Book Review – Pastor: A Memoir

I have always loved Eugene Peterson’s books.  Books such as Working the Angles, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, Five Smooth Stones, and several others have been guide books for me along the way in pastoral ministry.  His Message translation of the Bible has also been vital for me in my devotional life.  I am deeply appreciative of the voice he has shared over the decades.

But there has been one thing that I have struggled with about Peterson’s writings along the way.  I often wondered – was he ever really a pastor in a church?  For example, the “angles” of pastoral ministry he writes of in Working the Angles – Prayer, Scripture, and Spiritual Direction – are absolutely things that I would want to have as the primary angles of my ministry.  But where do budgets, personnel matters, building decisions, come into those?  One of the ongoing struggles I have had in pastoral ministry is knowing that those are the “angles” of pastoral work, but finding it difficult to keep those as the central angles of what I am doing when there are so many other things “out there” that have to “get done.”

What I appreciated most about Peterson’s newest book, Pastor: A Memoir, is the fact that this feels to be the most personal of Peterson’s books I have read.  It is all first person, stories, remembrances, etc of his calling, his avoidance of the calling initially, and then his embrace of it, along with his struggles throughout.  There were many places in the book where what he writes of speaks to exactly things that I have experienced or felt as a pastor for the last 12 years now.

This book is by no means a “how to” book, but it is, to me, more powerful and more effective than any of the “how to do pastoral work” books out there because it is his story and not just something that is a “you should do it this way.”

The middle third of the book spoke to me the most strongly as he reflected upon his connection with the congregation he was a part of founding in Baltimore.  It was encouraging to read that many things have not changed over the decades, especially the call of Christ in our lives.

This is a very important book, I think for pastors serving congregations now, for those looking to enter into this form of ministry, and for members of congregations who want to understand more of what it means to be a pastor, especially for those who may be like the one who Peterson spoke of in his book who said that pastors “pastors [are] invisible six days a week and incomprehensible the seventh.”

Several of the key quotes for me…

In reflecting upon how he was going to begin to understand his calling, he writes…

[it was] necessary to clear the ground for learning that God at work—not I—was the center of the way I was going to be living for the rest of my life. Inappropriate, anxiety-driven, fear-driven work would only interfere with and distract from what God was already doing. My “work” assignment was to pay more attention to what God does than what I do, and then to find, and guide others to find, the daily, weekly, yearly rhythms that would get this awareness into our bones. Holy Saturday for a start. And then Sabbath keeping. Staying in touch with people in despair, knowing them by name, and waiting for resurrection

As he was discussing the dissonance he felt between American culture and Christian ministry and how the two have intermingled greatly, he wrote:

We wanted to honor that more, to understand and treat our congregations not as a gathering of problems to be fixed but as souls being formed for salvation in a community of worship. Not men and women defined by what we could do for them but by what God was already doing for and in them. We wanted to develop facility in saying God and Jesus as prayer, personal prayer, not as an item of religious information.

He also writes about the proliferation of “programs” in churches:

A program defines people in terms of what they do, not who they are. The more program, the less person. Church was understood not in terms of personal relationships and a personal God but in terms of “getting things done.

The key point he raised throughout the book over and over is the one seen in that last quote…the church has to be about the people and not about the programs.  This is an area that is an ongoing struggle for me in ministry – the pressure (either internal or external or both) to have programs that attract, draw, grow, etc – and how so much energy can go into those programs that relationships seem to be secondary.  Peterson’s book provides a healthy corrective to this form of thinking and acting for ministry.  Again, a highly recommended read.

 

As Is – by Krista Finch

I feel another one of my manic reading periods coming on.

I started reading the book As Is: Unearthing Commonplace Glory =by Krista Finch tonight.  I read about the first 50 pages and had to put it down.  Not because it was troubling or difficult to read or anything of the sort, but instead I felt like I was missing something by reading so much so quickly.  The book is a collection of 1-2 page reflections grouped into sections.  I read the first two and when I came to the end of the 2nd, I felt like I had read so much that I needed to let what I had taken in thus far begin to settle in for a while.  My sense of the book to this point is that it is an exploration of the glimpses of heaven in the midst of real life, hence the title “As Is.”

As I read the first few sections, I heard about firefly chasing, children dancing before a camcorder, similarities to Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird, and grace upon grace.  While I have not finished the book (I have about 150 pages more to go), I already cannot recommend it highly enough for someone looking for a book to simply refresh the spirit and nurture the soul.

