Jul
2
Liberty and the Glory of Christ
Posted by Champ Thornton at 11:15 am
Here is an excerpt from John Owen’s “The Glory of Christ” (Works of John Owen, volume 1; pages 291 & 292). Beholding the glory of Christ is the only way to be free from the bait and captivity of sin. (Owen is not easy to read, but is well worth the effort.)
Herein, then, our present edification is principally concerned; for in this present beholding of the glory of Christ, the life and power of faith are most eminently acted. And from this exercise of faith doth love unto Christ principally, if not solely, arise and spring. If, therefore, we desire to have faith in its vigour or love in its power, giving rest, complacency, and satisfaction unto our own souls, we are to seek for them in the diligent discharge of this duty [=beholding the glory of Christ]; –elsewhere they will not be found. Herein would I live; –herein would I die;–hereon would I dwell in my thoughts and affections, to the withering and consumption of all the painted beauties of this world, unto the crucifying all things here below, until they become unto me a dead and deformed thing, no way meet for affectionate embraces. . . .
Our minds are apt to be filled with a multitude of perplexed thoughts;–fears, cares, dangers, distresses, passions, and lusts, do make various impressions on the minds of men, filling them with disorder, darkness, and confusion. But where the soul is fixed in its thoughts and contemplations on this glorious object [i.e., the glory of Christ], it will be brought into and kept in a holy, serene, spiritual frame. For ‘to be spiritually-minded is life and peace.’ And this it doth by taking off our hearts from all undue regard unto all things below, in comparison of the great worth, beauty, and glory of what we are conversant with. See Phil 3:7-11.
Jun
12
Bibleworks 8.0 Giveaway
Posted by Champ Thornton at 8:09 am
If you’re in search of excellent Bible software, don’t overlook Bibleworks 8.0. (I have a copy of an earlier edition, and I absolutely love it!)
Cal.vini.st.com is giving away two free copies of Bibleworks 8.0. Click here to learn more.
May
29
Sweatt, Driscoll, and the Joys of Blogging
Posted by Champ Thornton at 8:50 am
I’ve been repeatedly struck by how many Christian blog posts recently have focused on the (perceived) shortcomings of other believers. The blogosphere (or at least a small portion of it) has been abuzz recently with discussion about the problems with Dan Sweatt or Mark Driscoll or whomever. Of course in nearly every post there are the qualifying comments which reveal that the individual under scrutiny is not entirely bad. (Which is the blog equivalent of the Southern tradition of sweetening any diatribe by adding “bless his heart” to the end.)
While not advocating a Polly-anna-ish, bury-your-head-in-the-sand approach to life and ministry, I think blog-reading believers would be better served to hear more about the evidences of God’s grace in the lives of these individuals. For example, is it not cause to give thanks to God that He has so moved in Dan Sweatt’s life that he is passionate about the spread of the Gospel? Further, is it not a kindness from God that Mark Driscoll has over the last number of years moved away from the more extreme versions of the emergent church towards a more Reformed view?
This is not a call for another verse of Kumbaya. It is a desire that we resist the inclination to be more aware of failures (ours and others’) than of God’s grace. (On this topic may I recommend this excellent message by C. J. Mahaney?)
There is only so much time allotted to each of us. There is only so much writing to be done. There are only so many words we can speak.
Let’s encourage one another that in His grace God will finish what He has started.
May
20
flotsam & jetsam (5.20.09)
Posted by Jon Trainer at 10:55 pm
Piper on BHO on abortion–powerful. Like the text, not sure I like the presentation. I had the chance to attend the Basics Conference at Parkside this year. First time I have heard Piper in person…he preached on John 3:16 among other things….beautiful truth communicated through spirit-filled personality is a wonderful thing to behold.
Orthodox Christianity and Capitalism. A good online discussion with an orthodox lawyer/professor on the compatibility of the two. And a related article on not ending poverty. And just for fun, a short piece for small church pastors on not allowing a capitalistic mindset to creep into one’s heart.
The Fundamentalists and the Evangelicals are falling apart and blaming it on Calvinism. JC really knows how to celebrate his quincetenary (10 July 1509).
Ligonier offers online classes.
Average work week for clergy = 52 hours. Seriously?
No nukes? No way. I’ve been working on a class in International Security Studies the last few weeks, so forgive my wanderings afield, but the realists among us need to set the liberal institutionalists and social constructivists straight. To be honest, no one foreign relations theory will provide adequate guidance, but the realists accept a pessimistic view of the nature of man that coincides with my theology nicely. A case in point.
