Spring Arbor University Crusader

Issue date: 4/3/08 Section: Faith

ANd now I will show you the most excellent way.

Is anybody else overwhelmed, tired, stressed and brain-dead? Hey, but we aren't dead! We are very much alive. I recently modified an old Charles Wesley hymn into a modern worship song:
Verse 1: "Young men and maidens, raise. Your tuneful voices high; Old men and children, praise. The Lord of earth and sky; The universal King. Let all the world proclaim; Let every creature sing. His attributes and Name!" Chorus: "Him Three in One and One in Three, Extol to all eternity. (2x)" Verse 2: "In His great Name alone
all excellencies meet. Who sits upon the throne, And shall forever sit; Glory to God belongs; Glory to God be given, Above the noblest songs. Of all in earth or heaven!" Bridge: "I want to lift your Holiness, Above Worldly things. Your Honor and Glory, My greatest concern."

Everything but the bridge was written 200 years or so ago by Charles Wesley. I randomly picked this song as my first adaptation of a Wesley hymn. Its title, Young Men and Maidens, Raise, refers to Psalms 148:12-13. The reason I added the bridge was because I wanted to know what "Extol to all eternity," meant. This line in the chorus seemed ambiguous to me and lacked depth. When I looked up the word extol this is what I found: to praise highly, to lift up, to raise, to bear, carry, to endure, glorify, or honor, To place on high, to elevate. An image of literally lifting up God's holiness above my head appeared. A picture of physically elevating God's standards up with my hands hit me. I began to imagine enduring the weight of an 80's styled boom box above my shoulders as it blared out, "God's honor and glory is my foremost and greatest concern!" What are you lifting above your heads for the entire world to see and hear?

To live these things is The Arbor Way, for this is excellent.

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