Thundering Scot in rainy St Andrews rainy visit

Ian Hamilton, Minister, Cambridge Presbyterian Church, Cambridge, England

"I am delighted to recommend Douglas Bond's latest book, "The Mighty Weakness of John Knox". Douglas Bond has written many, mainly children's, books on sixteenth and seventeenth century Scottish church history. He writes with the passion of a man who believes that the church today needs, for its spiritual good and sanity, to learn about the church of yesterday. In choosing to write a book on John Knox, Doug Bond has done the church today a great service. Knox was the towering figure of the Scottish Reformation. In many ways he was a reluctant hero, conscious as he was of his own weaknesses. However, as the title of the book makes plain, Knox's sense of weakness was overwhelmed by his sense of God's greatness. Indeed, as Doug Bond shows us throughout his book, it was Knox's constant sense of his own weakness that enabled the Lord to use him so mightily in his service. When Knox was asked to account for the wonderful success of the Scottish Reformation, he replied, "God gave his Holy Spirit in great abundance to simple men". Read this book. Learn from this book. Thank God for men like John Knox. Above all, pray that God would raise up like-minded and like-hearted men in our own day, and once again give his Holy Spirit in great abundance to men who are deeply conscious of their own weakness".

 (Ian's off-the-record response to RT endorsement request: "I will be delighted to do this, on two counts: First, Doug Bond is a good friend of many years. Second, John Knox has been a good friend for many more years!")

 

Dr. David P Murray, Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary

"Though I love John Knox, I rarely enjoy reading about John Knox. Most biographers leave me feeling like a pathetic worm beside this mighty lion of Scotland. But, to my great surprise, this book lifted my spirits and even inspired me! Why? Because Douglas Bond has captured and communicated the secret of John Knox's power - a genuinely felt and openly confessed weakness that depended daily and completely on the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ. Mighty weakness! What an encouraging message for all worms who want to be lions!"

CHS staff and Shakespearean actor...

Eva Battle our CHS art teacher extraordinaire fending off an attentive actor in Stratford upon Avon. Note the lute and cat-gut strings he is about to pluck

More CHS in Normandy

There was a good deal of serious snoozing going on today as we traveled from Mont Saint Michel to Omaha Beach then to Pointe du Hoc and finally the charming medieval town of Bayeux with it's 11th century cathedral.

Les Miserables hit me like never before

I think I've seen Les Mis nine times, but this was the time that captured my imagination and really jolted my thinking (I'm slow and it takes time to process things). Here are notes from my devotions with the kids this morning (rough draft).


Les Miserables, London, 2012

How many of you cried? When and why?

Victor Hugo buried in Parthenon in Paris. 19th century rationalist who nevertheless felt compelled to draw heavily from biblical imagery creating a Christ figure of Jean Valjean. (cross in mullions of the window as Jean Valjean intercedes for Fantine, he seeks Cosette as she goes to draw water from the well, as with Abraham's servant seeking a bride for Isaac, others?)

"Sweet Jesus, hear our prayer; Sweet Jesus doesn't care." play opens.

Hugo was exploring the oppression and injustice endemic in society, and he really wanted to move people to change things. Play ends with an appeal, an admonishment to the audience to "join in our crusade." "To love another person is to see the face of God."

Hugo seems to want us to conclude that war doesn't solve the problem. Law and justice as Jauvert interprets these does not solve it either. The master of the house and his fulsome wife's pilfering ways don't solve it either (note how they have developed their own self salvation project through thievery, robbing the rich. "God is dead," cries the master of the house as he robs and steals for his own advantage).

Jean Valjean seems to have discovered e way to salvation, for Hugo: personal sacrifice, kindness and love, forgiveness.

But what is missing here? There are hints of the gospel in this redemptive tale, but only partial: when the bishop protects Jean Valjean, and what's more gives him still more silver, admonishing him to start his life anew on the principle of love and forgiveness.

Remember the problems with employing Christ figures in literature? Dickens and Tale of Two Cities....

Conversely Hugo gives us an antagonist extraordinaire in Jauvert.

"Honest work for just reward; That's the way to please the Lord," says Victor Hugo's rigid legalistic chief of police Jauvert to the unfortunate Fantine in the London adaptation of Victor Hugo's Les Miserables, longest running musical in the world. Jean Valjean is "a slave of the law" who is unable to "escape the whirlwind of his sin," and Jauvert is relentless in hunting down the ex convict Jean Valjean "until he learns the meaning of the law." Hugo was no theologian, but he makes Herculean efforts to portray unmerited grace when he has the kindly bishop clear Valjean the desperate and embittered thief and presses him to take the silver candlesticks along with the silver cups he stole. Filled with biblical imagery throughout, yet even this falls far short of the magnitude of the grace of God in the gospel.