On killing the F-22. Just think, for a mere 200 billion (the bailout is what…1 trillion at least–see here for a conceptualization that will knock your socks off) we could have finished out the F-22 buy and had air superiority for decades to come.
May
19
Be the People, for the Peoples
Posted by Champ Thornton at 10:09 am
This past two weekends in Sunday School, we have studied the Passion Week—the final week of our Savior’s earthly ministry. We noted how roundly Jesus condemned Israel and its leaders for being Israel for the sake of Israel. They longed for God to set them free from pagan oppression and bring in the kingdom He had promised . . . all for their own nationalistic benefit alone.
Different groups within Israel pursued this agenda through various means. Some had sought holiness in order to coerce God into bringing in the kingdom (Pharisees). Others had compromised in political maneuverings with pagans to bring in the kingdom of God (Sadducees). And still others had taken up sword (Zealots) or had cloistered themselves away in isolation (Essenes) for the same ends.
So, Jesus spoke and enacted judgment upon God’s people, whom God had intended to be a kingdom of priests, a light to the nations. During the Passion Week, Jesus cleared out the temple in Jerusalem. Why? The temple was judged for (among other things) not being “a house of prayer for the nations.” Instead, the temple was the very center of Israel’s nationalistic exclusivity and pride. In contrast to be a blessing to the nations (which Jesus did and prefigured in His ministry), many Israelites longed for a messiah who would shatter the all the nations to pieces.
Jesus condemned this narrowness. When He died, the Synoptics (Matthew, Mark, & Luke) teach that the temple was again struck by judgment. The curtain was ripped (by God—from top to bottom), opening up the way for all nations to be blessed by God’s presence. Then in each of the first three Gospels, a Gentile (the Roman soldier) makes a good confession about Jesus.
Jesus, as Israel’s representative, was being and doing what Israel had failed to be and do. He was the embodiment of God’s people for the sake of the peoples of the world. In contrast, Israel had erected, as it were, mirrors around their God-given “light.” They were being Israel for the sake of Israel. This religious snobbery entailed only an intensive “building up” of themselves.
Jesus, on the other hand, replaced, as it were, the mirrors with glass panes. He was the light for the sake of the world. He was the embodiment of God’s people for the sake of the peoples. This global-mindedness featured both an intensive and an extensive “building up” of God’s people.
For whom are we the people of God on earth?
May
8
Life is Busy
Posted by Jon Trainer at 11:19 am
Okay, so I was supposed to post a response to Champ’s review of the first chapter in Outgrowing the Ingrown Church last week, and then review the second chapter this week. Obviously, that hasn’t happened. I began a response to the first chapter, but later pitched it, and just haven’t gotten back around to the text.
To be frank, the plate is full to overflowing right now. The kids are winding up the school year, there is a lot happening at church, I am taking a couple classes for Uncle Sam, the grass is growing like mad, plus a bunch of other stuff that need not be mentioned. All that to say, that I think it is better for me to commit to short posts versus long posts. So, I’ll do my duty, but in staccato-like bursts! Here is the definition of staccato: an articulation directing that a note or passage of notes are to be played in an abruptly disconnected manner, with each note sounding for a very short duration, and a short break lasting until the sounding of the next note.
Apr
28
Outgrowing the Ingrown Church (Chapter One)
Posted by Champ Thornton at 7:00 am
“The Ingrown Church Leader: God’s Call to Faith and Repentance” (summary)
What is an “ingrown church”? Jack Miller includes the following descriptors: a church that due to a lack of zeal for outreach (p 17) is immobilized (p 16) and not turned toward the world (p 15). Even though this kind of inward-facing church may actively pursue sociologically-informed church growth strategies (p 18), at heart it has lost confidence in being used by the Lord of the harvest to bring people to Him (p 17). This just creates larger ingrown churches (p 18). At root, this is a church whose members, perhaps due to their awareness of corporate evils in the local church and personal evils in themselves (p 19) are not inspired by faith in Christ’s power to transform lives (p 18). Consequently, they may have surrendered their hearts to the familiar forms of religious life and found comfort of soul not in knowing God, but in knowing that their worship practices are firmly settled and predictable (p 19).
