Feb. 27, 2024
S2_EP14 - Blessed Assurance
As my father, Steve Peavyhouse, joins me once again in a heartfelt journey through the stanzas of "Blessed Assurance," we unravel the story of Fanny J. Crosby's timeless hymn that has fortified believers' faith for generations. Together, we trace the lineage of this sacred song from its inception, when a simple melody from Phoebe Knapp stirred Crosby's soul, to its role as a beacon of hope throughout history. Our conversation not only celebrates the spiritual depth found within Crosby's lyrics but also the emotional resonance that transcends the mere notes on a page, offering solace during life's unpredictable twists and turns.
Imagine finding strength and clarity not despite your challenges, but because of them. This episode delves into the profound truth that sometimes our greatest insights into God's grace come through what we perceive as weaknesses. Inspired by Crosby's own journey, we contemplate the conundrum of physical blindness opening the eyes of the soul. Our musings extend to personal battles, like grappling with a stutter, and how these hurdles can unveil the sufficiency of God's grace in our lives.
In a world that often looks for "saviors" in the wrong places, this episode is a testament to the joy and worth we find when the cross of Christ looms large in our lives—giving us an assurance that withstands all of life's storms and speaks to the very core of our being. Join us for a journey of faith, identity, and the unshakeable assurance we have in the love that was secured for us on the cross.
SHOW LINKS:
"Blessed Assurance" performed by Nathan Drake of Reawaken Hymns with chord charts and many other church music resources.
"Blessed Assurance" appears on the album Hymns of the Son available here.
The book I talk about on the podcast that explains the idea of the how the cross should "loom large" in our lives is found in Show Them Jesus by Jack Klumpenhower.
www.thebrightforever.com
All songs used by permission.
Transcript
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For we are not saved by believing in our own salvation, nor by believing anything whatsoever about ourselves.
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We are saved by what we believe about the Son of God and His righteousness.
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The gospel believed saves, not the believing in our own faith.
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Horatious Bonner, this is the Bright Forever.
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Hello and welcome to the Bright Forever where each week we rediscover the power and richness found in some of the greatest hymns of the faith.
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My name is Andy Peeviehouse and I am your host and guide on this Our Adventure Through Hymnity.
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It is always great to be back with you each week.
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We were off last week and this week is exciting because of another amazing special guest Returning for another episode, almost exactly a year after his first appearance, my dad, steve Peeviehouse, and we will be discussing an amazing hymn, one with which many of you will be familiar, blessed Assurance by the amazingly prolific hymn writer, fanny J Crosby.
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Many of you know this podcast is actually named after another amazing Fanny Crosby hymn, the Bright Forever.
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To learn more about it and to hear how this podcast actually got started in the first place, you can go and check out episode one of season one Before we dive into this amazing hymn and hear from, in my opinion, one of the greatest and most amazing men in the world.
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Let's explore the history of how this hymn became a song that has continued to help believers stand secure in their faith and proclaim the truth in its refrain.
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This is my story, this is my song, but before we begin, make sure to hit that follow button and click subscribe to never miss an episode.
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In the late 19th century, amidst a tumultuous era in American history, a woman named Fanny Crosby pinned the timeless hymn Blessed Assurance.
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Those of you who have been with us since the beginning know a number of details from Fanny Crosby's life, but for those of you who are new to our podcast, fanny Crosby was born in 1820 in New York.
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At six weeks old, little baby Fanny lost her sight due to a terrible medical error.
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However, despite her blindness, fanny Crosby became a prolific hymn writer, composing over 8,000 hymns throughout her lifetime.
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One day in 1873, fanny Crosby visited a dear friend, phoebe Knapp, a talented musician and composer in her own right.
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Mrs Knapp had recently composed a melody and was eager to share it with her friend Fanny.
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In Memories of 80 Years, her autobiography, written in 1906, mrs Crosby recalls this meeting and how one of her most beloved hymns came into being.
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She says in a successful song, words and music must harmonize not only in number of syllables but in subject matter and especially accent.
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In nine cases out of ten, the success of a hymn depends directly upon these qualities.
