Bill Deenick. Trowel & Sword. March 1987
Preamble: Background – When the Psalter Hymnal was no longer readily available from the U.S., the decision was made to produce a hymnal for The Australian Church. The first edition of the “Book of Worship”, produced in 1981, consisted of a brown, loose leaf folder containing three separate music sections, Psalms, Hymns and (Spiritual) Songs, as well as sections for Standards and Forms. It is to this book that Rev. Bill Deenick refers when he wrote about the song titled “Kyrie Eleison” in 1987. The final 1990 edition of the “Book of Worship” no longer divided the songs into separate sections and a number of songs from the first edition (including “Kyrie Eleison”) were dropped while others were added. With the advent of overhead projectors and electronic screens, the “Book of Worship” itself has passed into history and it would seem that the choice of music for Worship Services has now fallen to individual churches and their music teams.
Kyrie Eleison (Lord, Have Mercy On Us)
We do not sing it much. I do not remember having sung it even once in church. Yet, it is one of the songs in the Book of Worship (of the Australian Reformed Church);
Song 23. Kyrie Eleison; Lord have mercy on us.
In that particular section of the Book of Worship [‘Songs”] it is the only song in which the Church cries to God for mercy. There are plenty of hallelujahs, praise- the-Lord’s and hosannas in that section. There is also flag waving, clapping and raising of hands, laughing and shouting and dancing in it. But it has only this one cry for mercy; and it is hidden in Greek. Admittedly there is one set of bended knees in Song 10 and in Latin there is a prayer for peace but on the whole the Church singing the songs of this section is a triumphant and happy Church, full of joy, praising the Lord, living for Jesus, born again and with its sins forgiven, sanctified, one in the Spirit, walking hand in hand, sharing in Christ’s victory; and we will know that they are Christians by their love.
Well, is there any thing wrong with being a happy Church? Is it not pleasing to God when we sing cheerful songs of faith and rejoicing? Yes, sure it is; and I am ready to admit that I really love some of the songs in this section, such as the numbers 3 and 7; 20, 43 and 55:1&3.* And many of the others are quite alright too. Some of my grandchildren think that we have killed them by over-use. I have heard them say: “Oh no, not this one again” when a particular song was proposed. But then, they are still quite young. They may not yet appreciate the beauty of repetition!
My experience with Christian people [Reformed or otherwise] is that they are not really such a happy victorious band. The Church as I have come to know it is much more like a miserable, divided crowd of often small-minded and often discontented people;
My problem is a different one. I tend to be very suspicious about all that happy singing around me. To be honest, I am tempted to disbelieve it. I have never had much trouble in believing in the honesty of a man or a woman calling upon God for help, mercy and forgiveness. But when I hear all these triumphant hallelujahs I often feel very uncomfortable. They do not seem fair dinkum: They come too easily, even glibly. My experience with Christian people [Reformed or otherwise] is that they are not really such a happy victorious band. The Church as I have come to know it is much more like a miserable, divided crowd of often small-minded and often discontented people; and only very seldom was it possible to see that they were Christians by their holiness and love. I find that especially true with regard to evangelism. Everybody seems to be talking about church growth these days. Like the Pharisees of old, all Christians are supposed to make a few converts here and there [Matthew 23:15) but when all is said and done the Church as we know it in this country is unbelievably ineffective in its outreach, no matter how many training courses we organise or little books on church growth we read. In real evangelism – making Christ known to a lost nation – the Christian Church in this country is an abysmal failure. Yet, we sing our hallelujahs as if we really shared in the victories of Christ. And when a few souls are won we are so pleased with our little successes that we must report on them as soon and as widely as we can, counting the heads (how many we gained and lost) and making comparisons with others (how many they gained and lost). Forgetting about what we should really do: humble ourselves before God with cries and tears of contrition. Who knows, God may still have mercy on us.
In the Christian Church at worship a few more bended knees, a few more contrite hearts and a few more cries for mercy would seem more believable than the hallelujahs and the praise-the-Lord’s.
Now it could be argued that I have come to this negative view of the Church because I have always mixed with the wrong crowd and worked in the wrong church. But when I hear about their experiences from other Christians at times (when they are honest) and I listen to the testimony of church history I come to the opposite conclusion, viz. that God has rather blessed me in the Christians I met and the churches I worked in. But that does not alter my conclusion that the Lord’s unfavourable assessment of five of the seven churches in Asia Minor (Rev.2 and 3) is still very relevant to most of the Christian Church today, not excluding our own denomination. All these high spirited hosannas are out of character with the Christian reality of the day. In the Christian Church at worship a few more bended knees, a few more contrite hearts and a few more cries for mercy would seem more believable than the hallelujahs and the praise-the-Lord’s. Before too many hands are raised in jubilation, a few more tears of repentance and a few more prayers de profundis [Psalm 130] would not be out of place. After all, only the hallelujahs out of the depths of sorrow and of sins confessed, are truly believable.