One particular form of an “ingrown church” that Miller identifies is “the church as a religious cushion” (p 20ff). He explains:
This religious cushioning may take a number of forms. In its liberal variety, its primary concern is to comfort suburbanites with a vision of a God who is too decent to send nice people like them to hell. In its sacerdotal form, its purpose is to tranquilize the guilt-ridden person with the religious warmth of its liturgy. Among conservatives and evangelicals, its primary mission all too often is to function as a preaching station where Christians gather to hear the gospel preached to the unconverted, to be reassured that liberals are mistaken about God and hell, and to renew one’s sense of well-being without having a serious encounter with the living God (p 20).
What, therefore, might a church look like that is not ingrown? Miller sketches “the elementary principles of faith that motivate qualitative and quantitative church growth” as follows:
I am thinking of regular and thorough meditation on the promises of God, ongoing repentance based on the intense study of Scripture, continual personal and corporate prayer, daring gospel communication and discipling, mobilizing every member’s gifts for Christ’s mission to the world, and each congregation working to plant daughter churches (p 19).
In this initial chapter which contains his own diagnosis of and participation in the problem of ingrown ministry, Miller also puts his finger on the root issue. “I have written this book to speak to the deadly peril of misdirected faith. I do so freely acknowledging my need to resist my own defeatism and my hourly need to claim the promises of God by faith” (p 25).
How does a problem with “faith” relate to the problem of an ingrown church? To Miller unbelief lies at the heart of the issue. In the recounting of his own personal journey away from ingrown ministry, he shares his own discovery of the vital role faith plays in missional outreach.
It seemed to me that perhaps I had been understanding [the Great Commission] too narrowly and legalistically as a bare command of the Lord, without being gripped by His presence as the enabling power to fulfill it. Somehow I needed to grasp the Great Missionary Presence that Christ has promised in the Gospel of Matthew: ‘And certainly I will be with you all the days to the end of the age.’ In brief, I needed to learn how the promises of God, and especially Christ’s promise of the Spirit, related to the missionary mandate given by the Lord before His ascension (p 21).
I began to see that an act of faith lay at the heart of any obedience to the Great Commission. In faith we claim the presence of Christ as the power for fulfilling His missionary will. The promises are the handles that we grab in our weakness in order to secure his presence. . . . These promises were world-embracing. Christ not only said, ‘Go with the gospel,’ but also, ‘I will give you the power to bring in an immeasurable harvest’ (p 22).
[Then] while I was studying the Gospel of John, my mind was challenged by the ‘now-character’ of promise passages like John 7:37-39. In this passage Jesus says, ‘If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. He that believes in me, from within him, as the Scripture has said, will flow rivers of living water.’ John interprets this promise by applying it to the gift of the Holy Spirit [John 7:39] . . . As I meditated on this teaching, the present significance of the promise became clear. The ‘rivers of living water’ signified life-giving power provided from above to flow in and through the believer—power for holy living and daring witness. But there is a strong now-implication in Jesus’ words. The promise of verse 38 is in the Greek present, which is not quite like our English present; it is linear, ongoing, expressing habitual or continuously present activity. In other words, Jesus was saying, ‘The abundance of the Spirit is for those who are believing now and keep right on believing.‘
So ‘believing’ is present, ongoing believing and as such is a continuing channel for receiving grace moment by moment. This was a life-changing discovery for me. Not only did it awaken my confidence in Christ’s availability to help me, but it also began to work in me a new release from my self-dependence and self-effort. I then knew with quiet, unshakable faith that these promises were mine as a servant of the King, mine to claim for life and service in His church. There was power available to change me and to turn around the ingrown church (p 23).
Apr
27
Rhythm, Routine, Regular…Rut?
Posted by Jon Trainer at 11:49 am
The sun rises, the sun sets. Days, months, and years pass by. Babies are born, graduations occur, love inflames, careers wind up and back down, bodies tire, and funerals loom. Such is life and there is a beauty to it. An allotment. An appointment. In the Church, Advent leads to Epiphany to Lent to Easter to Pentecost to Ordinary Time. It is the cycle of the centuries. We can hear Qoheleth rehearsing, “Of course, there is a time to be born, and a time to die.” There is nothing new under the sun.
Some relish and thrive in these routine rhythms, and yet for others, real living is breaking through the not-so-benign barriers of the mundane. There is for them a realization that this mechanical existence tends to atrophy the very soul of a person. The habits and patterns of everyday living, if not consciously resisted, turn a person inward, and maybe even downward. Fallenness eventually withers the endeavor. It can happen, but that does not mean that it must happen–that diminishing is a necessary thing. In fact, it could be argued that the routine nourishes the soul. Nevertheless, people do shrivel (say that word out loud and slowly–it is frightening), and so too, can churches. This is something to be avoided.
