. And yet here, Elliot doesn't dance with the metaphor. Doesn't play theological tricks with it. Its simple. Our souls are covered with dark blots, like a shirt who had a pen burst in the pocket. But no elaborate ritual, no multistep process with three different chemicals are needed to remove these stains. Though the dark spots on our souls are literally 'damned spots', accepting a washing in Christ's atoning blood is all that is needed, and is freely offered, if we would but come.

The third stanza deals with that topic that every Christian deals with, and few like to talk about, except in the context of "I'm not like that anymore". The fact that often we still feel conflicted, doubtful, fearful. We are freed from the power of sin and death, not from fallen human condition in this life. How often was Peter, on whom Christ laid the church, fearful? Conflicted? He doubted Jesus as he was walking on the water to him. We can't possibly expect to do better. The good news is Christ doesn't ask us to come after we're sure. After we've weighed the pros and cons and come to a decision. He does not ask us to come to him after we've gotten over our fears. He will take us just as we are, flaws, sins, doubts, fears and failings all, if only we will come to him.

And here, in the fourth stanza, is our declaration, our hope and our joy. Christ will take us just as we are, with all our brokenness, our guilt, our fear that we don't belong, and takes it all away. We are welcomed as honored guests, our sins are removed as far from the east is from the west, their stains are forever removed, and all our fear, our pain, our brokenness healed. If only we will believe in his promises, by grace through faith, and come unto Him.

*Thanks Dad, for correcting my terminology. 

"Come, Thou Fount of Every blessing": A meditation

It's been a while since I posted on the wisdom of the saints who have gone before. We sang "Come, thou fount of every blessing", by Robert Robinson, as the closing hymn in church last Sunday, and as always it struck a chord with me. Here is the text, which  is near identical to the first three verses of the original.

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing,  

tune my heart to sing thy grace;

streams of mercy, never ceasing,

call for songs of loudest praise.

Teach me some melodious sonnet,

sung by flaming tongues above;

praise his name--I’m fixed upon it--

name of God's redeeming love.

Here I raise my Ebenezer,

hither by thy help I’ve come;

and I hope, by thy good pleasure,

safely to arrive at home.

Jesus sought me when a stranger,

wandering from the fold of God;

He, to rescue me from danger,

bought me with His precious blood.

O to grace how great a debtor

daily I’m constrained to be!

Let thy goodness, like a fetter,

bind my wandering heart to thee:

prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,

prone to leave the God I love;

here’s my heart, O take and seal it;

seal it for thy courts above.

And yes, this was originally 5 verses. Hymnary, which is a great resource, and has as many versions as they can find hymn books (and they can find a lot), lists only one hymnal, from 1791 and presumably the original, which includes all five. The last two verses are a little...weird. And if the Regency and Victorian hymn book editors left it out, you know they have to be a little funky. To sum it up--the original hymn ends by asking God to tell the singer to "Get me up and die".

Ok, this is a geyser, not a fount, but it looks a lot nicer

This hymn sits proudly in the middle of praise songs, before that term was taken over by sappy Jesus-is-my-boyfriend pseudo pop nonsense. The theme, thesis, focus of the song is God and all that he has done for the one who believes in him. It opens with a supplication to God, the 'fount of every blessing', to change the singer's heart, and teach them how to properly praise God. What could be more pleasing to God than 'some melodious sonnet/sung by flaming tongues above"(other than the repentance of one sinner)? The earnestness of the writer/singer is immediately apparent. Its almost as if his entire being were straining towards this one goal of praising God. It sounds odd, but every time I sing this, I feel a deep sense of yearning, almost homesickness.

The second verse has lead to many a 'huh?' I'm sure, unless you had one of the hymnals which kindly gave the Biblical reference and a note of explanation for what an Ebenezer is. It is, of course, a stone monument raised to commemorate God's help and salvation (Dickens didn't name Scrooge that just because it sounded funny). In fact, the second line essentially explains the first. I love this verse, for all it encompasses. I always imagined that this song, with its declaration with our dependence on God and devotion to him, was a kind of modern day ebenezer (if I actually went around erecting stone monuments for all the times God has helped me, my yard would resemble nothing so much as a grave yard).

