Here are some Quotations from Russian writer Alexander
Solzhenitsyn, who has died at the age of 89 near Moscow and some of my
sentiments these days….

 

         

Please note: this is the final passage of the book

Shukhov
felt pleased with life as he went to sleep. A lot of good things had
happened that day. He hadn’t been thrown in the hole. The gang hadn’t
been dragged off to Sotsgorodok [settlement]. He’d swiped the extra
gruel at dinnertime. The foreman had got a good rate for the job. He’d
enjoyed working on the wall. He hadn’t been caught with the blade at
the searchpoint. He’d earned a bit from Tsezar that evening. And he’d
bought his tobacco.

The end of an unclouded day. Almost a happy one.

Just one of the three thousand six hundred and fifty-three days of his sentence, from bell to bell.

The extra three were for leap years.

I
was feeling down in these past few days but compared to what this guy
had experience I am really better off. A text message from a friend
reminded me:  We fail to be happy because we are not satisfied with
what we have. ..appreciate what you have and be thankful for whatever
things people give you…  But I think there’s a deeper ache and
longing in my soul that only heaven can truly satisfy.

 

         

People
in the West have acquired considerable skill in using, interpreting and
manipulating law, even though laws tend to be too complicated for an
average person to understand without the help of an expert…

It is time, in the West, to defend not so much human rights as human obligations.

Destructive
and irresponsible freedom has been granted boundless space. Society
appears to have little defence against the abyss of human decadence,
such as, for example, misuse of liberty for moral violence against
young people, motion pictures full of pornography, crime and horror.

It
is considered to be part of freedom and theoretically counter-balanced
by the young people’s right not to look or not to accept. Life
organised legalistically has thus shown its inability to defend itself
against the corrosion of evil.

extract from his speech at Harvard University, 1978

One
of the reason I feel down these days is the continuing corruption in
the government and the unending suffering of millions of my
countrymen.  I long for a better Philippines.  Years before I decided
not to leave the country because I want to see our country rise up from
degradation to a bright future.  Now.  I am one with the Psalmist
praying …How long Lord…will you forget me forever?..How long will
my enemy triumph over me?

 

         

I
can’t say that I wrote my books in order to open the eyes of the West
to what had been going on in the East. Above all, I wrote all my books
for the benefit of my own people, for the Russians, because [we]
ourselves don’t know our own history.

It’s not just the West
that doesn’t know our history; we ourselves have lost it. Recent
events, both pre- and post-Revolutionary, have been wiped out. The
documents have been burnt, the witnesses killed. So I have been working
to reconstruct the truth, all the truth about my own country, and this
is what I have done primarily for our own people’s benefit.

speaking to the BBC in 1974

There
is truth in the saying that the pen is mightier than the sword.  i urge
all the Filipino writers out there to continue writing.  To keep
reminding our people about who we really are.  We are a people who have
a very short memory we do not learn from our past so we are as they say
bound to repeat the same mistakes our forefathers have made.

A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich was the single book which showed me the power of literature to change the world.

      

 

         

I
never doubted that communism was doomed to collapse, but I was always
afraid of how Russia would emerge from that communism and at what
price. I know I am coming back to a worn-out, discouraged,
shell-shocked, Russia which has changed beyond recognition and is
wandering about in search of itself.

from a speech in Vladivostok on his return to Russia from exile in 1994

 

         

The main achievement is that Russia has revived its influence in the world.

But morally we are too far from what is needed. This cannot be achieved by the state, through parliamentarianism…

As far as the state, the public mind and the economy is concerned, Russia is still far away from the country of which I dreamed.

his last TV interview, 2007

I
agree with him and as you read his words about Russia you cannot help
but think about the Philippines… we are still far from the country of
which every Filipino longs for….

Aug 1, 2008

‘Twas my birthday yesterday so as a present for myself I went to see this movie with Ryan after teaching at Benilde.  It provided the relaxation I needed.  Since next week’s topic on my music class will cover Music in film, I watched the movie not only minding the plot and visual effects but also for the how the music was used in the movie.  So here’s a little research I found about the following film composers:

The bulk of the score in the movie is composed by veteran composer Randy Edelman.visit  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randy_Edelman and http://www.randyedelman.com/bio/bio.htm for more info.

Some Trivia:  He wrote the theme  and scored many episodes of MacGyver a popular television series in the mid 1980s.  He also  wrote the song "You" which was later popularized by the Carpenters.  A choral acappella version  arranged by Joel Navarro is quite standard fare for most choirs here.

He wrote the themes for the movies:  Dragonheart, The Last of the Mohicans
and Gettysburg the latter was used in the closing credits of the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.  He has composed music for more than 60 movies. His music and video are  posted at youtube also.

The film score featured numerous different Chinese and Middle Eastern ethnic instruments along with classic British folklore. (I should be reviewing my notes  for I am teaching Asian Music next term. hehehe)

Composer John Debney  also provided additional re-scored material for most of the bigger action sequences, which was recorded in July 2008.

Debney is an award-winning prolific American film composer, who received an Oscar nomination for his score for Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ. He is also known for collaborating with such directors as Robert Rodríguez (Sin City, Spy Kids) and Tom Shadyac (Liar, Liar, Bruce Almighty and its sequel, Evan Almighty). He is considered one of the most sought after composers in Hollywood.