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Thus, melodies tell their own tale, and it is the purpose of the poet to interpret this musical story into language.
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Not infrequently, a composer asks what does that melody say to you?
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And if it says nothing to you, the probability is that your words will not agree with the music when an attempt is made to join them.
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Blessed Assurance was written to a melody composed by my friend Mrs Joseph F Knapp.
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She played it over once or twice on the piano and then asked me what it said to me.
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I replied Blessed Assurance, jesus is mine.
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Oh, what a foretaste of glory, divine air of salvation, purchase of God born of his spirit washed in his blood.
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This is my story.
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This is my song, praising my Savior all the day long.
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The hymn thus written seemed to express the experience to both Mrs Knapp and myself.
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Later in the book she recounts an interesting story about how Blessed Assurance had been used.
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She says Blessed Assurance was written in 1873.
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The music was composed by Mrs Joseph F Knapp, who became known to me as early as 1863, and who has also written the notes to several hymns of mine, including Nearer the Cross and Open the Gates of the Temple.
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She continues and says An English religious weekly gives the following account of how soldiers use God be with you and Blessed Assurance for passwords.
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When one member of the Soldiers' Christian Association meets a comrade, he says 494, which is the number of the hymn God be with you till we meet again in sacred songs and solos.
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The latter replies 6.
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Further on, that is hymn 500, which is the number of Blessed Assurance.
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Of this custom.
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The Secretary of the Association writes these hymns are constantly being used by our members as greetings and response and I do not think any member of the Soldiers' Christian Association ever writes without putting them somewhere on the letter or envelope.
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It's such a cool story I'm thinking about starting that.
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I'm just going to start maybe greeting and responding to people with hymn numbers.
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I don't know, it might work, it may not.
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A little different account exists in an earlier autobiography, fanny Crosby's Life Story, written by a friend of hers, will Carlton, in 1903.
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It wasn't in her own words but it had been approved by her and was written in the first person, and it reads Blessed assurance was made in this manner.
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My dear friend, mrs Joseph F Knapp, so well known as a writer and singer of most exquisite music and as an aid and inspiration to all who know her, had composed the tune and it seemed to me one of the sweetest I had heard for a long time.
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She asked me to write a hymn for it and I felt, while bringing the words and tones together, that the air and the hymn were intended for each other, and the many hundred times that I have heard it sung, this opinion has been more and more confirmed.
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Whichever way you believe the hymn came about, there is no doubt that Fanny was moved by the melody's beauty.
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She was inspired in that moment to compose what would become one of her most cherished hymns Blessed assurance, jesus' mind.
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Oh, what a foretaste of glory divine.
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The hymn's words echoed its author's life, an unwavering trust in God and her certainty of his presence.
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Despite her physical limitations, fanny Crosby's hymn resonated deeply with audiences capturing the essence of assurance and hope in what Christ had accomplished on the cross.
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It spread rapidly throughout churches across America and beyond, becoming a powerful anthem of faith for generations to come.
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Today, blessed assurance stands as a testimony to Fanny Crosby's enduring legacy as a hymnwriter and her profound impact on Christian worship.
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Through her words and amazing melodies, she continues to inspire millions around the world to find peace and assurance in their simple faith.
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This is a hymn that my dad, steve Peavey House, specifically asked to talk about, and I'm excited to hear what he has to say.
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Let's find out why he chose to talk about this hymn.
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Well, we are here with my father, steve Peavey House, and we're going to be talking about blessed assurance, and I've had you on before and so this is your second time on, and so we've kind of talked to you about, like, hymns and your history with hymns.
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But before we start, is there anything in the past year, since we've done this before, that's kind of changed about hymns, or for you, that you have realized something new about hymns that you didn't realize before, or is there anything like that?
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Well, I think that what I've noticed and I really started thinking about it more when you interviewed your mom about he keeps me singing, and I thought about I know it sort of sounds like I've been watching too much Pollyanna, but happy hymns, there are happy hymns.
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There are songs that just and of course, a lot of the Christmas carols are like that and he keeps me singing.
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There's within my heart a melody and there are just sings and there are rings and I've forgotten how it goes, but it's a happy song.