I have a great problem on this score. As Christians these days we seem to be able to overlook without too much trouble the almost complete failure of our Christian life and witness in the world. To talk about God’s anger and revulsion at the sins of those who claim to be Christ’s is quite out of fashion. We are forgiven, are we not? We are in Christ, are we not? In our kind of welfare society we are faring very well, thank you, also spiritually. We seem tobe so satisfied with the kind of Christians we are. We do not seem to realise how ‘wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked’ we are (Rev.3:17) and we feel embarrassed and do not know what to say when we happen to meet a Christian who feels totally rotten about his life before the Lord. We will possibly try to assure him that it is not as bad as all that. Once again an incredible bourgeois satisfaction has taken hold of our middle class Christian world; as it often did in the past, e.g. in the days of Kierkegaard.
This is reflected in our Sunday worship. Do you remember the days when the Christian Church dared to pray prayers like this: ‘Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Judge of all men; we acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness, which we, from time to time, most grievously have committed by thought, word and deed, against Thy divine Majesty, provoking most justly Thy wrath and indignation against us. We do earnestly repent and are heartily sorry for these our misdoings. The remembrance of them is grievous to us; the burden of them is intolerable. Have mercy upon us. Have mercy upon us, most merciful Father. For Thy Son our Lord Jesus Christ’s sake, forgive us all that is past and grant us that we for ever hereafter serve and please Thee in newness of life…’? I quote from the Holy Communion liturgy of the Church of England. Such prayers kept the message of sin and forgiveness alive in the English Church even in its darkest days. But I could have quoted from the Prayers of the continental Reformed Church as well: “O eternal God and merciful Father, we humble ourselves before Thy great majesty, against which we have frequently and grievously sinned. We acknowledge that if
Thou shouldst enter into judgement with us, we would deserve nothing but eternal death. We are deeply conscious of the fact that on account of our original sin we are unclean before Thee and children of wrath. Since we are conceived and born in sin all manner of evil desire against Thee and our neighbour fill our soul. We continually transgress Thy commandments, failing to do what Thou has commanded and doing that which Thou hast expressly forbidden. We all like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way. We acknowledge our waywardness and are heartily sorry for all our sins. We confess to our humiliation and to the praise of Thy mercy that our transgressions are innumerable, and that our debt is so great that we cannot even begin to repay. We are not worthy to be called Thy children nor to lift up our eyes heavenward to Thee in prayer. Nevertheless, O Lord and gracious Father . . . etc.”
Thus the Christian Church confessed its sins in years past. You can still find such prayers in the back of the Psalter Hymnal. If we compare this language with that of the liturgical forms now proposed, and accepted by the Australian Reformed Church Synod (1985])for provisional use, we seem to enter a totally different world, not only language-wise but also content-wise. I could illustrate that from practically each of the now suggested forms.
Do you remember that in the past we asked parents at the baptism of their child: ‘Do you confess that our children, though conceived and born in sin and therefore subject to all manner of misery, yea to condemnation itself, are sanctified in Christ and therefore as members of His Church ought to be baptised?’ Later we had a ‘Grey Book’, provisionally adopted. In it we were told to ask parents: ‘Do you believe that our children are born with sinful hearts and yet are holy in Christ and therefore as members of His Church ought to be baptised?’ Then we had a ‘Blue Book’ provisionally adopted. The questions changed again and we asked, more in line with the old form: ‘Do you confess that our children, though sinful by nature right from the beginning of their lives, and consequently deserving of God’s judgement and even of eternal death, are by His mercy holy in Christ…?’ But now the questions have changed again (all within a period of 15 years; the earlier forms lasted four hundred years) and we are instructed to ask: ‘Do you believe that your child though sinful by nature, is received by God in Christ as a member of His covenant…?’ That is all: sinful by nature. How sinful by nature, just a little or a great deal, we leave that up in the air. In the original form we had a Reformational question. With our present question any semi-Pelagian could wholeheartedly agree. Sin has been played down and we do not talk about condemnation or judgement.
We could also have a look at the now proposed forms for the celebration of the Holy Supper. It is good that we do that. Synod 1985 encouraged us all to study the Liturgy Report and to discuss ti widely in the churches. That includes T&S, I am sure.
In past centuries the Holy Supper liturgy always included what the Presbyterians called a ‘fencing of the Table’, in which unrepentant sinners were warned to repent and to turn to the Lord before partaking in the Supper. In recent years this warning has still been retained in what we call the exhortation before the Supper, to be read on the Sunday before. The exhortation now proposed still has that one sentence of prohibition: the Table of the Lord is not open, however, to those who wilfully and unrepentantly live in sin. We urge them to seek – or rediscover – the abundant grace of God’
But what about the new forms for the celebration of the Supper? Do they still ‘fence the Table’; do they still reckon with unbelievers and unrepentant sinners who might possibly be present in the church and who could ‘eat and drink judgment’ on themselves? No, they do not. With not one word is anyone discouraged from taking part because of unbelief or unconfessed sin. Even the words of Paul in 1Cor.11, which throughout the ages have been part of the Christian Church’s Supper liturgy are not worthy of inclusion in the now proposed forms. The rationale behind it is, no doubt, that a positive invitation to repentant sinners should suffice. But why should we be wiser than the Lord himself and his apostles? His words are full of warning; and it is not only in 1Cor.11 that Paul tells us about all the sinners who have no part in the Kingdom of God’s grace. We read about it also in Galatians: I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the Kingdom of God! That was written to the Christian communities in the province of Galatia.