His unique ability to create memorable work across a variety of genres, as well as his reputation for being remarkably collaborative, have made him the first choice of top level producers and directors. Debney combines his classical training and a strong knowledge of contemporary sounds to easily adapt to any assignment.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Debney

Well, there you have it. 

The movie experience is made more complete by the music of these two great film composers

One of my life long dreams is to be able to conduct music which will be used for film.  Having read  about and listened to the music of these two guys surely have inspired me.

A Passion for the Supremacy of Christ–Where He Is Not Named

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Romans 9:17

 

Today
my aim is to build the message on several different Biblical texts
around the theme of missions instead of dealing with only one text.
When Tom and I talked a few months ago about missions week, what struck
us was how few people are here today who were here when the driving
convictions of our church in missions were being formulated. Probably
fewer than 10% were here in 1983 when the Battle Cry of Christian
Hedonism was sounded, and a few more in 1984 when the first Missions in
the Manse was held, a few more when "90 by 90" was conceived and
achieved, and a few more between 1985 and 1988 when the Maninka were
adopted and the goal of "2000 by 2000" was resolved in 1990. But most
of you are newer than that, and even members of long standing can use
refresher courses from time to time.

Bethlehem had a vision for
missions long before I came in 1980. Ola Hanson went out and planted
the church among the Kachin in Burma 100 years ago. In the mid ’40’s
when the BGC was forging its own missions agency, the members of
Bethlehem and pastor Sjolund were in the thick of it.

But the
period of missions I know best is the last 16 years. It would be good
to review it so that God’s mercy and the force of our convictions will
be seen. They say words are cheap, show us your check book and we will
know your values. So consider the checkbook of Bethlehem for a moment.

In
1981, the missions budget was $62,270 and was 22% of the over-all
budget. In 1996, the missions budget is seven times as
large—$439,661—and is 32% of the budget. To give this a sharper point,
keep in mind that during the same period the percentage of the budget
devoted to staff compensation has dropped from 52% to 46%. In other
words, comparatively, we are doing more in missions for less outlay at
home, and that is good.

But there is another statistic that
probably shows even more clearly the transformation of values among us.
In 1981, the average missions gift per week of each Sunday morning
attender was $2.50. Today it is $8.90. In other words, the annual
missions budget divided by the average weekly Sunday attendance divided
by 52 has increased 356% in the last 15 years. In other words, the
reality here is not so much about growth in dollars or people; the
reality is about altered values. New priorities. Many of us believe
that the end of debt in three weeks will usher in another period of
remarkable growth in missions at Bethlehem. This is the main aim of Freeing the Future.

What Drives this Vision?

So the question should be asked. What is the vision driving this amazing commitment to missions among the people at Bethlehem?

Tom
and I thought that this missions week should be an effort to get as
many of you on board with the driving convictions as possible. Part of
that was the reaffirmation last Wednesday of our adoption of the
Maninka. Part of it was the uniting of worship and missions last
Friday. And another part is this morning’s message about the
convictions that drive the missions engine of this church.

There
are at least seven convictions that have driven our commitment in
recent years. The leadership knows them and loves them. They shape all
we do. If you are a part of Bethlehem, you need to know them too. May
the Lord cause them to capture your heart, and fill you with fresh zeal
for the greatest cause in the world. There are only three kinds of
Christians when it comes to world missions: zealous goers, zealous
senders, and disobedient. May God deliver us from disobedience!

Conviction #1:
God is passionately committed to his fame. God’s ultimate goal is that
his name be known and praised by all the peoples of the earth.

In Romans 9:17, Paul says that God’s goal in redeeming Israel "that [his] name may be proclaimed in all the earth." In Isaiah 66:19, God promised that he would send messengers "to the coastlands afar off that have not heard my fame or seen my glory; and they shall declare my glory among the nations." We believe that the central command of world missions is Isaiah 12:4, "Make known his deeds among the peoples, proclaim that his name is exalted."

The apostle Paul said that his ministry as a missionary was "to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of [Christ's] name among all the nations" (Romans 1:5). The apostle John said that missionaries are those who "have set out for the sake of the name" (3 John 7). James, the Lord’s brother, described missions as God’s "visiting the nations to take out of them a people for his name"
(Acts 15:14). Jesus described missionaries as those who "leave houses
or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake" (Matthew 19:29).

Back
in the mid-eighties God drove home to many of us that a God-centered
theology must be a missionary theology. If you say that you love the
glory of God, the test of your authenticity is whether you love the
spread of that glory among all the peoples of the world. Or another way
to say it is that worship is the fuel and the goal of missions.
Missions exists because worship doesn’t. God’s passion is to be known
and honored and worshipped among all the peoples. To worship him is to
share that passion for his supremacy among the nations.

Conviction #2: God’s passion to be known and praised by all the peoples of the earth is not selfish, but loving.

God
is the one being in the universe for whom self-exaltation is the
ultimately loving act. And the reason is easy to see. The one and only
Reality in the universe that can fully and eternally satisfy the human
heart is the glory of God—the beauty of all that God is for us in
Jesus. Therefore God would not be loving unless he upholds and displays
and magnifies that glory for our everlasting enjoyment. If God were to
forsake or dishonor or disregard the infinite worth of his own glory he
would be unloving in the same way that a husband is unloving who
commits suicide.

