Grace Greater Than Our Sin -- Julia H. Johnston

She took after her mother and grandmother when she lifted up her pen, perhaps early in the 20^th Century and probably while she was living in Peoria, Illinois (and perhaps occasionally gazing upon Peoria’s waterfront that looked something like this period photograph from 1909). Julia Johnston’s father, who was a Presbyterian minister, also must have stimulated her with many a sermon that guided her thoughts about “Grace Greater Than Our Sin” that she voiced and saw published by 1911, near the end of her life. No doubt, her life’s work as a Sunday school teacher and director also helped spur her writing, and was this a reflection of what she thought students in the bible classrooms should be learning? What she expressed is a fundamental concept of Christian faith, so was she trying to ensure that young minds – or even adults’ attentions—did not miss this pillar of belief?

Julia Johnston’s life by the time she wrote ‘Grace…’ included decades of effort to educate and inspire those in her classrooms and anyone who picked up one of the four books in which her works were circulated. Her upbringing also must have paid dividends by the time the adult Julia wrote in the early 20^th Century. Forty years as an educator must have meant that probably thousands of students were directly or indirectly touched by Julia’s influence. She was also a lifelong poet and hymnist, with reportedly over 500 texts attributed to her. Additionally, she was president of the Presbyterian Missionary Society for a time, so she would have been thinking about this grace extending probably much further than the borders of the Peoria area. Thus, she had a platform. But, the foundation upon which she first stood and grew was most likely the key to Julia some 40-50 years later – the adult influences in her childhood cannot be exaggerated. Her matriarchal and patriarchal models say much about Julia Johnston. One can imagine Julia as the young child or young adult sharing with her mother the poetry she wrote, episodes in which she was coached and affirmed, fine-tuning the art form she knew the older women in her life had practiced. Her grandmother, who while perhaps not present during most of Julia’s childhood, must have had some impact on Julia through the poetry her mother could have shared with the child. Woven into this tapestry was the ministry she watched her father exercise. How often had Pastor Robert Johnston preached on the subject of grace? We could say at least once, right? Multiple times is a better guess, since Julia decided as an adult to write a poem devoted wholly to this one idea, perhaps decades after her father had planted that seed.

Julia was not a rose-colored glasses-wearing poet because she wrote about a free gift. No, Julia was evidently in touch with why she stood in need of this most significant ‘G’-word. Verses 1, 2 and 3 contain many words that show she knew about ‘sin’, ‘guilt’ (v.1); ‘despair’, and ‘infinite loss’ (v.2); and a ‘dark stain’ (v.3). ‘Grace…exceeds’ all of those (v.1), she exults. Accordingly, she uses this word no less than 38 times in her four verses and the refrain, a reminder that Grace stands tall, despite various challenges to its power. Julia would have faced numerous grace-needy moments by the time she wrote about it, so as her life progressed perhaps Julia felt increasingly the urge to cling to God and His promise of clemency that He offers to all wrongdoers. Shouldn’t we all!   

  

See more information on the song story in these sources: The Complete Book of Hymns – Inspiring Stories About 600 Hymns and Praise Songs by William J. Petersen and Ardythe Petersen, Tyndale House Publishers, 2006; and Amazing Grace: 366 Inspiring Hymn Stories for Daily Devotions by Kenneth W. Osbeck, Kregel Publications, 1990.  

Also see this link, showing all three original verses: http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/g/r/a/g/gragreat.htm  

Also see these links for author’s biography: http://www.hymntime.com/tch/bio/j/o/h/n/s/t/johnston_jh.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_H._Johnston

Mighty to Save -- Reuben Morgan and Ben Fielding

It may be impossible for these two writers to say just how many people’s circumstances in a church in 2006 helped spur the poetry they wrote over a several-month stretch of time. Ben Fielding and Reuben Morgan were in Sydney, Australia and thinking of the body of believers there, and hearing many of their stories as they worked on “Mighty to Save”. Ben’s recollection of that time suggests these authors think of their own surroundings first when they mull over the words that eventually travel far and wide among other believers, a phenomenon that underscores the common needs and emotions of people across the planet. Their work habits further indicate they access the deep truths of ancient texts for inspiration, another cohesive element that gives their creation such widespread reception.

The local church of which Ben and Reuben were thinking in 2006 was the Hillsong Church in Sydney, a place where not only people but also biblical teaching has impact on songwriters like these two. Ben shared in an interview years after ‘Mighty to Save’ was published that restoration of hurting people at the church was a recurring theme that made the song’s emergence so natural. ‘Compassion’, ‘love’, ‘mercy’, ‘forgiveness’, and ‘kindness’ were not just convenient words for their composition (v.1), but acts that Ben and Reuben saw regularly at Hillsong. These demonstrations of a godly influence imprinted on their imaginations as they sat and thought about what they wanted to write that could resonate with these people. Though it was an immediate impact that Fielding and Morgan saw the first night the song was sung by the church, the journey to get there was nevertheless anything but a speedy one. Many months lay between the first time they experimented with word phrases, the music, and the final product. Ben also quotes three different scriptures (Luke 6:45; Zephaniah 3:17; and Romans 10:9) as he related the development of their thoughts and the special care they took in fine-tuning what they wanted to say. That biblical precision and inspiration they emphasized as part of the songwriting adventure was a key element, along with their collaborative spirit, Ben says. He concludes that ultimately, what made ‘Mighty to Save’ effective was how it intersected God’s truth and spirit with human life in all its reality.  