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But so many of the hymns are even the ones that are not, in terms of melodies and so on, happy sounding and everything.
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There's a deep joy that you find in so many of them and this happens to be one that I think just rings with joy.
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It just has so much power in.
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I mean, when you get to a chorus that says this is my story, this is my song, praising my Savior all the day long, I mean you know you just sort of you can just feel the abolience, you can feel the positive joy to sort of rising up out of you as you're singing this song.
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One of the reasons I love this particular song is the fact that it fits perfectly in my vocal range and, very honestly, if there was nobody else in the church it would be, you know, I would still be blasting away on this song because it just is the perfect song for that.
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But I think that's the thing that has changed somewhat, as I've gotten a new appreciation for just, not just the great theology and hymns, not just the great, the deep meetings.
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Some of the hymns are difficult hymns to sing, dealing with what Christ went through, dealing with our own sin and awareness of our own sin.
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They're not, you know, I would never classify them as happy hymns.
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But this is one that goes beyond happy.
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There's a joy because there's a depth to it, because it tells you it's not just that you can be happy as you go along life's merry way, but there is a reason why you have joy in your life and that just sort of like, and as you sing it, as you look at the words, it begins to well up in you and there's nothing like Jesus talks about living water welling up within you, and I think that kind of what is going on whenever I think about or sing this hymn.
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Well, that brings me to my second question, and answers it as well, which is can you share your personal connection to Blessed Assurance, and what significance does it hold for you?
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Well, which?
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is pretty much what you just told me.
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So, but pretty much, but there.
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But the thing is too.
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It's a.
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I'm a positive person for the most part.
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Sometimes, depending on whom around, I'm disgustingly optimistic about things, to the point of I have blinders on and I don't see reality.
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When things are really horrible, I need to see that there was being.
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They're horrible and so.
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But I tend to be very optimistic and one of the things about this particular song is that as you go through and look at the individual words and the phrases that they put in there, it gives it gives deeper meaning to my optimism.
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Even the things are very difficult in life and so on.
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There's a reason why you can be filled with joy and there's a reason why and that reason is basic because you have this Blessed Assurance, no matter whether or not the difficulties are there, because of just circumstances, the world is placed on you, or someone else is placed on you, or financial situation and so on, or for something particularly that you've brought on yourself by your own sin, by your own weaknesses and so on.
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In the middle of that, you still have Blessed Assurance, and because it has nothing to do with what you do.
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It has to do with what he has done, what he is doing and what he will continue to do in your life.
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One of the things and I shared this earlier in the podcast when I told the story of this hymn the way she wrote it is actually really interesting because of the fact that you just said that you enjoy the more upbeat hymns and things like that.
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And she was talking about how hymns there's a harmonization, not just musically, but the words to the music, and her friend, mrs Joseph F Knapp, is the one who wrote the actual music for this and she played it for her two times on her piano and then asks Fanny, is there anything that comes to mind when you hear this?
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And boom, here comes Blessed Assurance.
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So the music was there before the song was written yes, so she had written this piece.
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and she turns to Fanny Crosby and asks does this like?
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Does anything kind of spring up in you?
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Does this song make you think anything?
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And she recalls going.
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It makes me think Blessed Assurance, jesus is mine.
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Oh, what a foretaste of glory, divine Air of salvation, purchase of God, born of his spirit, lost in his love.
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This is my story.
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This is my song, praising my Savior all the day long and I'm going.
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Well, that's one way to write a song.
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I mean.
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I wish I could do that.
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Yeah, and but it reminds me of and this is something that I talked with mom about.
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It's something I talked with aunt Pam about too.
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In both of those instances, the music is what kind of elevates the hymn and it makes you like he keeps me singing, it puts you into this happy upbeat.
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Yes, god's gonna keep me going.
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He's gonna like, even in the midst of bad times, god's gonna keep moving me forward.
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And it's got this very uplifting song and this idea of day by day that you listen to the music, and the music is this calming, very things are gonna be okay.
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The word steadfast comes to me.
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Yeah, exactly, there's a steadfastness that you have because he covers day by day.