As I thought of the title, I immediately went to a piece on the Lord’s Prayer composed by Ennio Morricone from his soundtrack composition for The Mission.  One of the pieces (youtube link below) is entitled “As it is in Heaven.”

It is the perfect compliment to Ms. Finch’s beautiful and encouraging words.  Listen to the piece a few times and I am sure you will have a bit of that commonplace glory that Ms Finch writes of.

One other note about the book – Ms Finch is donating 10% of all sales to IJM – International Justice Mission – in their work to help end modern day slavery.

After You Believe: Review

There are several authors that I have struggled to connect with over the years.  Barbara Brown Taylor is one of them – until her most recent book, An Altar in the World, I had never actually finished one of her books.  Its nothing against her writing personally, but it just never seemed to connect with me.  NT Wright is another of those authors – I have tried reading several of his books in the past and ran into the same thing that I did with BBT – I just didn’t seem to connect or get drawn into the his writings.

I wish that I could say that I had a revelatory moment with Wright’s newest book, After You Believe: Why Christian Character Matters, but honestly it didn’t happen.  Technically I did finish the book, but it was not without a lot of skimming and feeling like I was going over ground that had already been covered.

Wright has an excellent point as the thesis of this book and I completely resonate with his central point.  Our character as Christians matters and matters absolutely.  He begins the book with an illustration of a conversation with a young man who basically asked Wright several years ago, “Ok, I believe in Christ, so now what?”  This young man was struggling with the “what’s next” of Christianity where he had heard so much about accepting Christ as Savior and receiving the gift of new life, but he wasn’t hearing a lot more in the church he was attending about the “what’s next.”

I 100% resonate with Wright’s central premise of the book that it definitely matters what’s next – not in a legalistic “earn your salvation” type of way, but in a life-change sort of way.  Our character matters, how we are reflecting the reality of Christ’s work in the here and now matters, and not just being sure that our names are written in heaven.  So, I resonate with Wright’s overall point, but as I have struggled with in the past, I did not resonate with the writing itself.

Wright makes many excellent points throughout the book and I do recommend the read, especially if you are asking a similar question about “what’s next”.  It may connect with you in a way that it did not wth me.  I am thankful for Wright’s book and for the point he is making because I think its a message that needs to be heard and taken in.

The manic reading cycle continues – The Gospel According to U2

Just returned home from Connecticut and attending the funeral of my dear Aunt Helen (aka known in my family as Ciocia Helen).  It was one of those bittersweet weekends – always difficult to gather with family and friends for a time such as this, but mixed with the celebration of a beautiful woman’s life and seeing family and friends who I have not seen in far too long.  I am very thankful to have been able to spend the last few days in Connecticut and blessed to share life with my dear Ciocia Helen.

As I was flying to and from Connecticut, I had some excellent time to read a few books.  I finished the last few chapters of McLaren’s book, A New Kind of Christianity on the way out and then read We Get to Carry Each Other: The Gospel According to U2 by Greg Garrett.  The book was a good, but a pretty fast and easy read.  I would best describe it as an introduction to U2′s music from a theological perspective.  For someone who is a die-hard U2 fan, familiar with their story and familiar with their music, it doesn’t bring out too many new things.  For someone, however, who might not know much about U2 beyond the stories about Bono in the media or have only heard a few songs of theirs, it is an excellent introduction.

Basically, Garrett traces three themes in their songs – Belief, Communion (or Community), and Social Justice.  He also has a brief appendix that lists 10 songs with strong Christian themes – would be useful for a small group to use at some point.  He begins each chapter with a song list to take in before the chapter is read.  Basically 7-8 songs that he will focus on in each chapter.  This is very helpful, especially for someone not familiar with their music. Along with this, he does some very basic introductions to those theological concepts.

For me, what I found most insightful was Garrett’s exploration of the band members’ faith journeys.  I have heard a great deal about U2′s Christian faith, but never much more than a general concept about it.  He goes into some of their experience in an Irish Christian community early on in their music and the impact that it made upon their faith, their view of the church, and on their music as a whole.

This is a solid exploration of U2′s music and I recommend it expecially for a small group that might be interested in a “different” sort of series.