Perhaps the best way to see that God’s passion
for his fame is an expression of his love is to notice that God’s mercy
is the pinnacle of his glory. This is what he wants to be honored for
above all else. You can see this in Romans 15:9 where Paul says that
the reason Christ came into the world was so "that the nations might glorify God for his mercy."

Do you see how conviction #1 and #2 come together in that little phrase: "glorify God for his mercy"?
God gets the glory, we get the mercy. God is praised, we are saved. God
gets the honor, we get the joy. God is glorified for his fullness, we
are satisfied with his mercy.

So to sum up convictions #1 and
#2: there are two basic problems in the universe: God is profaned and
people are perishing. Conviction #1 says that God will not suffer his
name to be dishonored indefinitely, but will act mightily to vindicate
his name and glorify himself among the nations. Conviction #2 says that
God has planned a way to do this by saving the perishing through the
death of his Son, Jesus, and making them a worshipping people who enjoy
his glory. In the sacrifice of his own son for the sake of the nations,
God reveals the pinnacle of his glory—his mercy. So the salvation of
the nations and the glorification of God happen together in missions.
They are not at odds. It is a loving thing for God to pursue his glory
like this.

Conviction #3: God’s purpose to be praised among all the nations cannot fail. It is an absolutely certain promise. It is going to happen.

When
Jesus gave the great commission in Matthew 28:19, he gave it a massive
foundation of certainty. He said, "All authority in heaven and on earth
has been given to me. Go therefore . . ." In other words, nothing can
stop him: "I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not
prevail against it" (Matthew 16:18). "This gospel of the kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world, as a testimony to all nations; and then the end will come" (Matthew 24:14).

When
I was at Wheaton last weekend I said to the students gathered for the
World Christian Fellowship that there are four reasons we can be
absolutely sure that the mission of God will triumph in the world.
First, the word of Jesus is more sure than the heavens and the earth
(Matthew 24:35). Second, the ransom has already been paid for all God’s
elect, and God did not spill the blood of his Son in vain (Revelation
5:9). Third, the glory of God is at stake and in the end he will not
share his glory with another (Isaiah 48:9-11). Fourth, God is sovereign
and can do all things and no purpose of his can be thwarted (Job 42:2).

In the September 16, 1996, issue of Christianity Today
(p. 25) Steve Saint, whose dad, Nate Saint, was martyred in Ecuador in
1956 by the Auca Indians, wrote an article about new discoveries made
about the tribal intrigue behind the slayings of Nate Saint, Jim
Elliot, Roger Youderian, Ed McCully and Pete Fleming. He wrote one of
the most amazing sentences on the sovereignty I have ever read from the
son of a slain missionary:

As [the killers]
described their recollections it occurred to me how incredibly unlikely
it was that the Palm Beach killing took place at all; it is an anomaly
that I cannot explain outside of divine intervention. (italics and bold added)

There
is only one explanation for why these five young men died. God
intervened. This is the kind of sovereignty I mean when I say no one,
absolutely no one, can frustrate the designs of God to fulfill his
missionary plans for the nations. In the darkest moments of our pain
God is hiding his explosives behind enemy lines.

Conviction #4: domestic ministries are the goal of frontier missions.

This
conviction addresses the tension that develops in a mission-driven
church between those who have a passion for ministering here to our own
desperately needy culture, and the radical advocates of taking the
gospel where they don’t even have access to the Source of any ministry
at all.

By domestic ministries I mean all the ministries that we
should do among the people in our own culture. For example, ministries
relating to evangelism, poverty, medical care, unemployment, hunger,
abortion, crisis pregnancy, runaway kids, pornography, family
disintegration, child abuse, divorce, hygiene, education at all levels,
drug abuse and alcoholism, environmental concerns, terrorism, prison
reform, moral abuses in the media and business and politics, etc., etc.

Frontier
missions, on the other hand, is the effort of the church to penetrate
an unreached people group with the gospel and establish there an
ongoing, indigenous, ministering church.

Now stop and think
about that. What this means is that frontier missions is the
exportation of the possibility and practice of domestic ministries in
the name of Jesus to unreached people groups.

Why should there
be tension between these two groups of people? The frontier people
honor the domestic people by agreeing that their work is worth
exporting. The domestic people honor the frontier people by insisting
that what they export is worth doing here.

Conviction #5: The missionary task is focused on peoples, not just individual people, and is therefore finishable.

Many
of us used to have the vague notion that missions was simply winning to
Christ as many individuals as possible in other places. But now we have
come to see that the unique task of missions, as opposed to evangelism,
is to plant the church among people groups where it doesn’t exist.

Revelation
5:9 is a picture of how Christ’s death relates to missions: "Worthy art
thou to take the scroll and to open its seals for thou wast slain and
didst ransom men for God from every tribe and tongue and people and
nation." When the church has been planted in all the people groups of
the earth, and the elect have been gathered in from all the "tribes and
tongues and nations," then the great commission will be complete.
Missions will be over. The task of missions is planting the church
among all the peoples, not necessarily winning all the people.

