The New Song
Clement on the Eternal Word
Dear Friends,
I hope you are all having a good Holy Week!
Things have seemed a bit hectic around here, with four services coming up and our big concert in a little over a week. Today it was a beautiful 70-degree day and I had to mow my lawn and get patio cushions and things put away because tonight we’re getting another four inches of snow. That’s how it goes in Big Sky Country. It’s always neat to be standing in the bright sunshine in the heat and watching the storm front slowly moving in right in front of you. Then the wind kicks up and you feel the chill.
I have not the desire to comment in this week’s Quarter Inch on current events. Tariffs and trade, war in Ukraine, Iran nuclear talks, deportation laws and due process, these can all wait. What I will do is share with you a beautiful passage from Clement of Alexandria (c.190). After comparing God’s creation of the universe to a harmonious “song” (Tolkien would’ve loved it, given his creation “account” in the Silmarillion) Clement turns to considering the eternal Word whom we are celebrating this week:
A beautiful breathing instrument of music the Lord made man, after His own image. And He Himself also, surely, who is the supramundane Wisdom, the celestial Word, is the all-harmonious, melodious, holy instrument of God. What, then, does this instrument—the Word of God, the Lord, the New Song—desire? To open the eyes of the blind, and unstop the ears of the deaf, and to lead the lame or the erring to righteousness, to exhibit God to the foolish, to put a stop to corruption, to conquer death, to reconcile disobedient children to their father. The instrument of God loves mankind. The Lord pities, instructs, exhorts, admonishes, saves, shields, and of His bounty promises us the kingdom of heaven as a reward for learning; and the only advantage He reaps is, that we are saved. For wickedness feeds on men’s destruction; but truth, like the bee, harming nothing, delights only in the salvation of men.
You have, then, God’s promise; you have His love: become partaker of His grace. And do not suppose the song of salvation to be new, as a vessel or a house is new. For “before the morning star it was;” and “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”2 Error seems old, but truth seems a new thing.
Have a wonderful rest of your Holy Week, and a Blessed Easter to you!
Nice! Happy and safe Easter! God bless you all!
So wonderful! Thank you!