Turning to One Another: A review

I am in one of my book manic modes.  I go in cycles of reading.  Some times I read a ton, some times I feel like it has been a year since I opened one.  Well, I am in one of those where I can’t get enough of the printed word.  I just finished a book that my dear wife gave me several months ago entitled, Turning to One Another: Simple Conversations to Restore Hope to the Future by Margaret Wheatley.  I had previously read Wheatley’s Leadership and the New Science, so I was a bit surprised by the content of this book.  It is a very different read.  It does not mean that’s a bad thing, but it is a very different book.  Wheatley’s book is a wonderful encouraging read in that it does help to get the reader thinking about how having hope in the future is a conscious act.  In the midst of stories of earthquakes, economic challenges, partisan gridlock, and so forth, it is very easy to live in fear and hopelessness.  Wheatley reminds us of the necessity of looking to the future with hopeful eyes about what is possible and what can be changed and how we have a role as a part of that hopeful future.

The book is not a “normal” book in that you simply read it cover to cover and put it away.  Instead, she provides ways for people to start a conversation about the topics at hand and encourages people to read these together and work through them together.  She begins with words about what it means to turn to one another as she focuses on the art of listening – how to listen, how to talk, how to be courageous in sharing, and how to listen with a willingness to be changed by the encounter with the other(s).

The main section of the book are the areas of conversation and she offers ten questions to consider…

• Do I feel a vocation to be fully human?
• What is my faith in the future?
• What do I believe about others?
• What am I willing to notice in my world?
• When have I experienced good listening?
• Am I willing to reclaim time to think?
• What is the relationship I want with the earth?
• What is my unique contribution to the whole?
• When have I experienced working for the common good?
• When do I experience sacred?

As I read these questions and the thoughts Wheatley offers from her own perspective, I began to think about a series of posts that I will do over the coming weeks/months on these topics.  It won’t be every week, but I am going to consider my own answers to each of these and invite you to be a part of the conversation.

Wheatley’s thesis of the book is stated simply and succinctly…”We can change the world if we just start listening to one another again.”

As I read Wheatley’s words, I am reminded of one of my core Scripture passages for my life – Jeremiah 29:11

For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.

Amen.

Thy Kingdom Connected: What the Church can Learn from Facebook, the Internet, and Other Networks

I think that the subtitle for this book does a great disservice to the content of the book itself.  I received Thy Kingdom Connected and honestly thought, great, here’s another one of those ‘how to’ type books for church leaders where the author simply walks people through what facebook is, how the internet works, how a church can set up a facebook fan page, etc.

I was so blessed to find that it was nothing like that at all.  While I did not count as I read, I cannot think of more than about 10 times in the entire book that the word Facebook was even mentioned.  I have read enough of those “how to” books that the subtitle for this book truly made me a bit wary before reading it.  However, I am very thankful that I did.  Friesen’s work is outstanding in painting a picture of the connections that are present in the world and how the church not only can work with them, but also how the church is already a part of them.

Truly the key words for me in the book were – connected, networked, and well…and.  He paints a beautiful picture of the connected world that we live in today and the effects that it has on the ways that we are already interacting with one another.  His five “clusters” (also known as sections) are:

• Seeing Connectively
• God’s Networked Kingdom
• Leading that Connects
• Networked Church
• Connective Practices

These various sections each help weave together the larger picture of a God who has always sought to work in a connective way with God’s people.  The book is not about how to use facebook or the internet to be a part of this connective reality as a church, but instead to focus on how we are connective in our respective ministries.  He very much paints a picture of how the church (both emerging and long-standing) can be connective in their practices, relationships, leadership, and worship.

A word of warning…It is not an “easy” read.  I found myself having to often re-read sections to “keep up” with what he was sharing. This is by no means a criticism, but instead a compliement about the quality of the content that Friesen was able to put together.

Through the River: Understanding your Assumptions About Truth – A brief review

I recently finished Through the River: Understanding Your Assumptions About Truth by Jon & Mindy Hurst (with Dr. Paul Hiebert).  As the authors themselves note, this is not a hard-core (my words) book about the philosophies of truth, but instead trying to serve as a gateway to help people explore some of the ideas of one particular philosopher, Dr Paul Hiebert.  I admit that I was not familiar with Dr. Hiebert’s thoughts prior to reading this book, so I cannot comment on the accuracy of the authors’ perspectives in the book.

