Sunday's Hymn: Come, Thou Almighty King

Come, thou Almighty King,
Help us thy name to sing,
Help us to praise:
Father, all glorious,
O’er all victorious,
Come, and reign over us,
Ancient of days.

Come, thou Incarnate Word,
Gird on thy mighty sword,
Our prayer attend:
Come and thy people bless,
And give thy Word success;
Spirit of holiness,
On us descend.

Come, Holy Comforter,
Thy sacred witness bear
In this glad hour:
Thou who almighty art,
Now rule in every heart,
And ne’er from us depart,
Spirit of power.

To the great One in Three
Eternal praises be,
Hence evermore.
His sovereign majesty
May we in glory see,
And to eternity
Love and adore.

—Author unknown

Other hymns, worship songs, or quotes for this Sunday:

• Behold, He Comes, the Glorious King at The Happy Wonderer

Sunday's Hymn: Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty

Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty!
Early in the morning our song shall rise to thee;
Holy, Holy, Holy, merciful and mighty!
God in three Persons, blessed Trinity!

Holy, Holy, Holy, all the saints adore thee,
Casting down their golden crowns around the glassy sea;
Cherubim and seraphim falling down before thee,
Who wert, and art, and evermore shalt be.

Holy, Holy, Holy, though the darkness hide thee,
Though the eye of sinful man thy glory may not see,
Only thou art holy; there is none beside thee
Perfect in power, in love, and purity.

Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty!
All thy works shall praise thy Name, in earth and sky and sea;
Holy, Holy, Holy, merciful and mighty!
God in three Persons, blessed Trinity!

—Reg­in­ald He­ber

Other hymns, worship songs, or quotes for this Sunday:

• Those Who Love the Lord at The Happy Wonderer

Selected Reading, January 16, 2021

 

A few current-events-free reading suggestions in case, like me, you’re trying to focus on things beyond and better. 

Apologetics

How I Almost Lost My Faith in College
Michael Kruger previews his upcoming book, Surviving Religion 101: Letters to a Christian College Student on Keeping the Faith in College. (Or university, if you’re Canadian.) Maybe you need this for someone you know—your son or daughter, a friend, or even you. It’s written for anyone “with intellectual questions about their faith.” (Right now, I’m reading Alisa Childers’ Another Gospel?, which you might find useful, too. It probably deals with some of the same issues.)

Theology

Doctrinally Dressed Up but No Way to Get There
A short piece on why we need the concept of eternal generation: “Eternal generation is the way Scripture and the early fathers affirmed that the Son is equal in nature to the Father without being two separate gods and it is the way the Son is Son to the Father and not Brother. The Son is divine because he shares the substance of the Father, he is Son and not Brother because he is from the Father, and he is not a separate deity because this generation occurs within the one being of God.”

Bible Study

Acts 4 and 5: Similar Narratives with Distinct Emphases
Peter Kroll examines two similar stories from Acts, and shows us that when we observe the text closely, we can see they have distinct main points.