Articles by davidtmyers

You are currently browsing davidtmyers’s articles.

December 15: They Stood Alone Because They were Left Alone

15 December, 2014 in December 2014 by davidtmyers | No comments

Ministry in Troubling Times

Here’s a question for those of you who are teaching elders and pastors:—how long would your congregations exist without your presence, or any pastor-teacher’s presence over them in the Lord? In other words, suppose your congregation did not have a pastor for an extended period of time? And further, there were no supply pastors available to minister the Word and Sacrament to them. Question? Would they persevere in the faith as an organized body of believers?

Such was the case in Scotland in the late 17th century. Presbyterianism as a whole in 1690 had been restored to Scotland by what is known as the Revolution Settlement. Covenanters however were disappointed by this settlement as it ignored early covenants made by the people. It further gave the civil government some authority over the church. And to make matters worse for the Covenanters, they were without an ordained minister at this time. Some 16 years later, the Rev. John MacMillan left the Church of Scotland to minister to their spiritual needs. But in hindsight, that was sixteen years down the proverbial pike. Sixteen years without a pastor! It took a degree of faith to stand together for the faith, by faith. And faith they did indeed possess, as evidenced by their organizing themselves in what is known as the Society People of Scotland.

These groups, according to A.S. Horne in his small booklet “Torchbearers of the Truth,” were not large in number, often being between ten and twelve individuals. If they grew beyond this, then they were required to split into two groups. They knew that the times were against them, as the principles of the Reformation had been largely swept aside and abandoned by the nation. Spiritual declension marked their times. Scrupulous care had to be exercised as to new members in their society.

Listen to one rule of entrance into a society, according to Horne. “None are to be invited, or upon his own desire brought into any Society” wrote author Horne, “but by the advice and consent of all the Society; and that he is particularly known at least to some of the members; that he is one who makes conscience of secret prayer, and of prayer in his family and he is of exemplary and blameless conversation and free from all scandal.”

Further, their meetings were quite obviously for the professing, committed Christian. A full meeting was “four hours at least should be seriously and closely spent about the work for which they meet, which is prayer and spiritual conference.” In addition, they “are not to be diverted from their work by talking about their worldly affairs or public news until they close, except something for the informing of the meeting whereof may be useful.”  It is clear that the primary purpose of the Society meetings were for spiritual edification.

There were other rules too, but space hinders their inclusion in this post. Some 7000 Scottish Covenanters regularly met together in this way throughout Central and Southern Scotland. Finally, a general meeting was held, with representatives from as many of the societies as could attend. The first of these general meetings was held on December 15, 1681 in Lanarkshire, Scotland. In all, some forty-one general meetings were held during this twenty years of persecution, “and never in one instance did informers succeed in getting information of them in time to prevent them, or capture those who attended them.”

Words to Live By:
This author can still remember during his years as a pastor-teacher, a church member who came to the door after the sermon, to urge  him to end his sermon on time as she and her husband wanted to be able to get the best seat in their local restaurant for their noon lunch! Contrast that remark with the Covenanters who, in the prelude to the Killing Times in Scotland, gathered together for hours in prayer and spiritual conversation so as to be made strong and valiant for the Lord.

Tags: , , ,

December 14: Reflection on Q. 101

14 December, 2014 in December 2014 by davidtmyers | No comments

A reflection worth reconsidering, time and again.

Making God’s Name Holy —

We begin on this day of December 14, by considering our Confessional Fathers  explanation of the familiar petitions of that which is commonly called the Lord’s Prayer. Question? Do you really understand Christian, what you are saying when you utter the Lord’s Prayer during your worship service or during a private moment?

Shorter Catechism answer 101 teaches us that “in the first petition, which is, Hallowed by thy name, we pray that God would enable us, and others, to glorify Him in all that whereby he makes himself known, and that he would dispose all  things to his own glory.”

After drawing near to God with all holy reverence and confidence, as children to a father, indeed as the children of God to our heavenly Father, believing that He is able and ready to help us, we begin with this upward direction of adoration. Hallowed be Your name, we pray.

The word “hallowed” is the same root as “holy,” or “sanctify.”  Set Your Name apart in our hearts, heavenly Father. Enable us to glorify You in creation, in providence, and in redemption. In everything whereby You make Yourself known, may we daily give you all praise and glory. “Give unto the Lord the glory due unto His name; worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness” (KJV)—so the Psalmist commands in Psalm 96:8, 9. Remember, from that magnificent first catechism answer, this is our chief and main duty in life, to “glorify God.”