What I appreciated about the book is that the authors are trying to bring philosophy “to the masses” while trying to not water it down too much.  I think they accomplish their goal in the book.  Through their analogy of the various communities of River Town, they do paint a very good picture of a variety of worldviews about truth.  What I think appeals about this idea is that it reflects a reality that many people are familiar with in the world today – a society strongly divided along worldview lines.  The three communities in River Town do not interact a great deal and there is suspicion from each group towards the other.  There is tension when one “crosses over” from one group to another.  Yet, while they are divided, they are tied together because they are all a part of one system.  This feels a lot like the current society we live in here in the US.  We are all a part of one system, yet there is deep suspicion of others in the other “camps.”  This is prevalent in the church, politics, and so forth.

What my hope for people reading this book is that it serves not as an end in itself, but instead as a springboard into exploring other perspectives on truth.  It whets the appetite and gives leadings to go forth in further study.

An Altar in the World review and a personal note

Well, I have finally finished my first Barbara Brown Taylor book.  I have started many of her books before, but until this one, I had never finished.  Not sure why, but it is just how it happened.  Rev. Taylor is a wonderful writer with some wonderful spiritual insights, but I had just not connected well with her writing prior to this piece.  I started this book several weeks ago as my morning devotions as each chapter focused on a new “simple discipline.”  The subtitle of the book is ” A Geography of Faith.”

It was that subtitle that initially drew me in.  When I think of geography, I think of maps, pictures, directions, and so forth.  The phrase that comes to mind is “the lay of the land.”  I know there is a great deal more to geography, but the “lay of the land” fits what I experienced in Taylor’s book.  She is painting a picture of the land of the spiritual life.  Noting some of the hills that one needs to climb, the valleys to cross, and the prairie grasslands to lay down and relax in.

She goes through 12 practices – some very challenging, some very encouraging, some both – but all of them focused on the simplicity of the discipline.  She makes it clear that many of the spiritual disciplines we are called to practice are actually things that we are doing in other ways and need a refocus.   The twelve disciplines are:

• The practice of waking up to God – Vision
• The practice of paying attention – Reverence
• The practice of wearing skin – Incarnation
• The practice of walking on the earth – Groundedness
• The practice of getting lost – Wilderness
• The practice of encountering others – Community
• The practice of living with purpose – Vocation
• The practice of saying no – Sabbath
• The practice of carrying water – Physical Labor
• The practice of feeling pain – Breakthrough
• The practice of being present to God – Prayer
• The practice of pronouncing blessings – Benediction

What Taylor does is she helps the reader find the ways that the practices of live are actually the practices of God or can be depending on how we approach them.  There is definitely intentionality required in these practices, but it is not “I have to drop these other things in order to now ‘do my spiritual discipline.’”  What it becomes is a shift in focus.  A shift from thinking that God is somewhere “out there” and that we have to find God through some series of practices that seem completely foreign to us to a realization that God is already present all around us.  I also look at this perspective as these basic disciplines being the door to further ones that are more out of the norm for our regular practice, such as fasting.  As we begin to experience the reality of Jesus in the everyday, everymoment of living, we are I think more able to move into those more unique forms of spiritual practices.   As I read the book, I found myself thinking of a similar volume by Kathleen Norris called Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith.

If you are looking for a read to help you go deeper in your journey, this is a volume that I highly recommend.  It is probably one that is also done best in groups to be able to go through the various practices and the ways they are experienced in different peoples’ lives.

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Personal Note – Asking for your prayers for me the next few weeks.  I was diagnosed with what might be a stress fracture, but is at least a pretty decent injury to some tendons on the outside of my right foot.  Its been really painful the last week or so and I finally decided to get to the doctor.  I get to wear this very attractive (sarcasm) “shoe” for the next two weeks to get it healing.  Fun fun fun.

Rising from the boxes…Reading and The Reader

Having moved twice in the last six months, I think its safe to say that I don’t want to do it again anytime soon.  But we are in our new place and it has been great to get settled into a home that will be ours for the foreseeable future.  I have said this in a few other circles, but I cannot say thank you enough to the army of people who helped out in packing up the old house, painting and preparing the new one, moved boxes, cleaned houses, helped unpack, hang pictures, do some fix-up stuff at the new place.  I would list names here, but I am sure that I would forget someone.  But thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you!

Beyond the reality of how the move has taken over our lives the last several weeks, I have been interacting with some very thought provoking pieces recently.