For that reason, we are going to spend some time in a book entitled, Outgrowing the Ingrown Church (Zondervan, 1986) by C. John Miller (d. 1996)–a former professor at Westminster, pastor, and overseas church planter. Here is a man who discovered himself dying in the highest of callings–slowly buried in a decade-long rut of religious routine. The self-diagnosed symptoms of the fatal disease were a growing blindness of the lost beyond the church walls, and a deafness toward the great commission. Weary of using the church as a “religious cushion,” Miller steps out in an “act of abandonment” to follow Christ, and the result is anything but routine.
Champ and I will work our way through this short text chapter by chapter. One of us will review the contents of a chapter and the other will provide commentary as time allows.
Apr
21
Online Conference
Posted by Champ Thornton at 9:07 am
If you are not able to attend the Gospel Coalition conference near Chicago over the next few days, be sure to check out the sessions made available online.You can watch each of the main sessions live via streaming video. Or you can download the video or audio of each session within a few days of its being recorded. Click here for a pdf of the conference program.The schedule for the main conference sessions is as follows (all times are approximate and for Central Daylight Time):
Tuesday, April 21
1:30 P.M. - 3:00 P.M. — Session One (Tim Keller: Acts 19:21-41)3:30 P.M. - 5:00 P.M. — Session Two (John Piper: 2 Timothy 1:1-12)7:00 P.M. - 8:00 P.M. — Session Three (Phil Ryken: 2 Timothy 1:13-2:13)8:00 P.M. - 9:00 P.M. — Session Four (Mark Driscoll: 2 Timothy 2:14-26)
Wednesday, April 22
9:00 A.M. - 10:30 A.M. — Session Five (K. Edward Copeland: 2 Timothy 3:1-9)11:00 A.M. - 12:00 P.M. — Session Six (Bryan Chapell: 2 Timothy 3:10-4:5)7:00 P.M. - 8:00 P.M. — Session Seven (Ajith Fernando)
Thursday, April 23
9:00 A.M. - 10:30 A.M. — Session Nine (Ligon Duncan: 2 Timothy 4:6-22)11:00 A.M. - 12:00 A.M. — Session Ten (Don Carson: 1 Corinthians 9:19-23)
Apr
15
judging a book by the cover
Posted by Jon Trainer at 9:50 pm
I cannot resist the temptation to comment on a singing sensation sweeping the internet this week. On the show “Britain’s Got Talent” (a Simon Cowell produced UK version of American Idol), Susan Boyle–a frumpy, middle-aged, unemployed resident of a small village in Scotland–made her singing debut before a hostile audience and three judges, including the infamously cynical Cowell. After a stumbling and bumbling introduction that couldn’t have set expectations any lower, Susan grasped her microphone with both hands as the music began. The audience snickered at the anticipated trainwreck they were convinced was coming.
Exactly five seconds later, and only a phrase into “I Dreamed a Dream” from Les Miserables, the audience was on its feet, the judges were agape with awe, and Susan Boyle’s life was changed forever. I am no great judge of vocal talent, and at the end of the day, Susan’s voice may not be that of an angel, but on this night and in this setting, her performance is one of the most powerful television events that many have ever witnessed to judge from the responses at numerous websites online. As of this writing just one of the videos of her appearance has recorded over eight nine eleven fifteen million views, along with about 50K 77K ratings and 50K 83K comments in the space of only four days.
A host of realities collide to make Susan Boyle’s audition a worldwide phenomenon. Her life story is remarkably unremarkable, but to underestimate its power is fatally flawed. Deprived of oxygen soon after birth, she possesses a learning disability. Her frizzled hair, bushy eyebrows, round face, and stocky forty-seven year old frame are so stereotypical of an unemployed spinster who lives with her cat, Pebbles, as her only companion, as to be incredible. Ridiculed by local youth for all of the above, Susan spends her time volunteering at the local Catholic parish and singing in the choir. Her plainness is vanilla and her halting words are few–just give a listen to this interview given after her jaw-dropping performance. Susan Boyle is the woman most of us would overlook in an empty room, let alone the crowded one.
Yet it is precisely all of these qualities and more that make Susan such a compelling individual. Her hard life (details buried in this great piece), geographic origins, dedicated care of aging parents, and absolute authenticity, give her a deep comfort level in her own skin and clear depth of character. She is the antithesis of an American Idol. Susan is a certified member of the hoi polloi.