The author's description of Christ's salvific act, which brings to mind the parable of the Good Samaritan and the Good Shepherd, and emphasizes the personal quality of Christ's sacrifice.  I like the original wording, which replaces 'bought' with 'interposed', if only because it gives me this mental image of me being in the process of being dragged off to Hell, and Christ stepping between me and damnation to cover me in his blood and purity. Gory and graphic? Yes, but we are talking about eternal damnation here. It should be dramatic. I want to have a sense of the cost. I somehow imagine God as having infinite money, should it come to that. And yes, it says 'purchased with his blood', but purchase has already put money on my mind. Somehow interposing gets the point across better, but that's probably a personal preference, not a theology thing.

The last verse does a pretty little inversion of ideas. Grace is freely given, otherwise it is not grace, but here the singer considers himself permanently indebted to it. We usually think of being saved as being freed from the chains of sin and death, but the writer acknowledges that he is 'prone to wander' and asks that God's mercy be used to fetter (aka old school handcuff) himself to God, so he can't wander away anymore. This reminds us of the seeming contradictions of faith. By choosing faith, we have to give up, or at least try to give up, a lot of our selfish impulses, which to the outside world looks more constrained than ever. But in giving up our 'freedom' to do whatever we want, we gain a new, better freedom in Christ. We can live free from doubt, from  guilt and shame (though we often do a terrible job of showing this). We can live knowing, truly knowing, that whatever happens to us in this life, we have an eternity with God to look forward to. We no longer have to be afraid, not of sin, not of other people, not of anything the world can throw at us. Songs like this remind me of this reality in Christ, and urge me to walk more in the new life, and less in the old.

Lorica of St. Patrick, Part 2

This post continues where I left off in my meditation on St. Patrick's Breastplate. Part 1 covered verses 1 -  3 and discusses in more detail the two versions that I refer to here. The original poem by an unknown 8th century Irish poet and the metricized* and edited translation by Cecil Frances Alexander in the 19th century. This post picks up with the fourth verse.

 The fourth verse sounds a bit new-age-y to 21st century ears, though it has a perfectly good explanation for being here in an 8th century hymn.

I bind unto myself today
the virtues of the star-lit heaven,
the glorious sun's life-giving ray,
the whiteness of the moon at even,
the flashing of the lightning free,
the whirling wind's tempestuous shocks,
the stable earth, the deep salt sea
around the old eternal rocks.

Druids, the priestly types of the Celtic pagan religion that dominated the pre-Christian British Isles, were fond of claiming for themselves the powers of nature (or at least the ability to control it). This verse reclaims nature for its Creator and those who believe in Him, much like putting this poem in the form of a lorica reclaimed that form for Christ (early Christians seem to have made a habit of either mocking or reclaiming things from pagans.) I'd categorize this verse as one of those that was very useful when it was written, but less so today.

 Verse five I would say is the meat of this hymn. Its twice as long as the other verses, and I would say get to the heart of the writer's purpose.

          I bind myself today to God's Virtue to pilot me,
          God's might to uphold me,
          God's wisdom to guide me,
          God's eye to look before me,
          God's ear to hear me,
          God's Word to speak to me,
          God's hand to guard me,
          God's way to lie before me,
          God's shield to protect me,
          God's host to secure me,
          Against snares of demons,
          Against seductions of vices,
          Against lusts of nature,
          Against every one who wishes ill to me,
          Afar and anear,
          Alone and in a multitude.

Remember, this poetic form is known as a 'breastplate' hymn. Its meant for protection. In this case I would say its a prayer for protection against both outside forces, and those inner forces which cause us to stray from God's will. It reminds, although indirectly, of the Aaronic Blessing: 

The Lord bless you and keep you;
the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you;
the Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace. 

Numbers 6: 24-26 (NRSV)

Particularly the first and last lines. Interestly, it also invokes "God's Host", presumably meaning angels and the like, to protect the speaker against three things we don't talk about much: demons, vices and lusts of nature. It also invokes for protection against other people "afar and anear" which takes on new meaning in this age of globe trotting. 

