just some cool random pics from youth group last wednesday…
we played the “wish i were an artist game” which involves trying to draw each other…here are the worst drawings of the evening:
and here are the best…
Sunday’s Challenge
on sunday i challenged the children of the congregation to come up with the seven sayings of Jesus from the cross. i preached on “Father, forgive them…” the challenge is to search the four gospels and find the other six – you can e-mail them or write them down and bring them on sunday. the one rule is that you can’t use any other tools except for the Bible. there will be cool prizes for those who succeed.
New URC Songbook
Over the next little while I am going to be posting some questions and answers from our federation’s Psalter Hymnal Revision Committee. I found these to be very helpful and hope you do as well. Our congregation has formed a choir which will be teaching some of the proposed new hymns to our congregation during our evening hymn sings.
I will be adding some of my own thoughts; feel free to discuss in the comments…
1. It seems that that Hymn Proposal (hereafter, HP) is inconsistent in how it deals with archaic language (for example, “thee” and “thou” changed to “you” and “your”). In some traditional hymns the older language is retained but not in others. Why is that?
The Committee’s general policy in dealing with archaic language is to replace as much of it as we can with ordinary, contemporary English. This is in line with Guideline #5, namely, to sing God’s praises using “intelligible” words. We think that using understood, modern language is especially important for our children and young people in our churches. It also helps those who are new to the Christian faith.
However, sometimes older, archaic words are so rooted in a hymn that to change those words would be to lose something of the richness of that hymn. For example, “Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah” would sound very strange if we were to sing, “Guide me, O Great Lord God.” In that hymn (HP #176), and a several others like it, we are recommend retaining the traditional text. The Trinity Hymnal used a similar way of proceeding as well as the newer (grey-covered) Psalter Hymnal.
In other cases, some lines in some hymns end with a “thee” or “thou” or another more archaic word and are necessary for the rhyming of the next line(s). To change these words would require rewriting an entire line. In those instances we recommend retaining the traditional wording. Some examples are “My Jesus I Love Thee” (HP #207), “Ah, Dearest Jesus, How Hast Thou Offended” (HP #131), etc.
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An example of a hymn where archaic language has been replaced would be #82, “And Can It Be?”, a song I am certainly glad to see in this book – “Amazing love! How can it be, that You, my Lord, should die for me?”
I tend to be pretty neutral when it comes to using thees and thous in hymns, but I am very much in favor of changing language that is no longer easily understandable for today’s people. One of my favorites alterations is in #197 (Fill Thou My Life), where the line, “In intercourse at hearth and board with my beloved ones,” is changed to “in fellowship enjoyed at home with my beloved ones.”
Youth Group Night – Wednesday!
“God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.”
Look forward to seeing you tomorrow night at 7:30 for more growth in our walk with Christ! We will also be hearing about our exciting Games Night coming up with the other URCs in the area on April 15. Don’t forget your folders, and use tonight to finish up the devotional work to prepare for our lesson.
Evangelism Class Begins Tomorrow!
tomorrow (saturday) at 10:00 am our church will hold its first evangelism class/brunch. please bring something to share for the feast. this is for all those who feel along with us a desire to grow in our ability to promote and defend the gospel with our neighbors. it will be pretty informal and will include a time of prayer. we will be considering some material from one of our own urc pastors, paul murphy. hope to see you there!
Thursday Bible Study
Join us this Thursday evening at 7:30 at the church for our biweekly Bible study. We search God’s Word so that we will know Him better and hopefully serve Him with greater zeal. There is always a lot of good food there as well and that is a good thing. Hope to see you there!
Youth Retreat
We are getting very excited about hosting our first Youth Retreat here at the Burlington URC. Keep checking here for more details as we get closer to the big weekend (May 20-21). We have invited the URC churches from Washington, Oregon and BC, as well as a number of other Reformed churches in the area. We want to help develop some good relationships between our youth and our churches and believe retreats like this can be a big part of that.
Below you can see some pictures of The Firs, where the retreat will be held!
Update: The price will be $66, which will cover everything. We will be announcing a topic and the speaker (s) soon!
Youth Group
Burlington URC Youth Group – don’t miss our lesson tomorrow evening, beginning at 7:30. Where else can you get a great Bible study, great friends, games AND food all in the same place? Lookin’ forward to seeing you there!
Spring Ahead!
Unless you want to stay on Hawaiian or Arizonan (mostly) time, you need to get up at 2:00 a.m. and put your clocks ahead one hour. This means we are all going to lose an hour of sleep tonight. To keep from falling asleep during the morning service, you need to either go to sleep an hour earlier, drink lots of coffee, or bring a double ration of King or Wilhemina peppermints (plus some for me).
