Vision

10 doctrines in 10 hours... all in one fun filled weekend called the Torrey Theology Conference. Not the best way to spend your Saturday, in my opinion. But then again, I think God has a sense of humor. He takes those things I don't want to do, rubs my attitude in my face and says, "here callie, learn something." So I walked in with a yawn and slumped down in a chair. The first speaker walked up and put a hymn up on the screen, asked us to stand and we started singing. I went through all the verses in a sort of daze and sat down. A hush fell over the room and we all waited expectantly for the first boring theology lecture. "Why do we sing that?" he asked quietly. As people started answering with things about focus and worship, I started to think about it. Why did I sing that hymn? What did the words really mean? I mean, the song is ancient and oddly phrased, how can I get anything from it? The answer to that didn't come and I became oddly discomforted. I started to listen to what the speaker was saying. He was talking about our need to have theology in the church. Throughout the years, theology has become something only for pastors-to-be, or wanna-be-doctorate students. I went back to thinking about the hymn. It was written hundreds of years ago, sometime in the 3rd century. It was penned in a time when all the doctrines of the church were still up in the air. The church fathers were still having counsels trying to solidify exactly what they believed. Ideas about Christ as both man and God and the concepts of the Trinity were absolutely fascinating to them. They spent their entire lives searching the scriptures for insights into the being of God. When most of these hymns were written, they were written full of rich theology. In an age where the newcoming "emergent church" says all that matters is if you "love Jesus", we have come far from knowing how to do just that. Without knowing who He is, or learning His heart, how can we love Him? And God is a consistent God, He is the same now as he was when the church fathers were writing down our concrete church doctrines. I just don't delve deep enough into knowing Him. . . I know I definitely don't take the time to pick apart the Bible and its ideas like they did. I tend to leave that for the pastors. But, I realized while sitting in that conference that though you can obviously know God and draw close to Him without going all theological, it plays a bigger role than I used to think. Maybe hymns aren't so bad either.
So from now on I plan to take a look at some of the hymns I sing. They say a lot more than you'd think, if you look past the old language and the plodding tunes. Theology conferences, or any other study of God and His doctrines, isn't that bad either I've discovered. I learned a ton that weekend. It's more complex than it was in sunday school, but that's the beauty of the Bible! It's simple enough for children, yet it never becomes unnecessary or completely figured out.

Oh and the hymn that caused this long train of thought was "Be Thou My Vision":

"Be Thou my vision Oh Lord of My heart. Naught be all else to me save that Thou art. Thou my best thought, by day or by night. Waking or sleeping Thy presence my light. Be Thou my Wisdom and Thou my true Word. I ever with Thee and thou with me Lord. Thou my great Father and I thy true son. Thou in me dwelling and I with Thee one. Be Thou my battle-shield, sword for my fight, be Thou my dignity, Thou my delight. Thou my soul's shelter, Thou my high tower. Raise Thou me heavenward, O Power of my power. Riches I heed not, nor man's empty praise, Thou mine inheritance, now and always: Thou and Thou only, first in my heart, High King of heaven, my treasure Thou art. High King of heaven, my victory won, may I reach heaven's joys, O bright heavens Son! Heart of my own heart, whatever befall, still be my vision, O ruler of all."