Last post I mused on how angels have fallen by the wayside, too sickly sweet, turned from fearsome servants of God into spiritual diabetes inducing Russel Stover candies. Those things your great aunt pulls out at the holidays. The flip side is that we've also, perception-wise, weakened their nemeses. Oh sure, we talk about all having to fight our own demons, but pretty much no one means it literally. The closest we get is the devil-on-the-shoulder thing. What ever happened to those guys? Did they all have to suddenly accept mandatory retirement around 1700? Did they all turn into cynical hipsters and decide to just slouch around Hell? Don't tell me humans started doing their jobs for them--humans have been doing that since the fall. Have we just started rationalizing them away? Have we gotten too 'enlightened' to see them? I'm not suggesting we go back to diagnosing schizophrenics as possessed or anything like that. And I'm definitely not suggesting we revive the ridiculous demonolgies of the Middle Ages. But I feel it is a question we need to address, seriously, and not try to sweep under the rug. Even if you aren't a hard core Bible literalist, I challenge you to find a way to explain away all of Jesus's casting out of demons without serious undermining the rest of the Gospel account. I'm not saying I have any sort of answer--I try not to think about demons, to be honest. But I think there is a certain amount of dishonesty, and we lose some credibility, by not addressing them. 

 Vices and lusts of nature are another we don't talk about. We joke about the seven deadly sins (all of which are vices) and we might give lip service to the lusts of nature, but we don't address them, at least not in ourselves. From where I sit, the church has an awful lot of planks to take out of our eyes. You can complain about the medicalization of vices and biological explanations for lusts, but what the heck have we Christians offered in rebuttal? A lot of shaming and blithering and hypocrisy. Of which we are supposed to be doing exactly...none. Seriously, point me to the place where we are supposed to be shaming our neighbors with anything else but our holiness, our taking care of societies cast offs, our embracing the sinner? The church needs to be praying this verse every single day until Christ comes again. 

*Thanks to my dad for pointing out my use of the non-existent word "meterized" in my first post and providing the correct term "metricized"

Lorica of St. Patrick, Part 1

To begin my series of meditations on the insights from the saints who have gone before, or historic Christianity if you want to be more academic, I thought I would start with the "Lorica of St. Patrick" or "St. Patrick's Breastplate" as it is more commonly known today. Two reasons for doing this. One, this is where my curiosity about historical Christianity was first piqued, so it seems a fitting starting point for deeper investigation. Two, starting with someone like Augustine, who has whole library departments devoted to studying him, was terrifying. And he probably deserves his own series if I am going to touch on him at all. This prayer/hymn is rather long as these things go, so I'm going to divide my study of it into two or three parts, depending on how the spirit leads, so to speak. 

This prayer most likely not written by St. Patrick himself, as the first evidence for it is several centuries after he died. However, it does emphasize certain points for which St. Patrick was known  and are attested to in his two surviving letters. For example, it begins and ends with emphasis on the triune nature of God, focuses on God's power to protect his faithful and his abiding presence with believers. It was written in an ancient Irish dialect, in the form of a lorica. A lorica  was a type of incantation or spell used by druids to ward off evil, and means "breastplate" or armor. It begins with an invocation of the deity, followed by what you are invoking them for, ended with a reiteration of who you are talking to and with what authority. This prayer could be seen as a reclamation of the lorica from pagan hands for use as spiritual armor, such as Paul talks about. 

Most people, if they are familiar with this prayer, are familiar with Cecil Frances Alexander's metricized and edited version known in hymn books as "I Bind Unto Myself Today" (incidentally, one of the few if not the only hymn set to two tunes in one setting). Alexander's version puts the prayer into iambic tetrameter, and eliminates verses 6 and 7. Both poems are rather long, so I will reproduce them as necessary, rather than in full. Both can be found in full on the The Order of St. Patrick's website. 

