Shakespeare said, “The man that hath no music in himself...  is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils."  

I’ve never understood people who don’t care about music and I can see what Bill Shakespeare was driving at when he said that such people were better suited for “treasons, stratagems, and spoils.”  There just seems to be something criminal about the kind of person who can sit idly by in a restaurant, chewing a sandwich and carrying on a conversation with a friend all the while being totally unmoved by the Nickelback “song” that has just begun oozing out of the speakers above them.

How can they just sit there????  

How can they be so callous???? 

Why aren’t they on their feet demanding the speakers be unplugged and the radio ran over by a steamroller?    

The solution lies in understanding what these three things have in common:

*  Praise

*  Prayer

*  Proclamation

Figured it out yet?

Ok, fine!  I'll tell you...  In the Bible, music fulfills three roles within the context of worship – the three categories listed above.

The reason we have worship music at all is to engage in one of these three actions - praise, prayer, and/or proclamation.

As someone has helpfully defined these three categories:

            Praise is the lauding of God for His acts and attributes, acknowledging His supremacy in all things.

            Prayer is communication addressed to God (did you realize that the vast majority of the songs you sing in church are actually prayers?)

            Proclamation encompasses any activity that proclaims the Word of God – quotation, explanation, teaching, and preaching.

The author of these definitions concludes:

“I contend that when worship music is properly fulfilling these roles according to biblical principles, discord dissipates, unity increases, and the Spirit utilizes music for it’s highest purpose...”

And I fully agree!

Here is our solution – whatever genre of worship music we choose, let’s evaluate its usefulness and propriety based on the principles of the Bible.  Let’s ensure that our choice of worship music is not rooted in the world, in pop culture, in pragmatism, or in mistaken notions of success...  Instead let’s seek, by God’s grace, to conduct our worship music in such a way that every Christian under our care will be better enabled to fulfill their chief purpose – namely, to enjoy and glorify the triune God. 

For more information feel free to contact the church office here

Join us this Sunday, July 12th as we begin our course - Christianity Explored.  We will begin by sharing a meal together then will have our study.  What have you got to lose?  

Life
Augustine was born in 354 in Tagaste, a provincial Roman city in North Africa. He was raised and educated in Carthage. His mother Monica was a devout Christian and his father Patricius a pagan. His father converted to Christianity on his death bed, which came from the persuasion of his wife. As a youth Augustine followed the unpopular Manichaean religion, much to the horror of his mother. In Carthage, he developed a relationship with a young woman who would be his concubine for over a decade and produce a son. His education and early career was in philosophy and rhetoric, the art of persuasion and public speaking. He taught in Tagaste and Carthage, but soon aspired to compete with the best, in Rome. However, Augustine grew disappointed with the Roman schools, which he found apathetic. Manichaean friends introduced him to the prefect of the City of Rome, Symmachus, who had been asked to provide a professor of rhetoric for the imperial court at Milan.

The young provincial won the job and headed north to take up his position in late 384. At age thirty, Augustine had won the most visible academic chair in the Latin world, at a time when such posts gave ready access to political careers. However, he felt the tensions of life at an imperial court, lamenting one day as he rode in his carriage to deliver a grand speech before the emperor, that a drunken beggar he passed on the street had a less careworn existence than he.

Although Monica pressed the claims of Christianity, it is the bishop of Milan, Ambrose, who had most influence over Augustine. Ambrose was a master of rhetoric like Augustine himself, but older and more experienced. Prompted by Ambrose's sermons, Augustine moved away from Manichaeism, but instead of becoming Catholic like Ambrose, he converted to pagan Neoplatonism. Augustine's mother followed him to Milan and he allowed her to arrange a society marriage, for which he abandoned his concubine (however he had to wait two years until his fiance came of age; he promptly took up in the meantime with another woman).

In the summer of 386, in a garden, Augustine underwent a profound personal crisis and decided to convert to Christianity, abandon his career in rhetoric, quit his teaching position in Milan, give up any ideas of marriage (much to the horror of his mother), and devote himself full time to religion, celibacy and the priesthood. Ambrose baptized Augustine on Easter day in 387, and soon thereafter in 388 he returned to Africa. On his way back to Africa his mother died, as did his son soon after, leaving him relatively alone.

In 391 he was ordained a priest in Hippo Regius, (now Annaba, in Algeria). He became a famous preacher (more than 350 preserved sermons are believed to be authentic), and was noted for combating the Manichaean heresy.

In 396 he was made coadjutor bishop of Hippo (assistant with the right of succession on the death of the current bishop), and remained as bishop in Hippo until his death in 430. He left his monastery, but continued to lead a monastic life in the episcopal residence.

Augustine died on August 28, 430, during the siege of Hippo by the Vandals. He is said to have encouraged its citizens to resist the attacks, primarily on the grounds that the Vandals adhered to Arianism, which had been condemned as heretical.

Influence as a theologian and thinker
Augustine remains a central figure, both within Christianity and in the history of Western thought. As he himself was much influenced by Platonism and Neoplatonism, particularly by Plotinus, Augustine was important to the "baptism" of Greek thought and its entrance into the Christian, and subsequently the European intellectual tradition. Also important was his early and influential writing on the human will, a central topic in ethics, and one which became a focus for later philosophers such as Schopenhauer and Nietzsche. It is largely due to Augustine's arguments against the Pelagians, who did not believe in original sin, that Western Christianity has maintained the doctrine of original sin. Augustine also contended that God exists outside of time in the "eternal present" -- time existing only within the created universe.