2 Corinthians 8:9 you know the grace of our Lord Jesus...
We will stand at Watts' grave in a little bit and sing his "when I survey the wondrous cross... Love so amazing so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all."

Beware redemptive tales that turn us to ourselves and not to Jesus, that sacrifice Christ and the gospel on the altar of social justice metaphor. Weep, yes, "but drops of grief can never repay the debt of love I owe..."

Westminster Abbey in London sunshine!

For a first night's sleep in a YHA bunk, not bad, really not bad at all. Full English breakfast, minus the deep-fat-fried toast and the organ-meat sausages (they always hit the gag reflex for me), and we were ready for the day. Westminster Abbey is a marvel in so many ways, architecturally and historically, of course, and such a panoply of evidence of the marvel of God's gifts given to his creatures, undeserved and often misused, and never used with anything like the gratitude we ought to have to God for them. Poets' Corner alone places the young person in the vicinity of the dusty remains of some of the greatest literary minds in the language.

Working on the technology side, so forgive the post sans photo...

London day one CHS

We landed in London after a rather bumpy flight in beautiful blue skies and sunshine, which lasted for... A while, then some mixed snow and rain, thunder and lightening while we talked with the students at St. Paul's about the earthquake synod in the 1300s intended to try and convict John Wycliffe. Then off with my group to Windsor Castle (though we did not connect with Hannah and Elsie until later).

The opening two days in London are so important for setting the stage for the rest of the tour. We encounter so many who suffered for Christ and the gospel at the Tower of London and Westminister Abbey and other places. Resting at Holland House (1622) YHA and sleep sounds really inviting.

Laura Cassis says of her first day in London, "I'd rather have a mini chapel attached to my bedroom like Henry III." The priority of worship impressed Laura.

Donny thought it was ironic that Henry VIII received a weapon from a French man. Ryan Gross was impressed with the Norman chapel at the Tower, jarring to be in a place where there has been so much torture and suffering and then see this wonderful gem of architecture where first Arthur Tudor then Henry VIII married Catherine of Aragon.

The final CHS "group" shots in London

Mark suggested that I park myself down in front of a place we know must have wi-fi even if it's closed. These kids and technology! We're sitting in the Picadilly Circus area, killing time before heading back to Heathrow for our night's bivouac, and "Presto!" I'm on-line and can make a final post on the most extraordinary CHS UK tour ever.Here's what we've been doing today.


Well it stopped raining and actually got very comfortable, patchy sun, warm-ish temperatures. Mark Anderson and David Banz and I have been having an enjoyable time today. We went to St. Paul's for morning worship, singing Psalm 23 from the Scottish Psalter (and others), but one is forced to wonder: there's a stupendously grandiose visible church; how many of the remnant of the invisible church are here?

David and Mark, making room for their classmates in the group shot in front of St. Paul's before Sunday service (I'm reminded again of just how unfinished the English Reformation was, still a good deal of tom-foolery going on).

Found the site where John Wesley heard the gospel and was "strangely warmed." Near Museum of London where we spent some time before heading off to the British Museum for a while.

And then we attended an organ concert at Westminster Abbey (my wife would not have liked it very much). and discovered I was sitting right next (nearly under) a pulpit that Thomas Cranmer preached from.

Cranmer's pulpit in Westminster Abbey

When we were in London half a lifetime ago, so it sort of seems, spring had not yet sprung, but it certainly has now, as seen in St. James Park, London

Today was the London marathon (and some fun runners too--and lots of London party animals).

Blogging this on the street in London

CHS featured in the The News Tribune

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2010/04/22/1158301/volcanic-cloud-strands-covenant.html?storylink=fb

My perilous cycle ride through Cambridge with the Haylett family

Near disaster! I'm staying with Andrew and Annabelle Haylett and their lovely family, Matthew, Kathryn, Jonathan, and Joanna (who gave up her bed for me). They invited me to an early morning ride through Cambridge on their way to school (and work for Andrew). I decided to try videoing while riding and unfamiliar bicycle, on cobblestones, on the wrong side of the road, through spectacular medieval views of chapels, cloisters, and colleges.