Conviction #6:
The need of the hour is for thousands of new Paul-type missionaries—a
fact which is sometimes obscured by the quantity of Timothy-type
missionaries.

Timothy left Lystra, his hometown (Acts 16:1),
and became a church worker (a Timothy-type missionary) in a foreign
place, Ephesus, (1 Timothy 1:3) which had its own elders (Acts 20:17)
and outreach (Acts 19:10). This is the model of a Timothy-type
missionary: going far away to do Christian work where the church is
fairly well established. It has Biblical precedent and it is a good
thing to do, if God calls you.

But that’s not what Paul was
called to do. His passion was to make God’s name known in all the
unreached peoples of the world. He said that he made it his ambition
"to preach the gospel, not where Christ has already been named" (Romans
15:20). One of the most stunning things Paul ever said is in Romans
15:19, 23: "From Jerusalem and as far round as Illyricum I have
fulfilled the gospel of Christ. . . . I no longer have any room for
work in these regions." This stunned me, when I finally saw its
implications.

No room for work between Jerusalem and northern
Greece! His work there is done in spite of all the unbelievers that
remain! He is now moving on to Spain. How could he say this? The answer
is that he was a frontier missionary, not just a cross-cultural
missionary. He was called to reach the unreached peoples, where there
is no church to evangelize its own people.

What most Christians
don’t know today is that there are probably ten times more Timothy-type
missionaries in the world than there are Paul-type missionaries. And
yet there are still thousands of people groups—especially Muslim,
Hindu, Buddhist, and tribal peoples—who have no access to a
gospel-preaching church in their own culture.

Therefore my
prayer for our church is that we put a very high priority on raising up
and sending frontier missionaries—Paul-type missionaries. Not that we
diminish the sacrifice and preciousness of the Timothy-type
missionaries, but that we realize what the utterly critical, uniquely
missionary need is in the world, namely, there are thousands of groups
with no access to the saving knowledge of Jesus. Only Paul-type
missionaries can reach them. That must be a huge priority for us.
Without the gospel everything is in vain.

Conviction #7:
God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him; and our
satisfaction in him is greatest when it expands to embrace others.

It
is amazing how those who have suffered most in the missionary cause
speak in the most lavish terms of the blessing and the joy of it all.
Start with Jesus: "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself
and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life
will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s
will save it" (Mark 8:34-35). We save our lives by giving them away in
the cause of the gospel. This is what Paul meant when he said, "This
slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of
glory beyond all comparison" (2 Corinthians 4:17). And: "I consider
that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with
the glory that is to be revealed to us" (Romans 8:18).

Samuel
Zwemer—after fifty years of missions labor (including the loss of two
young children in North Africa)—said, "The sheer joy of it all comes
back. Gladly would I do it all over again." And both Hudson Taylor and
David Livingston, after lives of extraordinary hardship and loss said,
"I never made a sacrifice."

When people who have suffered much
speak like this, their God is magnified. If God can so satisfy their
souls that even their sufferings are experienced as steps into deeper
joy with him, then he must be far more wonderful than all that the
earth has to offer. Psalm 63:3 must really be true: "The steadfast love
of the Lord is better than life."

These are our driving missions
convictions at Bethlehem. If God opens your heart, you will see that
there is no better way to live than in the wartime lifestyle that
maximizes all you are and all you have for the sake of finishing the
great commission. Because in this way God is magnified; we are
satisfied; and the nations are loved.

When it comes to world
missions, there are only three kinds of Christians: zealous goers,
zealous senders, and disobedient. Which will you be?

Appendix More Convictions Behind Our Missions Vision

1. Prayer is a wartime walkie talkie not a domestic intercom. (John 15:16)

John 15:16

"You did not choose Me, but I chose you, and appointed you, that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask of the Father in My name, He may give to you.

James 4:2-4

You do not have because you do not ask. 3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. 4 You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God?

Matthew 6:9-10

"Pray,
then, in this way: ‘Our Father who art in heaven, Hallowed be Thy name.
10 ‘Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, On earth as it is in heaven.

2 Thessalonians 3:1

Finally, brethren, pray for us that the word of the Lord may spread rapidly and be glorified, just as it did also with you;

2.
We are called to a wartime lifestyle for the sake of world
evangelization because there is a war going on with devastation and
urgency far outstripping anything in World War II. (Luke 14:33).

Mark 10:28-30

Peter
began to say to Him, "Behold, we have left everything and followed
You." 29 Jesus said, "Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left
house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or farms,
for My sake and for the gospel’s sake, 30 but that he shall receive a
hundred times as much now in the present age, houses and brothers and
sisters and mothers and children and farms, along with persecutions;
and in the age to come, eternal life.

Philippians 3:7-11

But
whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss
for the sake of Christ. 8 More than that, I count all things to be loss
in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for
whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish
in order that I may gain Christ, 9 and may be found in Him, not having
a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes
from God on the basis of faith, 10 that I may know Him, and the power
of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being
conformed to His death; 11 in order that I may attain to the
resurrection from the dead.

3. Worship is the fuel and the goal of missions. (Psalm 22:27)

Goal: the nations are coming to worship the Lord.

Psalm 86:9

All nations whom Thou hast made shall come and worship before Thee, O Lord; And they shall glorify Thy name.