The first thing you notice when reading through the texts is that it is a combination of catechism and prayer for protection and guidance . The first two verses in particular, while invoking God's power, lays out the foundation beliefs of Christianity: the Trinity, God as creator of all, Christ's birth, baptism, death, burial, resurrection, ascension and promised return for Judgement are all there in the first two verses. Its a good place to start. Alexander's version fleshes it out with more details ("His baptism in the Jordan River/ His death on the Cross for my salvation/ His bursting from the spiced tomb" vs "... his baptism,/ to the virtue of his crucifixion with his burial,/ to the virtue of his resurrection..."). If you were writing under the name of the man who helped convert Ireland, you'd probably want to start out with an emphasis on the Trinity and a catechism. 

Catechisms and confessions of faith are kind of funny things these days. I've been to quite a number of churches that don't have any sort of confession of faith as part of their normal services. I've known upstanding members of congregations who could not recite the Apostles' Creed or explain why each phrase in there was important. Now, last post I wrote about relying more on the wisdom of God and less on the wisdom of man, but I can't help but think this falls under the category of wisdom of God. Christ knew his time was short. I seriously doubt he wasted  his time. Shouldn't we be holding to our catechisms, which encapsulate the most fundamental of our beliefs and the entire story of salvation, like a life preserver? Not letting them fall by the wayside while we get distracted with petty side issues that do nothing to further the work we were set out to do. 

The next verse concerns itself with aligning the speaker with both the heavenly host and that great cloud of witnesses. 

   I bind myself today to the virtue of ranks of Cherubim,
          in obedience of Angels,
          [in service of Archangels]
          in hope of resurrection for reward,
          in prayers of Patriarchs,
          in preaching of Apostles,
          in faiths of Confessors,
          in innocence of Holy Virgins,
          in deeds of righteous men.

or, as Alexander phrases it

I bind unto myself the power
of the great love of cherubim;
the sweet "Well done" in judgment hour;
the service of the seraphim;
confessors' faith, apostles' word,
the patriarchs' prayers, the prophets' scrolls;
all good deeds done unto the Lord,
and purity of virgin souls.

This verse is left out of many hymnal versions, either because the hymnal editors only allow five verses and this one is deemed less important, the weird scan of the second line or some other reason (I have heard one person object to the idea of virgin souls being purer). With the possible exception of hemming and hawing over the Holy Virgins, there's not much of a problem with the last five lines of the original verse. We might not emphasize the saints who have gone before, but its not like we don't talk about Moses or Peter or the martyrs or praise good deeds done. Why wouldn't we want to say "I stand with these people and by their good deeds"? Its the other verses I would like to focus on for the moment.

The writer seems to be a lot more comfortable talking about cherubim and angels than most Christians I know, including myself. Cherubim have gotten labeled as those stupid winged baby heads and angels have become synonymous with 'guardian angel' or sappy religious Hallmark cards. "Don't drive faster than your guardian angel can fly" and that pouty pastel child you see on baptism cards. Those things couldn't strike fear into the heart of the Cowardly Lion, pre Oz. This prayer isn't talking about these mythical things, more fairy than servant of the Most High. It's talking about an Angel of the LORD. The being that has to preface every human interaction with "Be not afraid". The creatures who hover at the throne of God and cover their faces. God's messengers and generals. Putti I wouldn't want to be caught dead with. The cherubim that Isaiah saw or the angels who lead the charge against the dragon in Revelation? Them I would be proud to bind myself to. 

"Hope of Resurrection for Reward". "The sweet 'Well done' in judgment hour". Judgement Day. Dooms Day. The End of Days. Talking about the apocalypse is in right now, but its always the zombie apocalypse, the Mayan apocalypse, or some random dude with a calculator and selective reading ability's apocalypse. For the most part, Christians don't seem to like to talk about it these days. Too many wackadoodles. Too many awkward conversations. Apocalyptic literature reads, honestly, like a really weird acid trip. Eschatology is a field with a lot of good minds in it, but not one you're average Joe is going to dive into as a hobby.

Nevermind that for believers, its supposed to be a good thing. We will be raised in new, incorruptible bodies. We will see God, and we don't have to be afraid. We're washed in the blood of the Lamb, our transgressions have been blotted out. Judgement Day is when we get to hear "Good job." And afterwards comes the new heaven and new earth and that is going to be the most wonderful thing ever.