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Yeah, it's just every single day.
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It's just, you don't have to worry.
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It's a very comforting song and the music is very comforting.
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Along with it and this song comes along and one of the things that Fanny Crosby said is that you know, and she knew when a hymn of hers was going to be, it was gonna become popular, it was gonna be a really just man, it was gonna stick into people's heads.
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And this was one of those hymns, because the music and the lyrics, harmonized together in such a way that it's just the music of Blessed Assurance, brings along this feeling of assurance, like I can do this because I have Jesus Christ, and so I am assured.
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And the music comes along and it assures you as well.
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Yes, they fit together so perfectly.
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So last time I had you on, we talked about the hymn Thy Mercy, my God, which is a little bit more of a heady type song, very much a deeper understanding of what does it mean for God to have a mercy on us, and we talked about that.
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And this is, and it was, much more of an obscure hymn to.
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Not a lot of people have ever heard of it, which also goes to show why your podcast has not outpaced mom's downloads of the Old Rucket Cross.
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But this, on the other hand, is a completely different song because it may not be like a super deep intellectual song, but it is a very popular song and yet it does have a very deep understanding of we can know.
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Well, it reminds me that the poor, not brilliant peasant along the road, like a John Bunyan could then immerse himself in scripture and write Pilgrim's Progress.
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Because I read this and it has deep theological significance, but easy to understand significance I mean the second perfect submission, perfect delight.
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Visions of rapture now burst on my sight, angels descending bring from above echoes of mercy, whispers of love.
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I mean, anybody reading this who knows how to read is gonna be able to understand what is going on in Fannie Crosby's mind as she is writing these words down.
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And also, if they are believers, they have had those experiences, if nothing else.
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When they came to know Jesus Christ as their personal savior and suddenly the weight of their sin was no longer on them, then the freedom that comes in that, the exuberance, the abolience, the just amazing feeling and that's not always a feeling thing, but the feeling that comes with that is just visions of rapture now burst on my sight.
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Yeah, that's what happens, because you're just amazed that you are now a part of this family, you are accepted.
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In the middle of the yuck, sometimes, that is you that you have angels descending towards you, bringing from above echoes of mercy and whispers of love into your life, and that, to me, is just.
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It's one of those things that it is powerful, theologically, very powerful, but at the same time it's not that difficult to understand.
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The regular person can grab it, and you're right, I know this is perhaps one of the most popular of her songs and I can see exactly why it would be.
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One of the things also about verse two and we kind of talked about this earlier that I absolutely and I've talked about this I talked about this when I talked about Fanny Crosby in the very first episode of season one, when we talked about the bright forever and her understanding of what heaven's going to look like and the fact that she's blind and she says visions of rapture now burst on my sight, that this perfect submission, perfect delight, visions of rapture burst on her sight.
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She was blind.
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Yes, like, how does she know?
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Well, and the last verse, the last couple of lines, watching and waiting, looking above, yeah, I mean, but it goes back to Jesus says in John, one point, and I don't want to, I'm doing a little bit of a paraphrase here, but he's bringing sight to those who are blind and making blind those who think they see.
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You know, the whole idea there is that we are there's a difference between physical and spiritual sight and you can have all the, you can have 2020, you have 2010,.
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You can have perfect, perfect, perfect physical sight and be totally blind spiritually because you do not see what is really there.
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You see the external circumstances, you see the things that you want to see, but you don't see the truth behind what is really going on.
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You don't see the spiritual world that God is in control of and is doing battle on your behalf against Satan and his minions.
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I mean, you don't see that if you don't have a spiritual sight.
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But those things are spiritual and I think these things here are spiritually discerned and I just wish that I had the sight that Fannie Crosby had.
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I mean, she was physically blind, but you know she was watching, she was waiting, she was always looking above because she was setting her mind on those things that were above, not on the things of the earth.
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Yeah, and she has actually said before that if God were to come back and to offer her sight and I think you actually had the quote from it that she would be like no no I would not accept it.
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Yeah, I would rather continue to be blind.
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Yeah, what she said is I might not have sung hymns to the praise of God if I had been distracted by the beautiful and interesting things about me.
