One of my favorite hymns is by Harry Fosdick (see below for
full text or here for a video).
The hymn is triumphant praise to the One who is in control of all things.
Fosdick starts out by calling on the God of Grace and God of Glory to pour out
power on the People of God and bring the Church (which is the people-the Body
of Christ) to true and ‘glorious flower’.
Fosdick’s hymn starts in the right place-by asking God to
work in us. The fact is that we cannot by ourselves become holy or even good. Indeed
such efforts can have the opposite effect. “If I, self-consciously, try to make
myself good, I am unwittingly separating myself from those I love and would
serve…I learned that if I was what I had considered selfish, that is, if I took
reasonable care of my own needs, we had a smoothly running household,” say
Madeline L’Engle. We try so hard to be perfect and good that sometimes we
cannot see the Holy spark within us, and fall into the trap of thinking we
aren’t any good.
So we try to make ourselves over into what the world (or the
church) says we should be. Too often that comes at the cost of relationships and
even our soul. Rohr states, “it is precisely my ego self that has to die, my
need to be right, to be in control, to be superior…the longer you gaze [on the
Crucified One], the more you will see your own complicity in and profitability
from the sins of others.”
Fosdick’s hymn reminds us of the “hosts of evil ‘round us
[who] scorn Thy Christ”. Those hosts might just include our own need to control
and work out our own salvation. When we are working in our own power to be
‘good enough’ for God, we live in the “fears that long have bound us”. Instead
God would “free our hearts to faith and praise.” This doesn't happen overnight. In looking at Jacob's life in the Bible and in L'Engle's book (A Stone for a Pillow) you can see that transformation was a life long process filled with lots of errors. AND GOD STILL LOVED HIM! God loved Jacob enough to make him the patriarch of Israel-father of the 12 tribes!
The start to this process, for many of us, is learning to
love and forgive ourselves. L’Engle insightfully remarks, “[the] most difficult
of all is learning to bless ourselves…[to] accept ourselves as blessed-not
perfect, not virtuous, not sinless-just blessed.” Both L’Engle and Rohr know
that we have to forgive ourselves before we can really love ourselves or anyone
else. Rohr notes, “Forgiveness is probably the only human action that demands
three new ‘seeings’ at the same time: I must see God in the other, I must
access God in myself, and I must see God in a new way that is larger than ‘an
Enforcer’.” Because God is Love not Judgment, we must shift our paradigm to see
ourselves as we are seen: in and through the lens of God’s Love.
Too often we find it difficult to release the aim of making
ourselves holy because we fear the retribution of the angry God if we fail.
Fosdick calls on the God of Grace and Glory to “bend our pride to Thy control.
Shame our wanton selfish gladness, rich in things and poor in soul.” The
problem is that we really, deep down, like ourselves the way we are. Yes, we
admit to having some faults and know we could be ‘better’. However, we don’t
really want to get rid of the image we have created of our identity.
Rohr compares the paradigm shift to the “Passover
commemoration [where] we have an image of the death of something good,
innocent, and even loved”. He says we are called to put to death “what I deem
necessary to my identity; it is what I cannot live without. It is these
seemingly essential and good things-when let go of-that break us through into
much deeper levels of life.”
Not an easy thing-letting go of the identity I carefully
have built up. It is only in looking to the Cross and living Fosdick’s refrain
“Grant us wisdom, grant us courage…” that we can start
to change. Slowly we see, with Rohr that the Cross is “not an image of the
death of the bad self but, in fact, the self that feels essential, right, and
necessary-but isn’t necessary at all.” 
The final verse of the hymn calls on God to “save us from
weak resignation…let the search for Thy salvation be our glory evermore.” When
we let the God of Grace and God of Glory live and rule our lives we will be
able to live with our “feet on lofty places…armored with all Christ-like graces
in the fight to set men free.” It is in the letting go of our image of being in
control and in charge that we find true freedom and forgiveness. Then we learn
that what Archbishop Desmond Tutu said is true. “God loves you! And God’s love
is so great, God loves your enemies, too.”
It is not easy to live a life of openness to God’s love.
That Love demands a response. L’Engle emphasizes the paradox “our faith is a
faith of vulnerability and hope not a faith of suspicion and hate”. We are
called to enter into a life of openness and vulnerability instead of insisting
on our own way. Then we can with Fosdick live as “Serving Thee Whom we adore.”
Rohr says God’s love calls for
relinquishment of those things in life and esp. those things in ourselves that
we think we cannot live without. What might God be calling you to give to God?
L’Engle says we must learn to see ourselves as “blessed”-not perfect, just
blessed. Do you really believe that you are blessed? Fosdick’s hymn says we need to
lean on the God of Grace and Glory “lest we miss Thy Kingdom’s goal”. Can you
trust God enough to let God be in charge?
On Thy people pour Thy power.
Crown Thine ancient church’s story,
Bring her bud to glorious flower.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the facing of this hour,
For the facing of this hour.
Lo! the hosts of evil ’round us,
Scorn Thy Christ, assail His ways.
From the fears that long have bound us,
Free our hearts to faith and praise.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the living of these days,
For the living of these days.
Scorn Thy Christ, assail His ways.
From the fears that long have bound us,
Free our hearts to faith and praise.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
For the living of these days,
For the living of these days.
Cure Thy children’s warring madness,
Bend our pride to Thy control.
Shame our wanton selfish gladness,
Rich in things and poor in soul.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal.
Bend our pride to Thy control.
Shame our wanton selfish gladness,
Rich in things and poor in soul.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal,
Lest we miss Thy kingdom’s goal.
Set our feet on lofty places,
Gird our lives that they may be,
Armored with all Christ-like graces,
In the fight to set men free.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
That we fail not man nor Thee,
That we fail not man nor Thee.
Save us from weak resignation,Gird our lives that they may be,
Armored with all Christ-like graces,
In the fight to set men free.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
That we fail not man nor Thee,
That we fail not man nor Thee.
To the evils we deplore.
Let the search for Thy salvation,
Be our glory evermore.
Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,
Serving Thee Whom we adore,
Serving Thee Whom we adore