Psalm 22:27

All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the LORD, And all the families of the nations will worship before Thee.

Fuel: You must be glad in God to authentically say "Be glad in God" to the nations; hence fuel.

Psalm 67:1-4

God be gracious to us and bless us, And
cause His face to shine upon us. 2 That Thy way may be known on the
earth, Thy salvation among all nations. 3 Let the peoples praise Thee,
O God; Let all the peoples praise Thee. 4 Let the nations be glad and
sing for joy; For Thou wilt judge the peoples with uprightness, And
guide the nations on the earth.

4. Suffering to
"complete what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ" (namely, a
personal presentation of his sufferings, through our sufferings, to
those for whom he died) is the way that the Great Commission will be
completed. (Colossians 1:24)

Colossians 1:24

Now
I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I do my share
on behalf of His body (which is the church) in filling up that which is
lacking in Christ’s afflictions.

Philippians 2:29-30

Therefore
receive him in the Lord with all joy, and hold men like him in high
regard; 30 because he came close to death for the work of Christ,
risking his life to complete what was deficient in your service to me.

The
gift to Paul was a gift of the church as a body. It was a sacrificial
offering of love. What was lacking, and what would have been grateful
to Paul and to the church alike, was the church’s presentation of this
offering in person. This was impossible, and Paul represents
Epaphroditus as supplying this lack by his affectionate and zealous
ministry. (Marvin Vincent, I.C.C., Epistle to the Philippians and to Philemon, p. 78)

While
I was working on the missions book in May, I had an opportunity to hear
J. Oswald Sanders speak. His message touched deeply on suffering. He is
89 years old and still travels and speaks around the world. He has
written a book a year since he turned 70! I mention that only to exult
in the utter dedication of a life poured out for the gospel without
thought of coasting in self-indulgence from sixty-five to the grave.

He
told the story of an indigenous missionary who walked barefoot from
village to village preaching the gospel in India. His hardships were
many. After a long day of many miles and much discouragement he came to
a certain village and tried to speak the gospel but was driven out of
town and rejected. So he went to the edge of the village dejected and
lay down under a tree and slept from exhaustion.

When he awoke
people were hovering over him, and the whole town was gathered around
to hear him speak. The head man of the village explained that they came
to look him over while he was sleeping. When they saw his blistered
feet they concluded that he must be a holy man, and that they had been
evil to reject him. They were sorry and wanted to hear the message that
he was willing to suffer so much to bring them.

So the evangelist filled up the afflictions of Jesus with his beautiful blistered feet.

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Declare His Glory Among the Nations

Psalms: Thinking and Feeling with God, Part 6

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In this final message in the series "Psalms: Thinking and Feeling With God," I want to strike two notes: singing and nations—music and missions—for
the glory of God. These are what stand out to me from Psalm 96. How
shall we think and feel with God about nations and about singing, and
how are they related in this psalm and in the age to come? And how are
they related to Jesus?

Here is the way I am thinking about the sequence of these messages. After the overview from Psalm 1
to establish that the Psalms are God’s word and that Psalms are songs,
and therefore they aim to shape our thinking and our feeling, we looked
at spiritual depression and how to be discouraged well (Psalm 42). Then we looked at guilt and regret and how to be brokenhearted well (Psalm 51). Then, coming out of that discouragement and regret, we rose into gratitude and praise and blessing the Lord (Psalm 103).

Then last time
we saw that we are often bitterly opposed and sometimes horribly
treated and that the heart cries out for justice and for the punishment
of our adversaries (Psalm 69). And we found relief from this rage in
the assurance that the imprecatory psalms will indeed be fulfilled, and
all wrongs will be duly punished, either on the cross of Christ for
those who repent, or in hell, for those who don’t. Vengeance is mine,
says the Lord. As for you, love your enemy. God will handle those who
sin against you. Nobody gets away with anything in the universe.

Jesus Christ has been the key and goal of all these Psalms. They are not complete without him. So it will be today.

Made for Global Purposes

So now with our anger relieved, and our sense of justice sustained,
and our hearts full of gratefulness that as far as the east is from the
west so far are our transgressions removed from us (Psalm 103:12), and
our mouths and souls full of blessing to God for all his goodness, what
could be missing? Where do the Psalms take us finally? The answer is
that God has made you for global purposes. God has made you for
something very large.

Striking the Nations Note

You may think that, when discouragement is past and guilt is relieved
and anger is assuaged and your mouth is full of blessing, the reason
for your existence has been attained. In one sense, you would be right.
There will be nothing greater than blessing the Lord with overflowing
praise and gratitude.

But there is something missing. God did not make known his ways or
reveal his glory or display his marvelous works for you alone, or for
your ethnic group alone. He did it with a view to the nations—all the
nations, not political states, but nations like the Cherokee Nation,
the Navaho Nation, the Waorani Nation. “Peoples” the Psalm calls them.
So the first note we will strike is the nations note.

For the Nations

Trace with me the focus on nations in this Psalm. The psalmist says
that God’s people should do at least three things for the nations.

