Welcome to the online home of Tim Challies, blogger, author, and book reviewer.
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Few people have a sweeter and kinder spirit than Joni Eareckson Tada. Few people have suffered longer and more consistently than Joni Eareckson Tada. These two things—sweetness and suffering—do not necessarily go together, but by God’s grace they can and often do. They most certainly do in Joni’s life which is one of the reasons so many of us admire and honor her. One of the keys to Joni’s suffering is singing. As she suffers the effects of her paralysis, …
Some churches sing only old songs—they rely on the great hymns of the faith and add newer selections on only the rarest of occasions. Some churches only sing new songs—they rely on their own songwriters or the Christian top-40 and sing older selections on only the rarest of occasions. I am convinced there is value in deliberately singing both the oldest and the most recent songs (though gladly extend an exception to those brothers and sisters with the conviction that …
A few weeks ago I wrote an article titled What We Lost When We Lost Our Hymnals and was rather surprised to see 300,000 people stop by to read it! I meant to point out that there are consequences in shifting from one medium to another—in this case, shifting from hymnals to PowerPoint projection. (I use “PowerPoint” to stand in for all forms of projection.) It is true of every new technology that it brings benefits and drawbacks. Neither hymnals …
I don’t think we should go back to using hymnals. But I do think there’s value in considering what we lost when, over the course of a relatively short period of time, we gave up hymnals for PowerPoint projection. Not all of us, mind you, but most of us. It’s worth considering because it helpfully shows what we stand to lose when we switch from one media to another, and especially when we do so quickly and without due consideration. …
Onward, Christian Soldiers” was written in 1865 with no intention of ever being published, especially in adult hymn books. Rev. Sabine Baring-Gould, its author, was at that time the curate of a parish in Yorkshire county in the north of England, and he recounts how and why he wrote it: It was written in a very simple fashion … Whitmonday is a great day for school festivals in Yorkshire, and one Whitmonday it was arranged that our school should join …
Frances Ridley Havergal (1836-1879) was an unusually gifted and passionate saint. The daughter of a church rector, she was raised in Worcester, England and attended schools in England and Germany. In her love of learning, she grew to become an able scholar (even becoming proficient in both Hebrew and Greek) and a talented singer and pianist. The deepest desire of her heart, however, was in “personal spiritual influence upon others” (Benson). This led her to value most of all her …
Just As I Am” is one of the few hymns for which we know not only the author’s story but also the exact circumstances in which it was written. Charlotte Elliott of Brighton, England (1789–1871) was either born, or in early life had become, an invalid. Her life was a testimony to patient endurance in suffering, not only physical, but also emotional and spiritual. This was the context in which she wrote the hymn, as her nephew the Rev. Handley …
Christianity is a bloody faith. It is a bloody faith because it is the faith of sinful people and the Bible tells us that sin requires blood. For sin to be forgiven, for sinful people to be made right with God, there must be a payment of blood. That payment was made by Jesus Christ on a blood-soaked cross and through the centuries Christians have been praising God for providing the one thing they need most that they cannot do …
William Cowper was keenly aware of the truth that God moves in mysterious ways. His life, as John Piper describes it in his biography of Cowper, seems to have been “one long accumulation of pain,” especially mental pain. But this hymn writer trusted by faith–not perfectly, but perseveringly–that in this mysterious and maddening providence, God was working wonders. Cowper was born in 1731 in Berkhamsted, England. His mother died when he was only 6 years old, leaving him to be …
In 1787 Dr. John Rippon published A Selection of Hymns from the Best Authors as a supplement to Isaac Watts’ classic Psalms and Hymns. The book was an immense success. “The remarkable feature of the book,” writes Louis Benson, “is the great number of original hymns secured by him and there first printed.” Among these original hymns was the title “How Firm a Foundation.” As you can see in this facsimile of the original publication, Rippon attributed the authorship simply to “K——.” …