Augustine's writings helped formulate the theory of the just war. He also advocated the use of force against the Donatists, asking "Why ... should not the Church use force in compelling her lost sons to return, if the lost sons compelled others to their destruction?" (The Correction of the Donatists, 22-24)

Thomas Aquinas took much from Augustine's theology while creating his own unique synthesis of Greek and Christian thought. Two later theologians who claimed special influence from Augustine were John Calvin and Cornelius Jansen. Calvinism developed as a part of Reformation theology, while Jansenism was a movement inside the Roman Catholic Church; some Jansenists went into schism and formed their own church.

John Calvin was an ardent student of Augustine's writings which is abundantly evident in his Institutes and the basic tenets of Calvinism. Augustine taught that man has nothing to do with his own salvation. Man has inherited the totally depraved nature of Adam and Eve after the Fall -- to the point they are spiritually incapable of availing themselves of God's grace. As a result of the depraved Adamic nature being inherited, infants are born in sin and with a sinful nature. Augustine argued that the only way any are saved is by God intervening and choosing some whom he calls his elect to be saved. This choosing is totally independent of those chosen. Those thus chosen cannot ever be lost or fall from grace. Conversely, those not sovereignly chosen before the foundation of the world to everlasting life are irrevocably doomed to hell.

Augustine was canonized by popular recognition and recognized as a Doctor of the Church in 1303 by Pope Boniface VIII. His feast day is August 28, the day on which he is thought to have died. Roman Catholics consider him the patron saint of brewers, printers, theologians, sore eyes, and a number of cities and dioceses.

"De Doctrina Christiana (On Christian Teaching) is the book Augustine wrote to train preachers. He composed three chapters on how to understand the Bible, then after thirty years of regular preaching, added a final chapter on how to communicate what has been understood." Themelios 33.1 (2008): 39. See also On Christian Doctrine at CCEL.

Augustine on the problem of evil
Scholars have carefully investigated Augustine's life due to his contributions to theodicy, the problem of evil. Throughout Augustine's youth, he had been involved in a belief called Manicheanism. This was an ancient religion from Persia that accounted for the world's entire disharmony in terms of an eternal struggle between physical light and darkness or good and evil. After several years as an adherent of the Manichaean religion, Augustine read the writings of Neoplatonists such as Plotinus, which in turn helped him move beyond the materialism of Manichaeism. Then, at the age of 32, Augustine became a Christian.

Augustine now an adamant follower of Christ sought to deal with the problem of evil. The Scriptures taught that his monotheistic God was all good and all-powerful therefore he desired to understand how and why sin and evil existed. Augustine discovered experientially and biblically that his sin problem was more than one of knowledge or wrong thinking. His affections and will also reacted against what God knew, loved, and willed. He realized that he could not, by his own thinking transform the depravity of his own nature, overcome his separation from God, or remove his verdict of guilt before God's justice. The prodigal son realized his total depravity and the need for God's grace for any hope.

Augustine consequently proposed a solution to the problem of evil in the world attributing it to the Fall of humanity after the disobedience in the Garden of Eden. From this view, Man is responsible for evil by being led astray by Satan. Accordingly, this not only absolves God of creating evil but also allows Him to show the world His love by bringing Christ into the world. (Cf. Confessions, 4:24, 5:20, 7:4)

It is always helpful to remember that gospel work is global work.  We are not alone in our little corner of the world but we have a multitude of partners - some of whom are in heaven while others are spread throughout the four corners of the world.

When later I came to learn that Peter was studying to become a pastor and that his future plans included marrying that young piano-player and planting a church in his native Inverness, I recognized that he had an unusual amount of wisdom and foresight.  Both the marriage and the church-plant seemed like good moves (though to me the latter seemed more attainable than the former.) 

As a matter of fact, I liked Peter so much that I actually had plans to bring him on staff at my church as a ministry partner while he finished up his theological training.  Though providentially this never came to pass the prospect did give me multiple occasions to get to know Peter better and to be inspired by his zeal for the gospel. 

Then time did its work.  Peter and that piano player got married (I sat in a small rural church in Northern Ireland and witnessed the nuptials with my own eyes.)  They started a new life together.  About that same time I was called to a church 3,500 miles away from Scotland and along with my wife and children left the UK.  We settled down into our new routine together...  and as often happens Peter and I more or less lost touch...  And then today I was sent a link to the website of Living Hope Church - a new church plant in Inverness, pastored by Peter Rennie.  This news has come as a great encouragement and it has reminded me once again that gospel work is global work. The same Lord who has guided us in the planting of All Souls Church in a little place called Green Camp, Ohio has guided Peter and Anne in the planting of Living Hope Church in a big place called Inverness, Scotland.  

What a great God we serve!

To Peter, Anne, and the flock of Living Hope Church; we thank God for you!  We will pray for the success of your work.  We will pray that under your ministry the saints will be perfected even as the lost will be saved.  We will pray that the hand you have laid to the plow will remain on the plow....  

And we will do all of this with the firm conviction that we, here in this corner of the world, are greatly blessed to be your partners in the gospel.