First, I have started reading Rob Bell’s book Jesus Wants to Save Christians: A Manifesto for the Church in Exile.  I have read Bell’s two other books – Velvet Elvis and Sex God – and found them both to have some valuable thoughts about how we understand God and our faith lives today.  Bell’s new book continues the general theme that he raised in Velvet Elvis, namely that there are some significant pieces of our faith lives today that need some redefinition (at one extreme) to radical changes (at the other).  I’m only about 75 pages in, but it has been a very interesting read as he compares the state of the church today to the history of the “places” of the Israelitees – Egypt, Sinai, Jerusalem, and Babylon.  I’ll post a more thorough review after I get through the book in the next week or so.  One note about Bell’s writing…it is not “normal.”  Basically, he writes like he preaches – very conversationally.  So, there are fragmented sentences, 2-3 word paragraphs, and so forth.  Just be aware.

The other piece was a movie Amy and I watched last night.  We downloaded The Reader from Amazon last night after the kids went to bed, not really sure what we were going to be interacting with.  Before we go further, I do want to note that if you do watch the film, the first part of the film has a very strong sexual aspect that builds up what follows in the rest of the film.  It is necessary to what takes place in the film, but as with any film that I review, I want people to be aware of what is in there before they see it.  The film is an incredible movie to watch both in the performances of the actors – Kate Winslet very much deserved her academy award specifically – and the quality of the film making itself.  The movie pulled me in from the start and did not let up until the credits began to roll.

Reflecting upon the film, I won’t go into spoilers about the movie as there are some significant plot points that I don’t want to give away in this.  I will say that I was very surprised by the direction of the film and by the way the story plays itself out.  Its not a Sixth Sense type of twist, but the moves along the way are very surprising.

The pieces I was left with was the nature of secrecy in our lives and the nature of the pain we carry.  Again, without going into spoilers, these two themes thread their way through the whole film, secrecy in our past and the way that pain holds us and dictates so much of our lives when it is held away and held in secret.  There was also some questions for me about the nature of redemption and forgiveness in our lives.  Are there “unforgivable” sins either against people individually or sins against people in general?  If so, is there any kind of hope for ANY type of forgiveness?

Moving from the film to the general question this film raises…what place, if not the community of faith, do people have where they can be truly real with one another and move beyond their secret pains by allowing them into the open where they can be shared and people can move beyond.  Further, what do we as the faith community do with sins that we might think to be “unforgiveable”?  How can we move to a place of redemption while also dealing with the realities of justice and consequences?  The movie also did raise this issue through an ongoing discussion in a law seminar of the nature of law and morality.

All in all, an amazing and deeply provokative film.

The Furious Longing of God

Tonight was book night around my house.  Finished two books…The Country Parson by George Herbert and The Furious Longing of God by Brennan Manning.  Before getting into a specific review of The Furious Longing, I do have to contrast the two books.  Herbert’s book was written in the 17th century and is a description of the aspects of the life of a country parson.  The life described is one that feels very much devoid of joy, wonder, and awe, but instead marked by discipline, rigidity, and dourness.  Herbert even goes as far as to say that the parson should not be a happy person but instead one seriously devoted to the tasks of the parish. This is in stark contrast to the picture painted by Manning in his book – a book that is centered completely on the unimaginable love of God and our deep experience of that agape love.  I wonder what Herbert would say about Manning.

Anyway, onto my review of The Furious Longing of God.  I have to confess that after getting the book, my mind kept phrasing the title as The Furious Longing FOR God instead of the actual title The Furious Longing OF God. So typical of the western Christian mindset to be thinking of the book as yet another thing I need to be thinking about in my spiritual maturation.  So, in addition to daily queit times, prayer moments, listening to Christian music, service in the world, etc, I need to add a furious longing for God.

