Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow; Pastor Rebecca Ellenson; March 18, 2018; ICCM
Pastors get a fair amount of feedback about the choice of hymns for worship. Not just here, in every congregation, everywhere! How many praise songs, how many contemporary songs, how many traditional hymns, how many verses, how many new songs?
It reminds me of a story. A visitor was attending a particular church for the first time. Inspired by something in the sermon she raised her hands and exclaimed, “Praise the Lord!” The regular attender seated next to her leaned over quietly and informed her, “We don’t ‘praise the lord’ here.” Overhearing the comment another long-time participant seated in the row behind them corrected, “Oh, yes we do. But we sing it in unison during after the offering—it’s called the Doxology.”
Growing up in Minnesota, the land of Lutherans, I once thought everyone knew the Doxology and it’s traditional tune, the Old 100. We sang it every Sunday, and we sang it for grace at potlucks and family gatherings, sometimes with another verse that starts, Be present at our table Lord. We sang it in natural harmony. You should hear a convention of thousands of Lutheran pastors sing it!
The word means a hymn of praise, doxa comes from the Greek word for glory or praise and logy comes from the word for word. Over the last few weeks we’ve looked at the parallelism of the poetry of this Greatest Prayer and radical transformation of the world it proposes. First, there are three petitions or sections about God followed by three petitions mirroring them about God’s people, linked by the hinge words, on earth as it is in heaven.
Today we move on to the doxology, For thine is the kingdom, and the power and the glory, forever and ever, Amen. This section brings us full circle back to the first three petitions about God’s name, kingdom, and will. Although this ending of the prayer is found in that second century handbook on how to lead Christian worship called the Didache, the doxology is not found in the original manuscripts of Matthew’s gospel nor in Luke’s gospel. In later centuries the scribes who copied the original manuscripts added the doxology to Matthew’s gospel which accounts for it’s appearance in later translations like the King James’ Version. Even though it wasn’t there in the most reliable early manuscripts of the gospels it works well. It echoes the great prayers throughout biblical tradition.
When David prayed he cried, “Thine, O Lord, is the greatness, and the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty, for all that is in the heaven and the earth is thine, thine is the kingdom, O Lord, and thou art exalted as head above all.” (1 Chron 29:11)
When Sennacherib and his army seemed to have Jerusalem at their mercy “Hezekiah prayed before the Lord, and said, O Lord God of Israel, which dwellest between the cherubims, thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth, thou hast made heaven and earth.” (2 Kings 19:15)
Paul exclaimed, “Now unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honour and glory for ever and ever Amen.” (1 Tim 1:17)
Jude climaxed his brief letter by ascribing all honor to the Lord: “To the only wise God our Savior, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen.” (Jude 25)
The Psalms are the prayer and song book of the bible. They are divided into 5 sections or Books, each one ends with a psalm of praise, a doxology. Book 1 ends with psalm 41; Book 2 ends with #72; Book 3 #89; Book 4 with 106 and Book 5 with the glorious #150. The psalms were recited and sung and memorized in the worship life of the Jewish people so that they could be carried by heart, ready to call on when needed. If you haven’t done it before I invite you to pray the psalter— one a day take 5 months, 5 a day takes one month. I’d suggest one a day. Start at the beginning, read it several times a day, re-write it in your own words, and let it be for you like a song that’s stuck in your head. Look online for songs based on that psalm to listen to.
When we carry the psalms like songs in our heart then, when we are deep in neck deep in the mire of life, we can draw upon the psalms of lament: “O Lord, have mercy.” And when we are filled with grace and the joy of life, we can sing psalms of gratitude. When we are confused and frightened, we can remember God’s presence and pray, ‘I trust you O God, you are with me.’ And when we see God at work in the world, or the beauty of creation we can sing our own psalms of praise,
In our world we offer words of praise to others, to children, “Good job!” or to employees– “atta boy!” But our prayers of praise, including the doxology in worship or in the Lord’s Prayer is not about giving God a pat on the back. God doesn’t have an ego that needs stroking. We don’t praise God for God’s sake. We praise God in gratitude. Praising God is an affirmation, a mantra, where we identify for ourselves who really is our God and in doing so we reject any other claim on our lives.
Fred Craddock is a famous preacher and a minister of the Disciples of Christ Church. He says that one evening, while he was sitting alone on his porch under the stars an idea came to him. It wasn’t a new idea, and it wasn’t his alone. But he claimed it for himself, and “exercised an owner’s prerogative by giving it a name.” Craddock named the idea Doxology. Praise God from whom all blessings flow Praise him all creatures here below Praise him above ye heavenly hosts. Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Amen.
He says, “I took Doxology inside to our family dinner table. Supper is family time, and conversation is usually a reflection upon [everybody’s] day… Supper is a good time and pleasant, and the whole family agreed that Doxology belonged at our table.”
Craddock reports that the next day Doxology went along when he and his wife went “downtown for some routine errands, but somehow – with Doxology along – they didn’t seem routine. We laughed at a child losing a race with an ice cream cone, his busy tongue unable to stop the flow down to his elbow. We studied the face of a [homeless person] staring into a jewelry story window, and wondered if he were remembering or hoping for better days. We spoke to the banker, standing with thumbs in his vest before a large plate glass window, grinning as one in possession of the keys to the kingdom. We were delighted by women shoppers clutching bundles and their skirts at blustery corners. It was good to have Doxology along,” Craddock says.
But then, he goes on: “I made a stop at St. Mary’s Hospital to see Betty. Betty was dying with cancer, and the gravity of my visit prompted me to leave Doxology in the car. Betty was awake and glad to see me. I awkwardly skirted the subject of death. It’s all right, she said. I know, and I’ve worked it through. God has blessed me with a wonderful family, good friends, and much happiness. I am grateful. I don’t want to die. 4 But I am not bitter.” Craddock says, “She was the one who had the prayer. Back at the car, Doxology asked, ‘Should I have been there?” ‘Yes’ [Craddock said]. ‘I am sorry I didn’t understand.’”
He goes on to say that he took Doxology along when he and his family went on vacation. “There is no question,” he says. “Doxology belongs on vacation.” But when the vacation was over, Craddock got word that his oldest brother had died. He tells of driving to the place where his brother lived, wondering all the while what he would say to his sister-in-law, the widow. He says, “I was still searching when we pulled into the driveway. She came out to meet us, and as I opened the door, still without that word, she broke the silence: “I hope you brought Doxology.” “Doxology? No,” said Fred Craddock. “I had not even thought of Doxology since the phone call. But the truth is now clear,” he concludes. “If we ever lose Doxology, we might as well be dead.”
The Greatest Prayer ends with a doxology. It may not have been there when the gospels were first written, but it draws on the prayer pattern of the Jewish people and sets a pattern for us. Like Fred Craddock we can make it our pattern, let Doxology accompany us every day, we can take Doxology with us wherever we go. Into beautiful mornings or bad moments, into celebrations or hospital rooms, we keep Doxology with us to help, to heal, to bear hope in all circumstances.
Praise God from whom all blessings flow Praise him all creatures here below Praise him above ye heavenly hosts. Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Amen”