There are several thought-provoking aspects of this event. The cynicism of the audience toward Susan’s dowdiness is palpable. The judge’s skepticism is writ clearly on their faces. On the other hand, her clarion confidence and sense of purpose are intoxicating. World’s collide and Lady David slays the giant on a global stage.
The power of music is overwhelming. There are no spoken words that could have evoked this response; they could only be sung, and sung with a voice like THAT, and maybe only by a person like Susan, and perhaps just at that particular kind of event. It was the shock of shattered expectations that made this happen.
Our tendency to prejudge others based on appearances is laid bare in all its stark ugliness. Don’t be too quick to judge the young lady at 1:24 in the video. I’m glad I was not sitting in the audience at that moment with a camera pointed my way.
The few minutes of television choreography that define Susan’s debut are worth careful attention. Moving from audience, to judge, to Susan, and back again makes for addictive watching. As a viewer you want to see it all at once…the virtuous voice, the radical conversions, the judge’s wonder, even the guys backstage are compelling.
Apr
14
April 14, 1755
Posted by Champ Thornton at 8:35 am
Today is a special day in my family. It’s not only the birthday of one of my sisters, it’s also the birthday of my great-, great-, great-, great-, great-grandfather. His name was Dozier Thornton.
Dozier was born April 14, 1755 in Lunenburg County, Virginia. From what we can tell, he served in the North Carolina Militia during the Revolutionary War (perhaps serving under Colonel Benjamin Cleveland). He later settled in northeast Georgia and planted several churches, including Van’s Creek Baptist Church in 1785. In addition to extended missionary trips into the wilderness of Kentucky, Dozier served as pastor at Van’s Creek for 47 years. A brief biography relates . . .
The same day he came in sight of a fine dwelling, discoverable through a beautiful avenue, shaded with trees in either side. A strong impression came upon his mind to go up to the house and pray for its inhabitants. Without hesitation, he turned up the avenue. The lady came to the door, to whom he promptly stated his errand. She kindly invited him to alight and come in, and though neither she nor any of the family made any pretensions to religion, the strange preacher was treated with great respect. The husband being absent, the lady, two sons and two daughters, . . . listened to the good man’s exhortation, his song, and bowed with him in prayer, while he fervently plead with God on their behalf. This done, he bade them farewell and departed, expecting to see them no more this side of the eternal world.
Several months afterwards, two strange young men came into Elbert county, inquiring for Rev. Dozier Thornton, who proved to be the sons of the family above referred to, and who, with their mother and sisters, had, by his visit, all been awakened to a sense of their lost condition as sinners, had been hopefully converted, and had now traveled all the way from North Carolina to seek baptism at the hands of him whose prayer had been answered in their salvation. They were accordingly baptized and returned homewards rejoicing.
Dozier died in September 1843 in Franklin County, Georgia.
Apr
9
Passion Week
Posted by Champ Thornton at 8:51 am
The ESV Bible Blog has helpfully integrated the events of the Passion Week with Google Map. Now you can see not only when various events occurred, you can also see where they occurred.
There are 89 total chapters in the four canonical Gospels (Matthew, 28; Mark, 16; Luke, 24; John, 21). Do you know how many of these chapters are devoted to the last week of Jesus’ life? Twenty-nine. That’s nearly 33%. One third of the Gospels narratives are devoted to a mere seven days in Jesus’ life.
In fact, the Gospel of John features seven chapters (out of 21; that’s 33%) to the final 24-hour period of Jesus’ life. Clearly, the Passion Week is uppermost in the minds of the four Evangelists. As New Testament scholar Martin Kähler memorably overstated, “The Gospels are passion narratives with extended introductions.”
What this means is that we cannot read the first two-thirds of the Gospel accounts without remembering where they’re all headed: toward the cross. The Passion Week. As John Piper says, We should “read the Gospels backward.” He makes his point:
Another way to say it is that the cross of Jesus, where he took our place and became a curse for us and bore our sins and completed his obedience, casts a long shadow back over every verse in the Gospels. Every verse is meant to be read under the shadow of what Jesus did for us on the cross. Or to put it still another way, the four gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—are meant to be read backward. Children, remember I said that and at lunch today say to your mommy and daddy, “Why did Pastor John say that we are supposed to read the Gospels backward?” And don’t panic, mom and dad. Here’s the answer. Tell them, he meant that when you start reading one of the Gospels you already know how it ends—the death and resurrection of Jesus for our sins—and you should have that ending in mind with every verse that you read.
