Meet a Ministry Team

Proclamation’s Blogging Ministry Team

If the Internet were a cheese, it would be Limburger, heated, slowly for hours. The smell of its presence is inescapable no matter where you go. Although the technology itself is morally neutral, the amount and type of Internet usage can be as delightful as connecting with friends or shared family pictures, as comical as <<insert your favorite silly cat video here>>, or as dark as walking through the Valley of the Shadow of Death. No single word can encapsulate this technological tangle, but one might try; “shallow,” “comforting,” or “insidious,” “provocative,” or “dangerous,” “threatening,” or “refreshing.” It all depends on where you go. The challenge is that the choices are many, access is easy, and the available content represents a huge spread from God-honoring to blasphemous. With a few “clicks” a person can find truth that leads to life or lies that condemn to eternal death.

The blogging ministry at Proclamation seeks to speak, into the Internet maelstrom, words of truth, guidance, encouragement, and hopefully, a little humor and insight. We seek to enlighten, investigate, and explain. Our topics range from worship to apologetics, evangelism to prayer, and even current events, (although we carefully dodge discussing politics.) At all times, at the bedrock of each word we write is our desire to bring glory to God and to fulfill the Great Commission; always with the Bible as our ultimate source of truth and understanding.

It is easy to find the fruit of our blogging ministry on our church website, (www.proclamationpca.org), by clicking on “blog,” in the top navigation of the site.

How you can help:
1) Pray for our team of writers. We want to “get it right,” which means taking time to know God, know our topics, and then, make it come alive! Pray for us to receive the spark of inspiration and the time to write.

2) Read the blogs, provide comments, and share the links. As typical aspiring (and starving) writers, we all want our words to go viral, start a revival, and transform the world. (Sorry, I couldn’t think of another word that ended -al.) More seriously, this is a ministry, and we do want God to be seen and glorified, people to be challenged, and hopefully, some to claim the name, “Christian.” And it is simple math, if 50 people in our church post the link on their Facebook page….

3) Provide feedback to our team. As always, writers are shy, mousy people who hide out typing in their private basement sancti, (What is plural for sanctum?) dreaming that someone, somewhere really cares. (Don’t tell them I said this, though.) But DO accost them after service, point out every error of punctuation or syntax, pat them on the head and make suggestions for their next blog.

This blog was written by Charles Fox

Purposeful Praise: Making Sense of Congregational Singing

The God of Abraham Praise: Our March Doxology

Fittingly, our hymn “The God of Abraham Praise” was inspired by a Jewish doxology. Tradition holds that Methodist preacher Thomas Olivers attended a service at the Great Synagogue of London at some point in 1770, where he heard the celebrated singer Meyer Lyon leading the congregation in the Yigdal prayer. Lyon generously shared his music with Olivers, who composed a hymn to it. (Here’s a video of a modern version of the Jewish hymn.)

The text of “The God of Abraham Praise” may also be loosely based on the Yigdal. Yigdal literally means “may he be magnified,” and—as you may have guessed—it’s the first word of the prayer in Hebrew. The entire prayer is a 14th century adaptation of a creed written by the philosopher Maimonides, the most significant medieval Jewish thinker.

Whether or not Olivers intended to paraphrase the Yigdal text, the lyrics of verse 6 constitute an explicitly Christian doxology. Where the Yigdal stresses only God’s unity—his “inscrutable and infinite … Oneness”—Olivers’s hymn takes care to praise our one God in three persons: “Hail, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost!”

Verse 6 also reflects the Revelation imagery of all the saints eternally praising God before his throne in heaven. Remember “Holy, Holy, Holy,” in which we join this congregation, echoing the words of the cherubim of Revelation 4:8. Verse 5 of “The God of Abraham Praise” sets up this same scene for us: “On Zion’s sacred height his kingdom [God] maintains, and glorious with his saints in light forever reigns.” So when verse 6 refers to “the whole triumphant host,” it means all believers—past, present, and future—singing together in heaven.

The second half of the verse makes this personal: “Hail, Abraham’s God and mine! I join the heavenly lays [songs] …” The same God who called Abraham out of his city to the promised land has called us to participate in his kingdom today.

This blog was written by Corrie Schwab

Purposeful Praise: Making Sense of Congregational Singing

Gloria Patri: Our February Doxology

Our February doxology, the Gloria Patri, happens to be one of the oldest continuously sung doxologies in the Christian tradition.* At least one record suggests that the first half appeared before A.D. 100, and the entire text has been chanted since the fourth century at latest. Today it is regularly sung all over the world in Catholic churches, in Eastern Orthodox churches, and in countless Protestant churches.

For the non–Latin scholars among us, the doxology’s title—Gloria Patri—is simply the first line in Latin, “Glory be to the Father.” The first half of the song, “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost,” reflects the language of the Great Commission: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” When we sing this we’re affirming our identity as disciples.

When we sing the second half, we’re affirming the Trinity by acknowledging that Christ and the Holy Spirit are eternally deserving of glory alongside God the Father—past, present, and future. Indeed, this line was probably added during the Trinitarian controversies of the early church, when this hymn may have served as a sort of “fight song” for orthodox Christians!

