Thought for the day – Thursday 15th April 2020
How spiritual are you ? How much do you love God ? In effect, these questions ask the same thing just using different words. Your spirituality is measured by how much you love God and want to live your life in accord with his teaching.
Consider this hymn by Charles Wesley –
My God ! I know, I feel thee mine
And will not quit my claim,
Till all I have is lost in thine
And all renewed I am.
This is the first verse of a hymn published in 1740, a couple of years after his conversion which, in turn, occurred a few days before brother John had the same life-changing experience. Originally, the hymn had 12 verses rather than the 7 we find in Singing the Faith (no. 390).
It is a hymn about Christian experience and, more precisely, about growing in grace and holiness.
The opening words of the hymn are dramatic, perhaps the most dramatic of all his many hymns. The first line is persuasive in that it relates ‘knowing’ to ‘feeling’. Wesley is saying that the whole person is engaged in this relationship with a personal God – ‘my God’ – mind as well as emotion or spirit are involved. The second line (‘will not quit my claim’) shows the kind of determination and persistence similarly expressed in a hymn by Nahum Tate and Nicholas Brady
‘Through all the changing scenes of life,
In trouble and in joy,
The praises of my God shall still,
My heart and tongue employ‘(73 in H&P)
The third line of Wesley’s great hymn verges on the mystical, being so heavenly minded that you are absorbed with loving God to the exclusion of all else. The consequence of that burning love and commitment follows in line 4 – the work of the Holy Spirit coupled with the willing spirit of the believer results in renewal – ‘all renewed I am’