1. Declare God’s Glory

First, declare to them the truth about God’s glory and works and salvation. Verses 2–3: “Sing to the Lord, bless his name; tell of his salvation from day to day. Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples!”
Tell of his salvation, declare his glory, declare his marvelous works.
Do this “among the nations.” Do this “among all the peoples.” All of
them. Leave none out. Verse 10: Sum up your declaration with the
message of the kingship of God over the nations. “Say among the nations, ‘The Lord reigns!’”

2. Summon the Nations to Join In

Second: Summon the nations to join the people of God in ascribing glory
to God and singing praise to him. Verse 7: “Ascribe to the Lord, O families of the peoples, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength!” Verse 1: “Sing to the Lord, all the earth!”
(Psalms 96:1). So, don’t just tell the earth the facts about the
greatness and the glory of God; bid them to join you in praising him.
Call for their conversion. All the nations must bow before the one true
God of Israel, whom we know now as the Father of our Lord Jesus the
Messiah.

3. Warn Them of Judgment

Third, don’t just declare his glory to them, and don’t just summon
them to join in ascribing glory to him, but warn them that the reason
they must do this is that they are depending on false gods and judgment
is coming on all the nations. Verse 5: “All the gods of the peoples are
worthless idols, but the Lord made the heavens.” Verse 10: “Yes, the
world is established; it shall never be moved; he will judge the
peoples with equity.” Verse 13: “He comes, for he comes to judge the
earth. He will judge the world in righteousness, and the peoples in his faithfulness.” (Psalms 96:13).

In other words, when he says, “Sing to the Lord, all the earth,” and, “Declare . . . his marvelous works among all the peoples,” and, “He is to be feared above all gods,” and “Tremble before him, all the earth,” and, “All the gods of the peoples are worthless idols,” he really means all.
The God of the Psalms lays claim on the allegiance of every people. All
of them—in all their unimaginable diversity of culture and religion.

Every Nation, All the Peoples

Do not, the psalm implies, leave out any nation, any people, any
family—all of them must convert to the true and living God and abandon
all their other gods. Do not let any unloving trend of multiculturalism
make you shrink back from the loving work of calling every people from
every other religion to repent and ascribe all glory to the one and
only true and living God.

Listen to this (not from Psalm 96) and see if you can guess where it is coming from:

“I will praise you among the Gentiles (nations), and sing to your name.” And again it is said, “Rejoice, O Gentiles (nations), with his people.” And again, “Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles (nations), and let all the peoples extol him.” And again Isaiah says, “The root of Jesse will come, even he who arises to rule the Gentiles (nations); in him will the Gentiles (nations) hope.” (Romans 15:9–12)

Those are quotes from the Psalms, Deuteronomy, and Isaiah piled up
by the apostle Paul to support what? The coming of Jesus as the Messiah
for all nations. Here’s the context (verses 8–9): “I tell you that
Christ became a servant to the circumcised [the Jews] to show God’s
truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises given to the patriarchs,
and in order that the Gentiles (the nations) might glorify God for his
mercy. As it is written . . .” Then come the Old Testament promises
summoning all the nations to praise God for his mercy, namely, for the
work of Jesus Christ on the cross in dying for sinners and making mercy
possible for rebel, Gentile sinners like us.

Made to Sing of Glory

How should you feel about this emphasis on all the nations, and all
the peoples in Psalm 96? And in the New Testament? God is not telling
us this for the purposes of feeling exhausted, but for the purposes of
feeling exhilarated. And I mean both missionary goers and missionary
senders—all of us who believe in the one true God, revealed most fully
in the God-man Jesus Christ.

Why do I say this? Look at verse 1. This missionary impulse to all
the nations is flowing from singing and calling for singing. “Oh sing
to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord, all the earth!” This is a
singing mission. This is the way you feel when your team has won the
Super Bowl or the World Cup or the cross-town rivalry—only a thousand
times greater. “Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous
works among all the peoples!” We are speaking of glory. We are speaking
of marvelous works, not boring works. Nor ordinary works. We have
tasted and seen that this God is greater to know than all other
greatness. “Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised” (verse 4). We
are exhilarated to know him and sing to him and call the world to sing
with us to him.

You were made for this. I mean all of you who say from the heart,
“Jesus is Lord.” When you confess Jesus as the Lord of the universe,
you sign up for significance beyond all your dreams. I mean
businessmen, homemakers, students. To belong to Jesus is to embrace
nations for which he died and which he will rule. Your heart was made
for this, and there will always be a serious or mild sickness in your
soul until you embrace this global calling.

The Largest Cause of All

Listen to J. Campbell White, the first secretary of the Layman’s
Missionary Movement in the early 1900’s. This movement was born among
businessmen who were captured by a holy ambition to get behind what God
was doing in the massive Student Volunteer Movement. Here is what the
main leader among laymen said:

Most men are not satisfied with the permanent output
of their lives. Nothing can wholly satisfy the life of Christ within
his followers except the adoption of Christ’s purpose toward the world
he came to redeem. Fame, pleasure and riches are but husks and ashes in
contrast with the boundless and abiding joy of working with God for the
fulfillment of his eternal plans. The men who are putting everything
into Christ’s undertaking are getting out of life its sweetest and most
priceless rewards. (J. Campbell White, “The Layman’s Missionary
Movement,” in Perspectives on the World Christian Movement: A Reader,  225)

How should you feel about the global purpose of Jesus Christ to be
glorified among all the nations? You should feel like this cause is the
consummation of your significance in life. Many other things are
important in life. But this is the largest cause of all. Every follower
of the Lord of Lords and King of Kings embraces this purpose and finds
the consummation of his reason for living in being a part of this great
purpose of God to be glorified among all the nations.