Then since He is in control of all things, and nothing occurs outside His powerful sovereignty, we pray that He will by His upholding, directing, and governing all creatures, actions, and things, from the greatest even to the least, dispose everything to His own glory.

Words to live by:  Make it a challenging spiritual exercise to cause the Name of God to be set apart in all that you do in life. Indeed, make it a challenging discovery to find  how God has set apart His own name in His divine actions on this earth. Either spiritual exercise will add to your spiritual growth. Seek to magnify the name of God in a world which doesn’t care to even acknowledge His existence, and watch to see how God will bring opportunities for witness to your unsaved family and friends. Let us set the Lord always before us. Hallowed be Thy Name.

Tags: , , ,

December 10: Rev. Samuel Blair, Jr.

10 December, 2014 in December 2014 by davidtmyers | 3 comments

The Second U.S. House Chaplain was a Presbyterian

As a matter of fact, the first three chaplains to the United States House of Representatives were all Presbyterian, with the Rev. Samuel Blair, Jr. being number two.

Samuel was born at Faggs Manor, Cochranville, Pennsylvania.  Immediately our readers should recognize the name of Samuel Blair as being related to the New Side pastor and evangelist of that famous church in Chester County, Pennsylvania. Now called Manor Presbyterians, its history goes back to 1730.  It is now a congregation of the Presbyterian Church in America. But Samuel Blair Sr. was one of the leaders of the First Great Awakening in the colonies.  This is his son.

Attending the College of New Jersey (now Princeton), Samuel Blair Jr. graduated with honor at age nineteen.  Staying in the town of Princeton, he tutored for several years.  licensed to preach by the Presbytery of New Castle in 1764, he was called to Old South Church in Boston, Massachusetts in 1766.

In one of those “hard providences” of history, on his way up to Boston, he suffered a shipwreck, being actually cast into the Atlantic Ocean. His lost all of his clothes in that tragedy and all of his sermon manuscripts. This incident greatly depressed him and brought some major health problems to him.

He stayed on as one of the two pastors of Old South until 1769, when due to ill-health, he resigned and moved to Germantown, Pennsylvania, where he planned to devote his remaining years to study. But God wasn’t through with him yet in active service. On December 10, 1790, he was appointed as the second Presbyterian chaplain to the United States House of Representatives in Washington, D.C.  He would stay in that post for two years.

What a fitting close of ministry for a theologian, preacher of the Word, evangelist, and pastor.

Words to live by:  God always gives sufficient grace to those who need it in His work.  We may  have great weakness, but He is ever strong.  We may feel utterly inadequate, but He is all-sufficient.  Believer, trust in His strength always and then push out into His kingdom.  He will provide what you need for your effective ministry to the saints of God, and to say nothing for those who are in need of saving grace.

Tags:

December 6: Marion Harvey

6 December, 2014 in December 2014 by davidtmyers | No comments

A Maid Meets Her Master

It was on this day, December 6. 1680. that a young twenty year old maid stood before the Anglican court in Scotland. Her judicial examination and subsequent martyrdom for her Master, the Lord Jesus Christ, was for the terrible crime—are you ready for this reader—attending a worship service in a Scottish pasture, and subsequently giving testimony that she adhered to the truths of the Lord Jesus, avowing Him to be King in Zion and the only head of the Church.

Marion Harvey, the subject of this post, was reared in a home where her father had cast his lot in with those adhering to the National Covenant of Scotland and the Solemn League and Covenant. However, his religious convictions did not, for his daughter, permeate her character and conduct until she was in her mid-teens. Up to then, according to her own testimony, she lived according to the world, engaging in breaking the Sabbath and blaspheming the Name of God for her own pleasures. But a decided change had taken place in her  heart and soul in that middling teenager. Whether by curiosity or by just following the crowds, she began to attend the outdoor worship services in the fields and moors, listening to those ministers who had been ejected from their pulpits and parishes. Listening to the preached Word of God, she “left off hearing the curates, whose ministry she formerly attended without scruple. She now venerated the name of God, which she had formerly blasphemed; she sanctified the Sabbath, which she had formerly desecrated; and she delighted in the Bible, which she had formerly neglected and undervalued.” (from The Ladies on the Covenant). In truth, regeneration had occurred in her soul.

It would be five years later when she was arrested by the government’s soldiers as she left a field worship service. Thrown into prison, it was the beginning of the end on this earth for her, a trial of her convictions which began with a series of inquisitions by the Anglican government.