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I mean, it reminds me of and we have a contemporary like that too Gianni Eric Santata.
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I mean talks about if I go back and God could give me the ability to stand upright and walk and breathe and all the things that I don't have because of my paraplegia or quadriplegia.
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I wouldn't take it because I would not give anything, anything for the close relationship I have with Jesus Christ.
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And I mean that is for those of us who are blessed and privileged to have their bodies functioning in a fairly normal way at 75, I'm not sure it's functioning in a fairly normal way any longer, but to have that saying, no, I would rather have Jesus anything, yeah, I'd rather.
00:27:42,895 --> 00:27:43,617
Oh, wait, that's another song.
00:27:43,617 --> 00:27:44,801
Wait, that's another hymn, that's another song.
00:27:47,055 --> 00:28:17,981
But it's true because and I've actually shared this with this podcast before and I've also shared it with numerous groups that I've spoken to the same feelings, like I would be so concerned with how I was able to turn a phrase and how good I was at speaking and how I could jab at somebody or if I had fluency.
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But I've started my whole life and I look back and I see this path God was taking me on and actually, what was really interesting, pastor Tim at church was talking about that we're clay.
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We're clay to be molded and sometimes we would just rather just sit and just be clay.
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But God is shaping us into something.
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And I look back and I for a long time I thought my stuttering was not a gift from God.
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It was far from it.
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But I look back on it now, after years and years and years of thinking through it and reading God's word, and go, wait a minute.
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This is grace, because if I had been able to speak and speak fluently one, I don't know if I'd be where I am.
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I don't know if I'd be the same person I am, because I would be.
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I'd be so concerned about how good I speak and how wonderful I am at this and oh man, I have such a quick wit and I can do this and I can do this and I can do this and I can pierce somebody with my words Instead, it's humbled me tremendously.
00:29:46,006 --> 00:30:12,361
And not that I can't still be quick-witted at times or joke and be sarcastic and things like that and sometimes take it too far still, but how many times it has stopped me my stuttering has stopped me from saying things that I look back and go, man, I'm glad I didn't say that, man, I'm glad I not only that I didn't say it, I'm glad I couldn't say that.
00:30:12,361 --> 00:30:19,557
That would not have been able to even come out because of God's grace and it's God's grace that.
00:30:19,557 --> 00:30:31,880
And she sees that and says man, I wouldn't want my sight because I'd be so concerned with me and I'd be distracted by me.
00:30:33,217 --> 00:30:39,383
And that's really good, and I think sometimes also the picture there of echoes of mercy and whispers of love and so on.
00:30:39,383 --> 00:31:08,281
We fail to see that the reason why God does, actively, does things or allows things into our lives that we don't see as particularly good, one of those would be obviously her being blinded when she was six years old and the whole issue of John Eric Santata having when she was 17, having the spinal injury that she had, and you having this disfluency and so on.
00:31:08,281 --> 00:31:15,739
But you go back to I keep going back to John because that's what I've been studying lately the gospel of John.
00:31:15,739 --> 00:31:24,440
But the gospels were, and the gospels, the disciples, were, asking Jesus about the man born blind.
00:31:24,440 --> 00:31:25,344
Whose fault was it?
00:31:25,344 --> 00:31:27,142
Was it because of this or was it because of that?
00:31:27,142 --> 00:31:30,719
Was it his sin or was it his parents' sin and so on, that he was born blind?
00:31:30,719 --> 00:31:32,284
He goes neither.
00:31:32,284 --> 00:31:37,719
It was for the glory of God that the glory of God be manifested, and the same thing when he would.
00:31:37,719 --> 00:31:46,079
Why did Jesus wait two extra days to go to Lazarus and so that Lazarus is gonna be dead four days before Jesus ever gets there?
00:31:46,079 --> 00:31:47,999
And why?
00:31:47,999 --> 00:31:49,243
Why did he do that?
00:31:49,243 --> 00:31:51,260
Because God was gonna be glorified.
00:31:52,296 --> 00:31:54,140
And so your disfluency.
