Jehovah's Praise

The conclusion of yesterday’s meditation stated this. With our Master, Father and Sovereign Lord, we face a various week ahead and we give heartfelt and sincerest praise and thanks, to the One who is our Counsellor, Guide, Teacher and Enabler. 

The phrase, various week, has always resonated with me, all through my life, from my early years until now. Here’s my simple testimony. From early childhood, I grew up in a household where we as children, were taken to Church by our parents. Our father was known, in those days as a Local Preacher and he could be sent to different churches in the vicinity to preach. One of the services I treasured, was the Watch Night Service, as it always seemed to carry its own beautiful mystery and excitement.  Perhaps it was because it was one of the few nights we as children got to stay up with the adults and share their excitement and anticipation of the New Year.

Watch Night or Old Year's Night was always spent in Church and one of the hymns that was traditionally sung was a hymn written by Charles Wesley, way back in 1750, according to the records. It is entitled, ‘Sing to the Great Jehovah’s Praise’.  I mean there was not a Watch Night service, where this hymn was not belted out with vim and vigour as if to say, this is the only time in the Fifty-two Sundays that we will ever sing it, so let’s sing it with all our heart, soul, mind and strength, as though it were the only way to keep it alive in us.

As children, we learnt to belt it out too and since my path led to me marrying a Minister of Religion, a preacher, for whom this hymn was precious, we sang it on every Watch Night Service. Big congregation or small, organ accompaniment or not, this particular hymn by, ‘The Sweet Singer of Methodism,’ as Charles Wesley was affectionately called, was lustily sung as the Church bell rang in the New Year at the stroke of 12: 00 a.m. Today, even though the hymn may not be a chosen one by leaders and preachers at either the Watch Night Service or the Covenant Service, in the denomination to which I belong, I still sing it privately.   

Why have I told you all of this? Simply because in a stanza of this hymn, are found these words, various year, where the word, various, stands out as large as life.

His providence has brought us through,

Another various year;

We all with vows and anthems new,

Before our God appear.

What do we confess, each time we sing these words, another various year? It means, among other things, that in:-

God’s Providence, we acknowledge that our Lord has brought us through a year that was never the same from day to day, week to week, and month to month. O how uneven and rugged was the now past year! Yet, through every single varied part, we are living testimonies to the fact that no various is able to stop our God.   

God’s Provision, we accept that our Lord has navigated us safely, skilfully and powerfully through a year of some very unchartered and rough waters. O how threatening were some of those waters of the now gone year! Yet, in spite of every various experience, we have been made living examples of the fact that no various is able to curtail God’s works.   

God’s Power, we attribute, and articulate that our Lord has led us victoriously and triumphantly through a year of constant ups and downs, troubles and tribulations as beyond our feeble powers. O how discouraging, dark and scary were some of the nights of our days! Yet, amidst them all, every various peaceful or anxious path, our Lord was right there with us, all the way, proving that no various time can make His words of promise recede.

It is in this overwhelmingly victorious and unimaginable truth of grace that we have been brought to this week, as a various week. It will be a week of multi-coloured, variegated, and unthinkably different thinking and learning, in our ever-living, ever-stimulating Lord.

We embark upon our various week, with the men of the East who came to worship the King of the Jews.