This is not my idea. This is the way the Gospel writers want to be read. Matthew says in his first chapter, “She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins” (Matt. 1:21). He is coming not just to teach sinners, but to save sinners by his death and resurrection. . . . In other words, all the Gospels want us to know from the very beginning how the story ends: It ends with Jesus dying as a Lamb for the forgiveness of sins and rising again as the Lord of the universe. That is the way to understand every paragraph in the Gospels. Jesus’ commandments are not mere snippets of wisdom for how to raise your family, or how to prosper in business, or how to feel good about yourself. They are descriptions of how new human beings live who have been born again by God’s Spirit, and have seen the glory of his Son, Jesus Christ, and have recognized the desperate condition of sin they are in, and have ceased to trust in anything about themselves at all for acceptance with God, and have turned wholly to Jesus and all that God has done for us in him, and all God is for us in him. If the Gospels have not had that effect on you yet, you will probably misuse all the commandments of Jesus.
Apr
8
flotsam & jetsam (4.08.09)
Posted by Jon Trainer at 11:00 am
The centrality of the cross in biblical theology. Three lectures by Graeme Goldsworthy for your listening pleasure. Also, Paul Tripp. HT: JT.
On short-term mission trips. An excerpt:
Short-term missions often seek short-term results. And they aren’t financially efficient. Expending thousands of dollars to send people with no cross-cultural training or language skills to a foreign country and then expecting them to do something positive is naive and wasteful. One solution to this is long-term commitments to a specific project or mission. In this model, short-termers are less mini-missionaries and more ambassadors and accountability partners.
A new tome on baptism in the early church, if you really want to immerse yourself in the subject.
Lincoln was steeped in Shakespeare. A very interesting read that found its way into a recent sermon. I doubt too many presidential cabinet meetings are graced with readings of MacBeth these days.
Staying up with the emergent crowd.
Are you a small group host? The real reason you volunteer to open your home to a mini-flock of sheep each week.
On April 18, 1945 someone typed out Schindler’s list; the 801 names covered 13 pages. The sheets have been discovered at the Sydney Library in the collection of Thomas Keneally, author of Schindler’s Ark, the book on which the movie, Schindler’s List, is based. Interesting aside: if you go to the link, you’ll find a short story in which Keneally is spelled three different ways: Keneally, Kneally, Kneneally. The correct spelling is Keneally. Schindler’s List is one of those films I don’t need to see twice, and not because it was poorly done–it wasn’t.
On politics: blindly giving away the farm and prematurely beating swords into plowshares with non-friends. Scary stuff to keep in mind these days. And why we shouldn’t kill the F-22.
Apr
6
The Quintessential Teaching of Jesus
Posted by Champ Thornton at 7:00 am
Yesterday our Sunday School class covered the entire Sermon on the Mount. We spent the first 25 minutes going over the background and flow of thought or structure of this most famous of Jesus’ sermons. Then, since Matthew 5-7 is a sermon, we spent the final 25 minutes watching/listening to it as a sermon on DVD (from Matthew on the Visual Bible). (At $15.99 for the entire Gospel of Matthew, it’s a great purchase for families to watch together.)
Here are three links to watch the same version of Sermon on the Mount for free: part one; part two; part three.
Apr
2
Psalm 130 Remixed
Posted by Champ Thornton at 7:00 am
In July 2008 the musical team at Sovereign Grace Ministries (lead by Bob Kauflin) released an entire CD of psalm settings in a contemporary style.
Revisiting Monday’s post (“Psalmic Imagery”), here are the lyrics and audio of their remix of Psalm 130 (”Out of the Depths”).
Out of the depths, O Lord, I cry to You
When I am tempted to despair
Though I might fail to trust Your promises
You never fail to hear my prayer
And if You judged my sin
I’d never stand again
But I see mercy in Your handsSo more than watchmen for the morning
I will wait for You, my God
When my fears come with no warning
In Your Word I’ll put my trust
When the harvest time is over and I still see no fruit
I will wait, I will wait for YouThe secret mysteries belong to You
We only know what You reveal
And all my questions that are unresolved
Don’t change the wisdom of Your will
In every trial and loss
My hope is in the cross
Where Your compassions never fail© 2008 Sovereign Grace Praise (BMI)
Words and music by Bob Kauflin