I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, will give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation that makes God known to you. I pray that the eyes of your heart will have enough light to see what is the hope of God’s call, what is the richness of God’s glorious inheritance among believers, and what is the overwhelming greatness of God’s power that is working among us…
Ephesians 1:17-19
First, thank you to the many, many people who read yesterday’s post (If you missed it, please go back and read – carefully – “Enough with the Viral ‘Why I Quit Ministry’ Posts”).
Then, this morning, we had another good Sunday with our faith community at Hudson Memorial Presbyterian Church. It’s already late afternoon, but I wanted to share this short excerpt that represents our liturgical alternative to the traditional wording of The Doxology.
“Praise God from whom all blessings flow,
Brian Wren (published in the Glory to God hymnal)
Praise God, all creatures high and low.
Alleluia, alleluia!
Praise God in Jesus fully known: Creator, Word and Spirit one.
Alleluia, alleluia! Alleluia, alleluia! Alleluia!”
I especially love this wording for the way it represents the nature of the Godhead. This rendition gets away from the tiresome and inaccurate attribution of maleness to God (exclusively) when thorough and thoughtful biblical scholarship knows that God is so much more deep and rich and complex than that.
Throughout my life I have found that language, the words we use and how we use them, matters a lot. The more work we do to eliminate exclusive language in our day to day reading and speaking, then the more sexist attitudes and then behaviors disappear too.
Sometimes – and science has proved this – simply tweaking the language we use makes deep changes in how we think even without our intention to think differently. So, yes, there is a direct connection between sexist and exclusive language and then ideology and ultimately behavior.
As a writer, I am very excited to know that words can – and will – change minds and communities and nations and eventually the whole world!
That’s my thought (planted in your consciousness!) for today – DEREK