Stunning Shifts Among the Nations

And what is the situation among the nations today? Stunning shifts
are taking place as God gathers his elect from all the nations and
sends his church to all the nations. Europe and America are not the
center of gravity in world Christianity any longer. The center is
shifting south and east. Latin America, Africa, and Asia are
experiencing phenomenal growth and are becoming the great sending
churches. Read about this in Philip Jenkins’ books The Next Christendom and The New Faces of Christianity.

But I would plead that all of you become familiar with Joshua Project and People Groups. Here you find out who the nations,
in the biblical sense, actually are and how many there are and how
reached or unreached with the gospel they are. Joshua Project says
there are 1,569 unengaged people groups (no missionaries or church),
and 6,747 least reached groups (fewer than 2% evangelical). How I thank
God that there are people doing this difficult work of research to help
us know the task that remains before us. Go to these sites, and start
learning what the global situation is. And then dream how your life as
goer and sender might be more fully involved in declaring his glory
among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples.

How should you feel about the nations of the world? A passion for
their salvation and a thrill that God rules over them all and calls us
to be his emissaries to them all with the best news in the world, and
that he will have a people of his own from all the nations, singing to
him and ascribing glory and strength to his Son. You were made for this
kind of joy. All the other joys of the Psalms, all the other emotions
of the psalms, are taking us here: the glory of God celebrated and sung
by all the peoples of the earth.

Which brings us to our second note to strike in this message: singing.

Striking the Singing Note

Flying like a banner over all the emphasis on the nations in this psalm are verses 1 and 2, and they are all about singing. “Oh sing to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord, all the earth! Sing
to the Lord, bless his name; tell of his salvation from day to day.”
Why would you begin a psalm about the global reach of God’s kingdom and
the duty to “tell of his salvation from day to day” and to “declare his
glory among the nations”—why would you begin such a psalm with the
command to sing to the Lord a new song?

The answer is simple: You can’t summon the nations to sing if you
are not singing. And we are summoning the nations to sing. Verse 1:
“Sing to the Lord all the earth.” Verse 11 says, “Let the heavens be
glad, and let the earth rejoice.” Even nature is being summoned to be
glad. And singing is the consummation of that gladness and that
rejoicing. This psalm is calling us to spread a passion for the glory
of God in all things for the joy
all peoples. And then to summon them to ascribe this glory to God in
songs. This is the hardest and the happiest business in the world.

And you can’t summon the nations to sing if you are not singing. So
let me suggest why in this global missionary context the psalm would
stress singing new songs. Notice that these new songs are “to the Lord.” Not just about the Lord. Verse 1: “Sing to the Lord
a new song.” It’s not wrong to sing about the Lord. The Psalms do it
all the time. But when new songs are being written and composed and
sung “to the Lord,” something is happening in the church. It’s a sign
of unusual life and vibrancy. People are not just living off the
spiritual capital of previous generations, but they are dealing
vibrantly with the living God and their songs are being sung to him.
He is real. He is personal. He is known. He is precious. He is present.
Worship is more intense and more personal and more engaging.

A New Song in Our Day

That is what the psalm calls for, and that is what has been
happening during my entire adult life. Around the world there is a new
song and a new vibrancy and a new personal engagement in singing to the
Lord. And the really astonishing thing in our time is the way this
awakening of singing to the Lord with new songs has such a strong
global and missionary flavor. To my knowledge singing has never been
more at the forefront of missions as it is today.

God is doing something wonderful in the fulfillment of Psalm 96. It
is far bigger than any one church, or any one ethnic group, or any one
region of the world. The global church is singing—singing to the Lord,
singing new songs, and singing about God’s Lordship over the nations.

And I would simply say: Don’t miss what God is doing. Be a part of
it. Get the nations on your heart. Think rightly about God’s global
purposes. Feel deeply about his marvelous works. Sing with all your
heart to the Lord. And be a part of summoning the nations to join you.

The Center of Our Singing

And may the center of our singing be the same as the center of the
new song we will sing in the age to come, namely, the song of the Lamb
who was slain.

And they sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are you to
take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your
blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and
people and nation, and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our
God, and they shall reign on the earth.” (Revelation 5:9–10)

---

   

Hi guys!

How are you doing?  I would like to greet everyone Happy New Year!

Only one day to go and we bid farewell to 2006 and we face another year with hope.  I pray that we will all use the next 365 days to grow in our faith hope and love in the Lord and our fellowmen.

The past year has been full of challenges we hardly noticed how fast we breezed through the days, weeks and month; and now this year is about to end.  We have been busy with a lot of things.  I have not been able to update you much.  Sadly we’ve been busy and yet as I looked back I’ve been busy but have not accomplished much of the goals I set my mind to do this year 2006. 

I hope we will all have the time to reflect and set our priorities right this time in all areas of our lives before the small still voice in our hearts is drowned by the noise barrage that will grow louder and louder when the clock strikes 12 tomorrow to usher the new year.

