I Stand Firm – Music Story

Paul pictures the Christian life as a battle. A battle against doubt, fear, deception, darkness. Paul instructs us to “Put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.”

Doubt and Fear vs. Pursuit of Holiness

When we experience pain, problems, and stress, we are tempted to pursue happiness. The battle we face is internal, a battle against doubt and fear. When life doesn’t go as we wish, Paul instructs us use the Word of God as a sword. We are to let God’s Word pierce us and transform our pursuit, from happiness to holiness.

Deception vs. Liberty

We live in a post-truth culture, a culture in which feelings trump facts. Jesus, not how we feel, is truth. His teachings are under attack. This battle is external, a battle against deceptive cultural norms, claims based on feelings. This battle is fought in the public arena for the right of Jesus followers to express truth. And after doing everything we can, Paul instructs us to stand our ground.

Darkness vs. Life

Jesus is the light. Darkness seeks to extinguish the light. Darkness rules where Jesus and his teachings are banned. When the day of evil comes, followers of Jesus may experience loss of property or livelihood, imprisonment, torture, even death. In the day of evil Paul instructs us to put on the full armor of God and stand firm.

From the album “Main Street” this video is scrolling playback of a song based on Ephesians 6:10-18.

Kathy

Click here to read Ephesians 6.

Print (PDF) and/or digital (MusicXML) sheet music is available for I Stand Firm.

Click here for PDF.

Click here for MusicXML.
(MusicXML™ is the standard open format for sharing digital sheet music. Check the help files in your music notation app for directions on importing MusicXML files.) 

Doxology – Music Story

The Doxology I grew up singing pales in comparison with the Doxology that ends Jude’s book.

                Now to him who is able

                to keep you from falling

                and to make you stand in his presence

                unblemished, faultless, and with great joy—

                to the only God our Savior

                through Jesus Christ our Lord,

                be glory, majesty, power, authority,

                before all time, now, and forevermore!

                Amen.[1]

From the album “A ChorusBook” this video is scrolling playback of the song.

Kathy

Jude is only 25 verses long. Click here to read Jude.

Click here to hear the Doxology I grew up singing.

Lead sheet (PDF) is available for Doxology.

Click here for PDF

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[1] The lyrics for Doxology are compiled from these versions of The Holy Bible:

Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen. (Jude 24 – 25 ESV)

Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen. (Jude 24 – 25 NASB)

To him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy—to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen. (Jude 24 – 25 NIV)

Now to him who is able to protect you from stumbling and to make you stand in the presence of his glory, without blemish and with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, power, and authority before all time, now and forever. Amen. (Jude 24 – 25 Christian Standard Bible)

And to Him who is able to guard you not stumbling, and to set you in the presence of His glory unblemished, in gladness, to the only wise God our Saviour, is glory and greatness, power and authority, both now and to all the ages! Amen. (Jude 24 – 25 Young’s Literal Translation)

Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen. (Jude 24 – 25 KJV)

 

The Trinity

Historic Christianity teaches that the Creator God of the Bible is Triune. The Creator is three Who’s and one What. The three Who’s are the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The one What is God. There is only one God. A recent survey revealed that many evangelical Christians are out of step with historic Christianity. 30% say Jesus is not God!

When I was in high school my neighborhood was homogeneous. A friend told me that I worshipped three Gods, not one. Her church taught that the Trinity is nonsense. I did not know how to respond. 

Times have changed. Today my neighborhood is diverse. Recently a group of us were discussing Jesus. The Muslim in our group said that Christians worship three Gods, not one. He worshipped one God, Allah. We were snacking on potato chips. He picked up three empty chip bags and said these three bags are not one. Three cannot be one. The Trinity is not logical. 

How would you respond? You might say that the Trinity is a mystery; it cannot be explained, yet it is true. But that would not address his misinformed potato chip bag analogy. It would not expose his straw man argument. It would not satisfy his thirst to know his Creator. 

Here is the presentation I gave last month on the Trinity. At the end I share how I responded.

Kathy

Click here for the results of the State of American Theology Study.

Print (PDF) and/or digital (MusicXML) sheet music is available for No God But One, a song featured in the presentation.

Click here for PDF.

Click here for MusicXML.

(MusicXML™ is the standard open format for sharing digital sheet music. Check the help files in your music notation app for directions on importing MusicXML files.) 

No God but One – Music Story

When I was five years old, I fell in love with the Creator. I fell in love with Jesus. I knew he loved me for the Bible told me so. It said that God loved me so much he sent Jesus to die for my sins. And because Jesus rose from the dead, I can live eternally. I asked Jesus to forgive me and be my Savior.

But that belief was challenged in high school. A friend told me it was not the Creator who died on the cross. One God couldn’t be the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. That was logically impossible. She also questioned my belief in the resurrection. I wanted to be a nurse and that meant taking science classes. My science textbooks told me that we were on the verge of discovering the pathway from molecules to man. We no longer needed a Creator to explain the universe.

I had lots of questions and wanted answers.

For thousands of years people believed the universe is eternal and unchanging. But the first verse in the Bible says the universe was created, it had a beginning. And other Old Testament verses tell us that the universe is expanding, it is being stretched out. The 2006 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded for the discovery that the universe, that is, space, energy, matter, and even time, had a beginning and has been continually expanding from that beginning, forming galaxies, stars, and planets. A beginning requires a Beginner, one who transcends space and time!

Not only that, I learned that triune things are common. Pre-med students learn about resonance theory in organic chemistry, a class not required for nursing students. Some molecules have more than one structure or resonance. Nitrate has three resonances. Nitrate is all three structures all the time, never just one of them. That’s exactly how Christians describe the Triune God! God is all three persons all the time, never just one of them.

As a nurse, I know that crucifixion is lethal. Jesus did die. Historians and critical New Testament scholars tell us that the primitive church recited creeds about Jesus years before any of the New Testament documents were written. Unbelieving scholars tell us that one of those creeds contains a list of people who saw Jesus alive after he died. That list can be dated to within three years or even months of Jesus crucifixion.

A Triune Creator with the power to create space, matter, energy, and time from nothing and stretch it out to the size it is today would have the power to enter his creation as a man, die for sinners, for me! and rise from the dead.

I fell in love with the Creator. I fell in love with Jesus. I know he loves me because the Bible tells me so. I know this is so because evidence from science and history confirm the Bible’s claims.

From the album “Main Street” this video is scrolling playback of the song.

Kathy

Click here to read what I learned about the Creed and here to read about the NASA satellite discovery that’s ‘like looking at God’.

You can get print (PDF) and/or digital (MusicXML™) sheet music for No God But One.

Click here for print sheet music for horn and organ. 

Click here for digital sheet music for horn and organ.
(MusicXML™ is the standard open format for sharing digital sheet music.
Check the help files in your music notation app for directions on importing MusicXML™ files.)