00:31:54,140 --> 00:32:13,801
I mean, I hear people mention and I'm sure they've mentioned it to you too a lot, but just I cannot believe the fact that in carrying on conversation you struggle with the disfluency, but when you're up there leading worship, when you're on your podcast and so on, you don't have that disfluency.
00:32:13,801 --> 00:32:26,301
And it is a God thing, it is something which he is protecting you with and he is using you, and that's one of those echoes of mercy, one of those whispers of love and so on.
00:32:26,301 --> 00:32:29,306
Because I think God, he's not like the man born.
00:32:29,306 --> 00:32:31,799
You're not like the man born blind, where he just took away the disfluency.
00:32:32,494 --> 00:32:51,222
But see, god either deals with his grace he has and there are probably more variations of this but sometimes God does this thing to show his supremacy of his grace, and sometimes he does things in order to show the sufficiency of his grace.
00:32:51,222 --> 00:32:56,320
And with the man born blind, he showed the supremacy With ladders he showed the supremacy.
00:32:56,320 --> 00:33:10,267
He had power over illnesses, he had power over death itself, and yet in your situation you still have the disfluency, but his grace is sufficient in the middle of that.
00:33:10,267 --> 00:33:24,661
And I think that picture there, of that assurance that we have, that we can depend upon all things working the good to those who love him and are called according to his purposes.
00:33:24,935 --> 00:33:35,635
And then I don't know and in 2 Corinthians, chapter 12, that my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in your weakness, right.
00:33:35,635 --> 00:33:42,503
So boast all the more in your weakness, because when I am weak he is strong.
00:33:42,775 --> 00:33:46,122
Yeah, get out there and show people how disfluency can be.
00:33:46,824 --> 00:33:47,526
Oh, I can do it.
00:33:50,402 --> 00:34:11,244
But because in that then, seeing how he works in your life as you are worshiping him that just one of the things I would love and I know you've got the idea, I think and you may have even talked about it more before on the podcast, but from Bob Coffin about as a worship leader.
00:34:11,244 --> 00:34:34,902
Your job is not to be a worship leader but a lead worshiper, and if you go out there and worship with all your heart, other people will want to worship along with you, and I think that's and I go back to this hymn there if she, the blind person, sees these things, I mean I want to see them with her.
00:34:34,902 --> 00:34:43,079
I want to walk along with her and experience that same blessed assurance that Jesus is mine and I want this to be my story.
00:34:43,079 --> 00:34:53,880
I'm gonna go ahead and just blast it out that praising my Savior all the day long is really what life is all about.
00:34:54,094 --> 00:35:03,643
And you could look around the world today and you can see the things that people look to to give them happiness and to give them satisfaction and so on, or to even be their saviors.
00:35:03,643 --> 00:35:37,960
I mean, we're coming up another year now where there's gonna be an election and there are people on both sides of the aisle and right in the middle of the aisle, who really in some ways see the possibility of an earthly Savior, that they'll see a Democratic candidate or a Republican candidate or some independent candidate, someone out there who has an answer that's gonna make their life better, more acceptable, and so on.
00:35:37,960 --> 00:35:40,782
And she comes back to no, no, no.
00:35:40,782 --> 00:35:44,063
This is all because Jesus is mine.
00:35:44,063 --> 00:35:49,467
Life is worth living because he lives.
00:35:50,617 --> 00:35:51,440
I'm sorry, I'm going to.
00:35:51,440 --> 00:35:53,442
Are you going back into another toilet or song?
00:35:53,594 --> 00:35:56,063
Nevermind, but no, but it really is true.
00:35:56,063 --> 00:36:08,965
Life is worth living and you have this joy well enough within you because you have the blessed assurance that Jesus belongs to you and you belong to him.
00:36:08,965 --> 00:36:13,942
You were held in his hands and there's no place else you would want to be.
00:36:13,942 --> 00:36:32,759
We see that the great things beyond us that God has done in Christ and therefore give us the ability to be happy, to be joyful, to experience and to say, no matter what it is that we're facing God's bigger than that.
00:36:32,759 --> 00:36:39,324
It's also a thing that I learned.