Wishing you all the blessings that God has instore for you this coming year my friends!

God Bless!

Ronald

Hi guys!

Been quite awhile since i visited my site.  I hope you are all doing well.

Summer vacation is about to end. waaahhhhh My 2nd semester ended with completing all my backlogs:  2 papers long overdue completion of my first recital and finishing my 6 units in Italian whew!!!  Grabe sa wakas wala na akong incomplete except for my 2 remaining recitals and one comprehensive and exam and one more subject to take this sem which is choral writing.  I hope I will get to finish my masters this school year Lord willing! yes sa wakas!

I’ ve been busy with refocusing the vision and mission of CMMA (church music ministers association) with the help of my batchmate Bong.  Thanks again.

We have now a new yahoogroup.To those of you who wanted to take advantage of the resources of CMMA and shares the burden to minister thru music please feel free to join.  Just go to www.musicministers@yahoogroups.com Invite na rin your friends who you think will benefit from this ministry.

I just finished handling the worship leading worshop in our church Grace Bible Church which is part of our two-day leadership training.

Next week classes begins at ASCM (Asian Seminary for Christian Ministries) This is were I teach every Wednesday.  I will be there from 9AM onwards.  I will be teaching Fundamentals of Music, Conducting I and Piano class I and i will be handling individual piano lessons for piano concentration students.

Enrollment pa lang sa UP next week sobrang aga sa ASCM no? pero ok lng excited na rin ako to see my former students.

Ok eto muna ang post ko hope to hear from you and please continue to pray for me as i finish my studies and teach again this semester.

God Bless everyone!

Ronald

dont forget visit www. musicministers@yahoogroups.com

I am still in the middle of completing all the requirments for this semester.  I have 2 take home exams 2 projects and a report to pass.  hay… I hope to be done by the 19th.  Good thing wala ng pasok sa ASCM and last day na rin ng teaching ko ng piano sa Cornestone yesterday.  Please pray that I will no longer procrastinate, which I am in the habit of doing.   Ayoko ng ma-incomplete.

Anyway,  the first general rehearsal with CMMA Singers and Grace Bible Church Choir went pretty well.  Nabuhayan na ako ng loob na matutuloy ang recital ko hehehe. I went to Febias to practice with ate Jasmin and talked with Aziel to sing the Aria and she agreed to do it. 

I’ll just pause here have to work work work and do those requirements

Time flies so fast.  My first week of classes flew just like that.  Attended my classes at UP met my professors got the syllabi and got the first batches of readings and assignments. whew!  I just found myself photocopying books (yeah u read me right) for my classes at UP and for my classes at ASCM.  I also met my classes at ASCM for the first time.  I have to practice speaking in english because english is the language of instructions there.(baka maubusan ako ng ingles hehehe)  I have Koreans, Burmese and Filipino students in the vocal ensemble class.  All our a classrooms are airconditioned sarap! ;)  Three hours additional hours were added to my teaching load to accomodate 4 piano students in the morning so this week I will start teaching Wednesday from 9 - 7 PM.  The President of ASCM is very supportive of the music program the classrooms were newly renovated.

Last Sunday night the CMMA Singers (kasama po ako dun) sang at the wedding re ception at Century Park Hotel. This week Grace Bible Church ensemble is preparing the songs for Glady’s wedding.  I will also sing with Tonell.  Tonight rehearsals with CMMA will give way to a badminton match after my classes at UP.  Just arrived from Caritas to have my annual medical check up.  I will get the result tomorrow or Thursday hope everything will turn out fine.

So how was your first week of classes?

God Bless!

Ronald

I now see David and Tin2 at UP College of Music. naks! and also Ian de Felipe is also there se College of Educ and one more alumnus sa Mascom naman.  Twice na kami badminton ni Ian usually sunday night hope u can join us guys! Hope you guys adjust well to your new environment.  Kaya natin to by God’s grace!

Hi guys!

Yeah it’s this time of year that most of us are
going back to school. So I found myself enrolling
and going to my first class yesterday.

I am still a student haay!!! I have 6 units (3
subjects 2 units each) Music Ed Supervision,
World Music and Contemporary Music

I still have to complete my 2 papers for my
subjects last sem and have my first 40-minute
recital.

I will also be a teacher this term at ASCM in
Makati will be handling Music MInistry and Basic
Choral Conducting every Wednesday afternoon.

I pray that we all survive and thrive this semester. I
covet your prayers and I will also pray for your
concerns just send them to me ok?

Vacation is over and we must now apply ourselves
to work study and learn.

God be with us all!

Ronald

Hi guys!

Yeah it’s this time of year that most of us are
going back to school. So I found myself enrolling
and going to my first class yesterday.

I am still a student haay!!! I have 6 units (3
subjects 2 units each) Music Ed Supervision,
World Music and Contemporary Music

I still have to complete my 2 papers for my
subjects last sem and have my first 40-minute
recital.

I will also be a teacher this term at ASCM in
Makati will be handling Music MInistry and Basic
Choral Conducting every Wednesday afternoon.

I pray that we all survive and thrive this semester. I
covet your prayers and I will also pray for your
concerns just send them to me ok?

Vacation is over and we must now apply ourselves
to work study and learn.

God be with us all!

Ronald