The last phrase of the doxology (well, not counting amen) is particularly interesting. The phrase we sing as “world without end” is a translation of the Latin in saecula saeculorum, which in turn is a translation from Greek. In both Latin and Greek, the phrase literally means unto ages of ages, and is normally translated to English as forever and ever. You may be familiar with this phrase: it occurs many times in the New Testament, including 12 times in Revelation. For instance, “Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen” (Rev. 7:12).

So the second half of the Gloria Patri encompasses all of Scripture, in a sense: from “in the beginning” (Gen. 1:1) to “forever and ever” (a continual refrain in Revelation, finally in Rev. 22:5).

* Here’s a challenge: find an even older doxology! Remember, doxology simply means a brief expression of praise to God. By this definition, any Scripture passage that praises God counts as a doxology. If you consider only doxologies that are sung by churches today, what’s the oldest doxology you can find? Please share your discoveries in the comments.

This blog was written by Corrie Schwab

Proc Talk: Theology and Current Events at Proclamation

Not Your Fine China

In early December over 100 members of the Early Rain Covenant Church in Chengdu, in Sichuan province, China, were arrested and detained by the Chinese government. Among the detainees was the Pastor Wang Yi and his wife, Jiang Rong. Their son is currently staying with the Pastor’s mother. The arrest included church leaders, seminary students, and worshippers at the church, many who were in a worship service, but also many were arrested in their homes or on the city streets. As is typical of religious persecution in closed nations, there has been no way to make contact with the people arrested and there have been reports of torture and coercion.

Although the church in China is often understood as the fastest growing in the world, this is often matched with wave upon wave of official persecution from the Chinese government. It is remarkable that the church in China wears their persecution proudly like a badge of honor, and the members have stood strong and faithful. The government allows the church to meet in an “official” capacity where the teaching and worship is carefully controlled by the government. In contrast, there is a thriving unofficial church that loves the Bible, teaches the gospel, and worships the risen Jesus. The unofficial church has a stance of “faithful disobedience” to the government, which brings a heightened level of animosity upon the church. This latest round of persecution and incarceration of the church is part of a concerted action against all religions which include a massive round up of Muslims who are being held in retraining camps.

As always, God has worked in both ordinary and miraculous ways in and through this persecution. The stories of God’s faithfulness and the perseverence of his people are painful, touching and awe inspiring. We need to pray. We need to be aware. We need to worship God for his wisdom and love.

For an article that contains far more details and a copy of Wang Yi’s letter to his church, navigate to the following link: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/persecuted-chinese-pastor-issues-declaration-faithful-disobedience/

This blog was written by Charles Fox

Purposeful Praise: Making Sense of Congregational Singing

Holy, Holy, Holy-Our January Doxology

When I was a child, if you had asked me to sing a doxology I would have used the following words: “Praise God from whom all blessings flow; praise him all creatures here below; praise him above, ye heavenly host; praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” Thousands of English-speaking congregations around the world treasure this poem and sing it regularly. Yet the term doxology does not refer to these specific words; it simply means a brief expression of praise. The word is derived from the Greek doxa, meaning glory, and logos, meaning word or speaking.

Verse 4 from “Holy, Holy, Holy!” makes an excellent doxology. Note how the traditional words cited above urge God’s earthly and heavenly creatures to praise him: “praise him all creatures here below; praise him above, ye heavenly host.” When we sing “Holy, Holy, Holy!” we join the chorus of creaturely voices already singing God’s praise on earth and in heaven.

“Holy, holy, holy” echoes the refrain of the cherubim John saw in his vision of heaven, endlessly praising God from before his throne: “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!” (Rev. 4:1). Isaiah similarly saw a vision of seraphim before God’s throne crying “holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!” (Is. 6:3). These passages lend even more of their imagery to verse 2 of the hymn, which not only pictures the cherubim and seraphim worshipping God, but also refers to “all the saints … casting down their golden crowns before the glassy sea”—the calm-as-crystal sea John describes in front of God’s throne (Rev. 4:6).

John’s “twenty-four elders” who “cast their crowns before the throne” (Rev. 4:10) represent all the saints—that is, the complete church past and present, two-times-twelve suggesting the twelve tribes of Israel and the twelve apostles. As Andy Styer explained in week 5 of his Revelation class, Revelation 4 reminds us that God is receiving the worship he is due right now, in heaven, by the whole gathered church and all the angels. So when we sing our doxology to God, this is the congregation we are joining.

And what do we join all God’s works in calling him? “Merciful and mighty,” and—most emphatically—“holy, holy, holy.” We tend to think of holiness as synonymous with righteousness, but it more properly refers to being set apart: a holy object is set apart from common use, and a holy person is set apart from common existence (including sin). To call God “holy” is to acknowledge his transcendence and his absolute superiority to his creation.

Finally, who is the God we are praising? Our God has graciously identified himself to us in his three persons, and so we take care to address our praise to the Trinity explicitly.

This blog was written by Corrie Schwab