We would love to see you if you’re in the area! Here’s our tentative schedule:
Lord willing I’ll give a report on the ministry in Mexico, and share from God’s Word. Hope you can join us!
My grandfather was an organist, and even composed a hymn tune himself (called “Garside” after his church). Our Christmas carol got its most famous tune from another organist, published 42 years after the words were written.
The man was Henry Thomas Smart, an organist from London. Not only an organist, Smart was a recognized expert on organs, designing several organs himself. (Incidentally, you can see one of the organs he designed in the Leeds Town Hall. It’s currently being restored, and you can even “adopt a pipe” if you want to help!) He was also a well-known composer, and like Thomas Cotterill he promoted the use of both Psalms and hymns by editing hymnals himself.
In 1864, at the age of 52, he went completely blind. But he continued his work, and it was three years later that he composed “Regent Square”, the best-known tune for Angels from the Realms of Glory.
Perhaps it’s appropriate that a blind man wrote the tune for a song that looks back to history and then forward in faith. The next verse of the carol puts it this way:
Though an infant now we view Him,
He shall fill His Father’s throne,
Gather all the nations to Him;
Every knee shall then bow down:
Come and worship, come and worship,
Worship Christ, the newborn king.
Looking back at the wonderful miracle of the incarnation of Christ, we must always keep in mind the future – as King of all people, He will one day be truly worshipped by all. Not only that, He will “gather all nations to Him”. Not only will some from all nations become believers, someday all nations will be directly under His rule, instead of the rebellion we see now (Psalm 2:1-3).
This should be a great comfort to us, as it was to those “coming out of the great tribulation” in Revelation 7:
…the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.
Revelation 7:17
Philippians echoes the promise of God from Isaiah 45:22-24, proclaiming that Jesus Himself is Yahweh, to whom all will bow…
Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Philippians 2:9-11
“Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth!” says Yahweh in Isaiah. “Come and worship!” repeats our Christmas carol. Join those from every tribe and language and people and nation who will recognize the One born in Bethlehem as the One who is worthy of all honour and praise (Revelation 5:9).
Check out organist Craig Williams playing this rendition of Angels from the Realms of Glory on a pipe organ in New York.
To all our friends in Southern Ontario! If you would like to come and see us and hear about what’s been happening in Mexico, come this Sunday to Garside Bible Church in Hamilton. 🙂
The service is at 10:30am, and Lord willing I’ll be preaching and sharing a few pics. Shari and Nathanael will be with me, to answer all your burning questions after the service. 😀
See you there!
Just stopping in to remind you that we’ll be at Garside Bible Church in Hamilton tomorrow for the morning service. We’ll share a little about what’s been happening in Mexico, and I’ll be preaching.
For more information about this and other upcoming events in Ontario, see this page. Hope to see you there! 🙂
On Sunday I flew to Guadalajara to join a team for a couple of days. It was a joint team from two churches in Hamilton – Primera Iglesia Bautista Hispana and Garside Bible Church.
The team was involved (actually, as I write, they’re still involved – they leave tomorrow) in an outreach in the north of the city. It’s a poorer area where some people from a local Baptist church have been serving for quite some time in hopes that a church can be planted there.
So it was a great opportunity, and the team was doing a great job. They presented the Gospel clearly, they had lots of fun with the kids, they worked hard, and they were very organized (even when unexpected things happened, which they always do!). I’m guessing on the first couple of days there were 80-90 children.
On the first day, the police stopped by in the middle of the club. Were they going to shut us down? Were we missing some permit or doing something they didn’t like?
No, actually they came to congratulate us for what we were doing to help the kids in this neighbourhood!
It’s exciting to think that this team is a part of a work that may lead to a new church plant – which will be a witness in that community for many years to come – maybe until the Lord returns!
I made up the video below to give you a bit of a picture of what they were doing. It also shows the faithful Mexicans who are working here each week. Here it is…
It’s been a great few days. We’ve enjoyed times with friends, both here and in Cuernavaca. We got Tiffany settled in language school. We had a good service on Sunday, and Shari led Sunday School (a large class this week!). All right, my keyboard playing left a lot to be desired, but some weekends are just like that.
Now we’re tying up a few loose ends… and then until next Monday we’ll be taking a little holiday (that’s a vacation, for you in the USA).
Sometimes it seems like the preparation and build-up of work makes the holiday not-so-worthwhile. Kinda like what I call our most-expensive-holiday-that-never-was in April. But we won’t go there.
So we’re hoping and praying that this time we’ll actually have a real rest. For a large chunk of the time we’re going out of cell phone and internet contact. We’ll spend some time as a family, and visit some friends.
Then lots to look forward to when we get back. I’ll be preaching the following Sunday, then Lord willing heading to Guadalajara to visit some people from Garside Bible Church. Then we’re looking forward to a visitor here… Shari will be teaching again, the baking class will continue, women’s Bible study… the Chronological Bible Study will be wrapping up…. doctor’s visits…. the van needs some work… yeah, we won’t be bored. And school starts on August 23rd!
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By the way, I was able to get a few photos up over the weekend, so feel free to check those out. For some reason I had some trouble getting them uploaded, so some I hoped to have up are missing. Perhaps it’s our … special internet connection. 🙂
To the right here is a shot of a river in the Tuxpan, Veracruz – right next to a shop where we picked up some seafood. Yum. The boat came in while we were inside – can you say fresh?
See you when we get back.