Serving the Word of God
I’ve recently been reading Serving the Word of God, edited by David Wright and David Stay. It’s a collection of essays in honor of James Philip, who served for forty years as the pastor of Holyrood Abbey Church in Edinburgh, from 1958 on.
I knew nothing about James Philip before reading the biographical essays in this volume. He appears to have been one of those great pulpit giants, a man who preached twice on Sunday and once again at the midweek meeting, besides leading the Saturday night prayer meeting (at which he also spoke), preparing Bible Reading Notes for every day of the year, writing a monthly pastoral letter to the congregation, and keeping up correspondence with many missionaries.
I’m not going to go through the book chapter by chapter, though there are a few things in the later chapters that I’ll spend more time on in another blog entry. But here, I want to pass on a few things that I especially appreciated, all of them from James Philip himself as he is quoted at various points in this book.
On what young Christians need:
What I am certain of is this: a great many of the problems and difficulties that beset young Christians’ lives, and the not-so-young as well — temptations, pressures, mixed-up-ness, loneliness, depression, discouragement, or whatever — would be well on the way to solution if only they would at last submit themselves to the “ordinariness” of the means of grace, and applied some discipline to themselves in terms of getting themselves under the word of ministry on a regular, as opposed to a spasmodic basis (cited p. 62).
On preaching the whole of Scripture:
We need all the truth of God for our balanced growth, not merely this or that doctrine, this emphasis or that. Christ is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification and redemption, and to get a whole Christ we need the whole Word (cited p. 63, emphasis mine).
On being missional:
The gospel that lifts the burden of sin from our hearts lays upon us another burden — the burden of a lost world (cited p. 103).
On worship:
The deeper reaches of worship are attained not by the mystics or those that are temperamentally suited or inclined to rapt adoration and wonder, but by those that are poor and of a contrite spirit, that tremble at His Word (Isa. 66:2); and for this reason, that the issues involved are not mystical primarily, but moral, a matter not of temperament but of character (cited p. 246).
On the church as a body:
In a loose association of individuals, each may well remain not only independent of the other but also indifferent to the other; nor is there any essential bond existing between them to lay mutual obligations upon them. But in membership of a body there is an organic bond which obliges us to be interested in one another, and lays upon us the duty of mutual consideration and care. What then, are we to say of those believers who are regularly present with us week by week, feeding on what they themselves have sometimes called “the finest of the wheat” but who nevertheless do not become involved in the real life of the fellowship … but remain detached, reserved and, even after some years, still comparative strangers to those who want to share fellowship with them in the things of God…. Either we are content to regard Holyrood as a preaching station, a kind of spiritual “self service” store where you help yourself to anything that happens to appeal to you, or we submit to the biblical teaching about membership of the body and take our responsibilities towards one another seriously…. We need one another. This is the meaning of the fellowship. There is a healing, sanctifying and enriching power in the true fellowship of the Spirit. Most people would be surprised to learn how many needs there are that nothing but the love of the saints in fellowship can meet and solve (cited pp. 257-258).
May 3rd, 2007 at 7:52 am
Great quotes. Thanks for posting them.
May 5th, 2007 at 4:26 am
I really like the idea of a monthly pastoral letter to the congregation. Do you know if anything in that genre is collected somewhere in the form of a book?
May 5th, 2007 at 6:53 am
On what young Christians need:
What I am certain of is this: a great many of the problems and difficulties that beset young Christians’ lives, and the not-so-young as well — temptations, pressures, mixed-up-ness, loneliness, depression, discouragement, or whatever — would be well on the way to solution if only they would at last submit themselves to the “ordinariness†of the means of grace, and applied some DISCIPLINE TO THEMSELVES IN TERMS OF GETTING THEMSELVES UNDER THE WORD OF MINISTRY ON A REGULAR’ AS OPPOSED TO A SPASMODIC’ BASIS(cited p. 62).
Other than adding the caps John, we should probably also add caps to what’s just above which says ‘the not-so-young as well’.
May 5th, 2007 at 6:57 am
\”There is a healing, sanctifying and enriching power in the true fellowship of the Spirit. Most people would be surprised to learn how many needs there are that nothing but the love of the saints in fellowship can meet and solve\” (cited pp. 257-258).
Let\’s also put this part in bas relief and act like we believe it 52 Lord\’s days a year and all those other days we have the opportunity and invitation to come together.
June 2nd, 2007 at 2:49 pm
Gideon, sorry I didn’t respond to your comment sooner. I thought I had, but I don’t see the response here.
I don’t know of anything in that genre in the form of a book, and I don’t think that James Philip’s own pastoral letters were ever published in bound volumes (though now that I think about it, I wonder if his church might have something like that available).