After one lengthy examination, she returned to her cell, already aware that on January 26, she would be hung for her religious views. She left a testimony in that cell in Edinburgh prison which said,

“I, being to lay down my life on Wednesday next, January 26, I thought it fit to let it be known to the world wherefore I lay down my life, and to let it be seen that I die not as a fool, or an evil-doer, or as a busy-body, in other men’s matters.  No, it is for adhering to the truth of Jesus Christ, and avowing him to be King in Zion, and head of His church, and the testimony against these ungodly laws of men, and their robbing Christ of His rights, and usurping his prerogative royal, which I durst not but testify against.” 

On the 26th of January,. she along with another woman were martyred and went joyfully into the presence of the Lord Jesus.

Words to Live By:
At this very time, there are countless fellow Christians, being members of the persecuted twenty-first century Church, who are experiencing the same kind of suffering and death which Marion Harvey experienced in her day. Are you aware of that, Christian? Do you ever think of them, and pray for them in their hour of trial?  Ask your pastor for a list of the names of the countries which still persecute the church today? The list begins with China, North Korea, and continues all across the ten-forty window. Thousands of believers are in jail and inhuman conditions for no other reason than for worshiping whom you worship today. We need to pray for them.

We need to make their cause our cause. Certainly you would want all these responses by others if you were the ones suffering for the Savior today.

O God, thou hast cast us off, thou hast scattered us,
thou hast been displeased; O turn thyself to us again.
Thou hast made the earth to tremble; thou hast broken it:
heal the breaches thereof; for it shaketh.
Thou hast shewed thy people hard things:
thou hast made us to drink the wine of astonishment.
Thou hast given a banner to them that fear thee,
that it may be displayed because of the truth.
Selah
—Psalm 60:1-4, KJV

Tags:

December 5: Walter Smith (hymn writer)

5 December, 2014 in December 2014 by davidtmyers | No comments

The Next Time You Sing . . .

Whether it is from the original Trinity hymnal on page 35, or the red Trinity Hymnal on page 38, both editions of this Presbyterian and Reformed hymnal have the majestic hymn “Immortal, Invisible, God only Wise.” The tune was taken from a traditional Welsh ballad, but it is the words, not the tune, which stand out to any worshiper who sings its biblical phrases.

“Immortal, Invisible, God only Wise,” is found in the benediction of Paul to young Timothy, when he says,” Now unto the King, eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honour and glory for ever and ever. Amen.” —(1 Timothy 1:17, KJV).

Continuing on in the first verse, line three, the hymn writer refers to God as the Ancient of Days, in speaking of “Most blessed, most glorious, the Ancient of Days, Almighty Victorious, Thy Great Name we praise.” This title of God comes from Daniel 7:9, where the Old Testament prophet says that he “beheld till the thrones were cast down, and the Ancient of Days did sit . . . .”

Then in the second line of the second verse, we sing “Thy justice like mountains high soaring above,” we think of Psalm 33:6 the Psalmist saying “Thy righteousness is like the great mountains; Thy judgments are a great deep.”

There are two other verses which the hymn author wrote, but which are left out of our Trinity Hymnal. They are: “To all life thou givest, to both great and small; In all life thou livest, the true life of all; We blossom and flourish as leaves on the tree, And wither and perish; but naught changeth thee.” The second verse not included in the Trinity Hymnal reads “All laud we would render; O help  us to see ‘Tis only the splendor of light hideth thee, And so let thy glory, almighty, impart, Through Christ in his story, thy Christ to the heart.”:

smith_walter_chalmersThe author of this majestic hymn was Walter Chalmers Smith, born this day December 5, 1824 in Aberdeen, Scotland. He was educated in the elementary schools of that town and for his higher learning, graduated from New College, Edinburgh. Walter Smith was ordained in 1850 in the Free Church of Scotland and served four churches in that Presbyterian denomination. His longest pastorate was in Edinburgh. He was honored by his fellow elders when in 1893, he was elected Moderator of the General Assembly in the Jubilee year of the Free Church of Scotland.

It was interesting that it took several years before this hymn surfaced in print, being found for the first time in 1876 in his “Hymns of Christ and the Christian Life.”

Words to Live By:
In the familiar acrostic of A.C.T.S, standing for that prayer outline of Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, and Supplication, we could easily sing the stanzas of this majestic hymn and go a long way toward fulfilling the Adoration part of our prayers. It is that full of praise. So the next time you sing it in one of our Presbyterian congregations, sing the words with your heart and voice as you adore God’s person.

Tags:

« Older entries § Newer entries »