Sunday.....Christianity.....Valley Of Vision.....redux

H. L. Mencken was an influential essayist in America in the first half of the 20th century. One of his famous quotes was a definition of Puritanism as The haunting fear that someone, somewhere may be happy. This is a grossly inaccurate caricature of a religious mindset but an opinion totally expected from a critic in that age. The Puritans loved life and the fruit, joy, blessings and challenges of it. They might be seen at one moment laughing over beer and the next in serious contemplation of the glory of God. It is this concept that I have clung to since first reading about them. Jonathon Edwards, who died in 1758, may have been the last American Puritan. English preacher Charles Haddon Spurgeon, who died in 1892, was called the last Puritan but modern day English preacher David Martyn Lloyd-Jones was also portrayed that way. We have experienced a grand separation of Christian traits in today's evangelicalism. We can be worldly and we can be pious but we cannot be both and either way we have to be victorious, but the solemnity of their own failures was part and parcel of the Puritan life and that introspection is what is needed most today. The pietistic element in Christianity today (liberal churches) can only mollify the secular element in society if it promises to only challenge fellow Christians and not them in being pious. The worldly element of evangelicalism (politically conservative churches) can never mollify the liberal/secular element of society and that element then perceives that Christians challenge only the secular world and not themselves which makes matters worse.  If some desire to, let them glory in their own strength but the Puritan mind gloried in the strength of Christ that overcomes our weaknesses. Please consider the following prayer and if you feel led, bring this topic up for conversation during fellowship with other believers. The book, often mentioned in this blog, that the following Puritan prayer comes from is its initial offering, and source of its title, is Valley Of Vision edited by Arthur Bennett and available through any book seller. Leland Ryken's Worldy Saints and J. I. Packer's A Quest For Godliness would be good reads on this subject.

Lord, High And Holy, Meek And Lowly,
Thou has brought me to the valley of vision,
where I live in the depths but see thee
in the heights;
hemmed in by mountains of sin I behold
thy glory.
Let me learn by paradox
that the way down is the way up,
that to be low is to be high,
that the broken heart is the healed heart,
that the contrite spirit is the rejoicing spirit,
that the repenting soul is the victorious soul,
that to have nothing is to have all,
that to bear the cross is to wear the crown,
that to give is to receive,
that the valley is the place of vision.
Lord, in the daytime stars can be seen from
deepest wells,
and the deeper the wells the brighter
thy stars shine;
Let me find thy light in my darkness,
thy life in my death,
thy joy in my sorrow,
thy grace in my sin,
thy riches in my poverty
thy glory in my valley.