If the Reformed Church is not to be a sect but an ecclesia in the N.T. sense it needs to hear before its Holy Supper celebrations that no one can run off with someone else’s wife or live in the sins of tax evasion, gambling or quarrelling and still have part in the Kingdom of God.
From the apostle’s example we learn that we cannot presume everyone in the Church to be among the elect, a born-again believer living a sanctified life. Such a distorted view of the Church has sectarian but no biblical credentials. The Church of Jesus is not a friendly society of nice, like-minded and morally living Christian people with loveable children. In the Church, as the people of God, there are among us rebels and hypocrites; there are goats among the sheep and tares among the wheat. If the Reformed Church is not to be a sect but an ecclesia in the N.T. sense it needs to hear before its Holy Supper celebrations that no one can run off with someone else’s wife or live in the sins of tax evasion, gambling or quarrelling and still have part in the Kingdom of God.
Do you remember the old form that served us for four hundred years? It is still in the Psalter Hymnal. Read it once more. But you have to hurry; it is not likely to be incorporated in the new Book of Worship. When we still knew that the Reformed Church was not a sect but a Church, we read: *wherefore also, according to the command of Christ and of the apostle Paul, we admonish those who know themselves to be defiled with the following gross sins to abstain from the Table of the Lord; and declare to them that they have no part in the Kingdom of Christ; such as all idolators. all despisers of God and of His Word, and of the holy sacraments; all blasphemers…all who seek to raise discord, sects and mutiny in Church or State; all perjurers… quarrelsome persons… all adulterers… gamblers, covetous persons, and all who live offensive lives. All these, while they continue in such sins, shall abstain from this food which Christ has appointed only for his believers, lest their judgment and condemnation be made the heavier.” And then, of course, followed the delightful passage in which the invitation came to the “contrite hearts of the believers” who are “by the grace of the Holy Spirit heartily sorry” for their sins.
It pains me to think that there are young ministers in our church who have never read that form for their congregation; and possibly never even have heard it being read.
Now, I have quoted this from the continental liturgical forms of the Reformation period, but I could have quoted also the Book of Common Prayer of the English
Church. Please, check it for once, in the form for the Holy Communion.
One more point: the now proposed forms for profession of faith and adult baptism. Notice the questions asked and the statements expected from the candidates for baptism and confirmation. The form for adult baptism includes a straightforward confession of sins, as does one of the four (only one of the four) Holy Supper forms; however, such confession may have been included earlier in the service. But then the questions and the statements; especially the statements. The candidate assures us: “I profess… I want to follow and serve… I believe… / trust….. I continue to turn from my rebellion.. with repentance… I believe… I accept… I promise… I join..” in short a statement of good intentions, excellent intentions; and there is repentance of rebellion. All of that is nice enough. But again, where is the typical Reformation emphasis? Any semi-Pelagian could answer questions and make statements like these. In the questions we used in the past (which were introduced only at the start of this century) there was at least still: “do you abhor yourself and humble yourself before God because of your sins and do you seek your life not in yourself but only in Jesus Christ your Saviour?”
Throughout the history of Christianity the spiritual life of mature believers has been characterised by a deep and humble recognition not only of their creaturely insignificance but especially of their total original lostness in sin and of their abiding helplessness and unworthiness before God. The OT Psalms are full of it and so is the Book of Job. The Lord Jesus gave expression to it in his parables and miracles. He surrounded himself not with the nice people of his day but with the morally and spiritually down-and-out. In Jesus’ days the Pharisees were the praise-the-Lord party. Their hallelujahs resounded through the temple. They rejoiced no end about being Abraham’s children. Jerusalem, the golden! The temple, the temple is here! Hosanna in the highest! But it was the publican who went down to his house justified. Jesus said. Only “de profundis” is there hope”. Out of the depths I cry, o Lord, to Thee.”
Have we become a consumers’ church in which grace is readily available over the counter in neat little packages?
Have we become a consumers’ church in which grace is readily available over the counter in neat little packages?
In short, and putting it in historical terms: surrounded by a Christian world of spirituality on-the-cheap, could we not have a little more Augustinianism, even Jansenism, in Reformed worship?
In Eastern Orthodoxy the hallelujah of the “Christ has risen indeed” is properly counter-balanced by the humbling “Jesus Prayer”, “Lord Jesus, Son of God, have mercy on us, Sinners”. Kyrie Eleison.
Bill Deenick
*Songs referred to:
3 – Be Still And Know That I Am God
7 – Surely Goodness And Mercy
20 – Therefore The Redeemed
43 – Thy Loving Kindness
55 – Because He Lives (verses 1 and 3)
also 10 – They That Wait Upon The Lord
(Bill Deenick is a Retired Minister since 1983. He has served Reformed Churches in New Zealand, N,S.W., Vic. and S.A. For many years he has been Editor of Trowel and Sword and is still a regular contributor).
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