00:36:39,324 --> 00:36:48,650
I can't remember if I learned it from taking psychology classes, but whatever you focus on tends to enlarge.
00:36:49,875 --> 00:37:02,286
If you focus on something, it becomes bigger and bigger in your life, and so if you have difficult things that you are focusing on, they get to be huge and totally unable to be overcome.
00:37:02,286 --> 00:37:18,085
But if you're focusing on and God seems then because of that to be sort of small, lose his power in the background because you're so overwhelmed by the difficulty or the disruptions going on in your life.
00:37:18,085 --> 00:37:31,264
But when you're focusing on God and this is a beautiful picture there of that when you're watching, you're waiting, you're looking above, and when you're focusing on those things, God just gets bigger in your mind.
00:37:31,264 --> 00:37:39,360
I mean, he doesn't get bigger, he's always huge, he's always more powerful than anything you would possibly think or imagine, but it reminds me of.
00:37:42,155 --> 00:37:57,181
I wanna say there's a book I taught to the teachers at my school a couple of years ago and it's something that actually, I think, when we were at Journey, pastor Michael used to talk about this, about does the cross loom large?
00:37:57,181 --> 00:38:04,342
Yes, and the bigger we see our sin, the greater the cross has to be.
00:38:04,342 --> 00:38:07,284
And how does the cross loom in your life?
00:38:07,284 --> 00:38:18,735
Is it this tiny little picture of God, or is it this thing where the cross is huge because it has to be huge in order to cover my sin and to cover?
00:38:18,735 --> 00:38:29,025
With regards to this hymn to, to remind me, I do have that assurance because of the cross, you know.
00:38:29,199 --> 00:38:34,706
Yeah, and it's all because of the cross, just like we talked, you know, the idea of later on.
00:38:34,706 --> 00:38:37,364
It's actually about goodness, filled with goodness, and so on.
00:38:37,364 --> 00:38:39,519
It is nothing of ours, you know it's.
00:38:39,519 --> 00:38:42,789
You know it is something that he gives us.
00:38:42,789 --> 00:38:46,706
He makes us heirs, he is the one who gives us the blessed assurance.
00:38:46,706 --> 00:38:51,661
And because we can focus on that, you know, it doesn't even.
00:38:51,661 --> 00:38:57,086
Does it dishearten me at times to see how weak I really am?
00:38:57,086 --> 00:38:57,882
Yeah, it does.
00:38:57,882 --> 00:38:58,802
It bothers me.
00:38:58,802 --> 00:39:08,628
I remember one of my answers to the questions in the Bible study one time was do I have any questions for Jesus?
00:39:08,628 --> 00:39:12,007
And I don't have the questions like why, why me?
00:39:12,007 --> 00:39:13,864
Why is this a bad thing happening?
00:39:13,864 --> 00:39:14,487
Why is it evil?
00:39:14,487 --> 00:39:15,463
I don't have those.
00:39:15,463 --> 00:39:30,344
The questions I have are like is there, you know, is there any chance that someday I might get it together enough to where I feel like I'm not just an abject failure at the Christian life and in one sense.
00:39:30,666 --> 00:39:38,304
No, no, it will be but at the same time that does not dishearten me because I know it's not about me, it's not about how good I do.
00:39:38,304 --> 00:40:07,731
I mean, I want to do things well because I want to please my savior, I want to please my heavenly father, but even doing things well, you know, if I do things well it's because he is somehow doing something in my life to make me, you know, give up my momentary absolute, total dependence on and attraction of my earthly self and focus on him more.
00:40:08,092 --> 00:40:18,030
Yeah Well, and it's kind of like what I talked about in from the depths of woe, all the good I can muster up in my life is still filthy rags.
00:40:18,030 --> 00:40:25,885
It's not about me, it's not about what I can do, it's not about how good I can be, and if it is, then I am.
00:40:25,885 --> 00:40:30,282
I am an abject failure and I always will be, and you can't have.
00:40:30,684 --> 00:40:37,266
If that's your plumb line is how well you're doing, I don't see how someone can have less of assurance.
00:40:37,266 --> 00:40:42,764
How can you have assurance if it depends on you knowing what you're like?
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