Fielding and Morgan can be expected to collaborate on future musical projects. They’ve been teaming up since they were in their mid-teens, but surprisingly, ‘Mighty to Save’ was the first one Ben says they completed together. Perhaps that was a result of the Hillsong influence that helped incubate the song. Reuben’s life has taken him to the Hillsong church in the United Kingdom, but he and Ben have continued their music-writing adventures, including at least a dozen other songs they’ve co-written since 2006. Evidently, that spirit they used in ‘Mighty to Save’ is still at work. That’s not a surprise, is it? Just where does that Spirit originate, and is He musical Himself? Check out 1 Samuel 13:14 and Acts 13:22, think about that poetic character, and then see what you think.          

See here for information about the song: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mighty_to_Save_(song)

See the authors’ story of the song’s development here: https://worshipleader.com/music/mighty-to-save/

They'll Know We Are Christians -- Peter Scholtes

“Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples”. (John 13:35)

He got it straight from the bible, and he wanted the same theme to be true in the place and time that he lived. That’s what Peter Scholtes thought in the mid-1960s, as he was organizing a diverse gathering based upon the theme that “They’ll Know We Are Christians”, something that a God-Man said that a writer remembered years after the words were first spoken. He was on Chicago’s South Side in a church basement where he was directing a choir, but that doesn’t mean he was insulated from what was going on about himself and the people to whom he ministered. It was a turbulent time in urban America, meaning Civil Rights – the reach for them by some, while others fought to preserve the status quo -- was very much on the minds of citizens. So, Peter wondered about unity in a cultural and a spiritual context, and he had the perfect model when he considered what to pen in four poetic verses.  

Peter Scholtes must have had a special place in his heart for the places along the western shore of Lake Michigan in northeastern Illinois since his childhood, a condition that mingled with the practice of his faith in a Catholic church where he served as a priest in the 1960s. He was raised in Evanston, 12 miles north of mid-town Chicago, so it was no surprise that after attending two nearby seminaries for his undergraduate degree (he subsequently acquired a graduate degree at Boston University) Peter would land in Chicago someday. And, his heart was in trying to help the people of this area link arms in the midst of strife, not throw punches at one another. ‘We’, Peter wrote over twenty times in ‘They’ll Know…’ (it’s often also known as “We Are One in the Spirit”), as he borrowed the words spoken by Jesus. Peter knew that a blight was upon the inner-cities of the country, as black people sought access to the same rights as others about them. Violence, despite Martin Luther King’s admonitions, was just a lit match away in the tinderbox of race relations in Chicago and elsewhere. So, when Peter considered how to coax interracial harmony among different churches and peoples in some upcoming events, he knew what needed to be underscored. It was so apparent, that Peter reportedly composed the four verses of ‘They’ll Know…’ in a single day. For Peter, ‘We’ was linked to the ‘Spirit’ and the ‘Lord’ (v.1); ‘walk(ing) with each other’, ‘hand in hand’, in order to jointly ‘spread the news’ (v.2); and ‘work(ing)’ together (v.3). With the words of verses one through three in mind, all people could blend their voices to revere Him in the Trinity (v.4). A Christian community could really only draw others if love and unity in Him were the foundation. Peter probably heard the phrase ‘Make love, not war’ in his time, as antiwar protesters marched in opposition to a conflict on the opposite side of the globe that nevertheless involved many Chicagoans. Peter’s recipe for a love potion was never more needed.

People of the 1960s might tell us that few other periods in American history strained the generational and ethnic divides like that period. There were others -- the Civil War, the Great Depression, and certainly both World Wars – that threatened and broke down social mores, as some said at the time ‘America is coming apart at the seams’. A rent garment is not easy to reassemble. It has a gash in it that may only be repaired with an ugly patch, perhaps, reminding those who look that the original piece of clothing is irretrievable. A split people are harder yet to unify. That’s what Peter Scholtes saw coming –maybe events were already threatening to crush the community he loved. Peter proposed an alternative, and with the song he crafted so effortlessly, he indicated that Love is an action, not an emotion. What do you make of that? Hey, wasn’t there was another guy who loved through action, once?                 

See this link for brief capsule of the song story: https://hymnary.org/person/Scholtes_P

Also see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/They%27ll_Know_We_Are_Christians