How grace-filled to start to read and be hit by the mistake as I entered in to the initial pages that we are talking about God’s furious longing FOR US rather than our furious longing for God.  Manning covers similar ground here that he has done in his previous books such as The Ragamuffin Gospel, but it is good ground to keep going over because it is so easily forgotten in our lives.  It is so easy to get caught up each day into the “what have we done for God” race that we lose the reality of what God has already done for us.  Manning puts it this way:

…I’ve decided that if I had my life to live over again, I would not only climb more mountains, swim more rivers, and watch more sunsets; I wouldn’t only jettison my hot water bottle, raincoat, umbrella, parachute, and raft; I would not only go barefoot earlier in the spring and stay out later in the falll but I would devote not one more minute to monitoring my spiritual growth.  No, not one.  (p 65)

He has a passage that reaffirms this position near the end:

How is it then that we’ve come to imagine that Christianity consists primarily in what we do for God?  How has this come to be the good news of Jesus?  Is the kingdom that he proclaimed to be nothing more than a community of men and women who go to church on Sunday, take an annual spiritual retreat, read their Bibles every now and then, vigorously oppose abortion, don’t watch x-rated movies, never use vulgar language, smile a lot, hold doors open for people, root for their favorite team, and get along with everybody?  Is that why Jesus went through the bleak and bloody horror of Calvary?  Is that why He emerged in shattering glory from the tomb?  Is that why He poured out His Holy Spirit on the church?  To make nicer men and women with better morals?

The gospel is absurd and the life of Jesus is meaningless unless we believe that He lived, died, and rose again with but one purpose in mind: to make brand-new creations.  Not to make people with better morals, but to create a community of prophets and professional lovers, men and women who would surrender to the mystery of the fire of the Spirit that burns within, who would live in ever greater fidelity to the omnipresent Word of God, who would enter into the center of it all, the very heart and mystery of Christ, into the center of the flame that consumes, purifies, and sets everything aglow with peace, joy, boldness, and extravagant, furious love.  (pp 124-125)

This book is quite simply a brief and simple treatise on the amazing and unimaginable love of God expressed through Jesus the Christ and a statement of the freedom that we have in knowing that it is God’s love that is the deciding factor and not the works that we lift up so much. As a pastor, I have many conversations with people who struggle each day with acceptance – acceptance from other people, acceptance of themselves, and acceptance by God.  They struggle daily with whether they are worth anything, whether they measure up, whether they are loved by anyone or anything.  Manning lifts up a clear and unashamed affirmation of the worth of the wonderful and beautiful creations that we each are.

Like Manning’s other works, this is not a “scholarly” text that is deeply footnoted and cross referenced, but is filled with the stories of Manning’s journey and his encounters with other ragamuffins along the way.  It is a book that reinforces a message that so desperately needs to be heard in our journeys.

As I read, two varied “images” came into my mind.  The first was that of the storms that sweep the South Dakota prairie each year.  Even after living in SD for over nine years, I never got used to the fury and power that those storms contained.  They would sweep across the plains and had the power to radically reshape the landscape and the lives of anyone who was in the path of the furious storm.  Those were storms of a furious destructive power.  Manning speaks of a power in this book that is no less furious, but a love that is furious.  A love that, like the storms over the plains, has the power to reshape anything and anyone in its path.  But instead of lives being destroyed, this furious love brings healing, redemption, mercy, and hope.

The other “image” was a song by Jars of Clay entitled Hymn from their album, Much Afraid. It is a song that I listened to countless times on my drive back from the hospital internship while in seminary.  I listened to it time and time again to remind me of the amazing love of God that I was trying to declare to people going through some of the most difficult periods of their lives that I, myself, was struggling to experience as well through that period in my life.  I am actually listening to it right now as I type.

Hymn, by Jars of Clay

Oh refuge of my hardened heart
Oh fast pursuing lover come
As angels dance around your throne
My life by captured fare you own

Not silhouette of trodden faith
Nor death shall not my steps be guide
I’ll pirouette upon my grave
For in your path i’ll run and hide

Oh gaze of love so melt my pride
That I may in your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry
Spring worship unto thee

When beauty breaks the spell of pain
The bludgeoned heart shall burst in vain
But not when love be pointed king
And truth shall thee forever reign

Oh gaze of love so melt my pride
That I may in your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry
Spring worship unto thee

Sweet Jesus carry me away
From cold of night, and dust of day
In ragged hour or salt worn eye
Be my desire, my well sprung lye

Oh gaze of love so melt my pride
That I may in your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry
Spring worship unto thee

Oh gaze of love so melt my pride
That I may in your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry
Spring worship unto thee

Spring worship unto thee
Spring worship unto thee

I strongly recommend this book to anyone who struggles with the fact that God has accepted them and that God radically loves them.  May you hear the word of grace that God loves you with a love that is beyond anything any of us can conceive.