Well, I finally watched A Great Awakening (2026), the new movie about the friendship between the Rev. George Whitefield and Benjamin Franklin and I loved it.
It is available to rent on Amazon Prime. I have the DVD, because I will definitely watch it again. And you know how I feel about physical media.
As Greg Morse writes, “The story of the man whom God used to spark revival on two continents cannot be fully told in a running time of just over two hours. Whitefield was a force, a hurricane that swept through Britain and the colonies with Christian zeal, resistless spirituality, and renowned oratory. The facts are almost unbelievable. On many weeks, he preached nearly as much, if not more, than he slept. When not preaching, he rode on horseback miles upon miles to his next speaking engagement. He preached and taught one thousand times every year for thirty years, most of the time to thousands of people, all without microphones and notes, and often outside. John Piper notes in his excellent sermon, ‘Estimates are that eighty percent of the entire population of the American colonies (this is before TV or radio) heard Whitefield at least once.'”
Yes, it is an amazing story and this movie tells it well. The production values are high. I had never heard of anyone in it, but the acting is excellent. The direction is solid. It is not a Hallmark movie. It won’t win any awards, because it doesn’t check any of the woke boxes, but it checked all of mine.
How was your weekend? Mine was quite busy, so I needed a whole day to recover. Friday was a full day plus the fam came over for a little party that night. Then I spent the whole day Saturday at Innsbrook with my small group from church.
We had a wonderful time sitting around talking, eating our potluck lunch, sharing our spiritual concerns. And I got to take a ride on the pontoon boat. I was pretty tired by the time I got home! Nevertheless I roused myself and went to the early service at church on Sunday. I heard a good sermon on Psalm 33–our hope is in our faith in God, not in the things of this world. I was impressed by our young pastor who made a reference to The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) and its star Errol Flynn in the middle of his exegesis. Props to him for owning that movie! Then we had another great adult ed class on meditation and prayer, chapter 10 of Tim Keller’s book. This week it was led by my friend Dan, the optometrist. This has been such a good series!
After church I went to an estate sale at a really nice house. It was the second day, but I did find something–two lamps for daughter #2. Score!
Then I went to daughter #1’s pool with her, but we were only able to float for a short time before a storm rolled through and everyone had to clear the deck. C’est la vie. Wine time started a little early! Then I went home and collapsed, literally, before going back to church for the evening service which included a review of the PCA’s General Assembly meeting a few weeks ago. I was pleased to hear the update of our denomination, which is actually growing.
Here’s Andrew Ripp’s new song, which I really like (note pontoon boat):
Oh, I be singing! (and whistling)
Also, Union Pacific’s massive steam-powered Big Boy No. 4014 — 133 feet long and weighing in at 1.2 million pounds — passed through my flyover town yesterday and I heard it from my house. Quite a commotion of loud whistling–much more than the usual coal trains going through.
Crowds watch the train go through Kirkwood in 2021. (Webster-Kirkwood Times photo)
Are you having a good summer? It is half over already! Not that that matters to us retired folks.
Today we remember the day in 1799 when the Rosetta Stone was discovered in the Egyptian village of Rosetta by French Captain Pierre-François Bouchard during Napolean’s Egyptian Campaign. The stone is famous for being inscribed with three versions of a decree in Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, Demotic (the cursive Egyptian script used for daily purposes, meaning ‘language of the people’), and the Ancient Greek script. The Ancient Greek was translated into English in 1803. This allowed for the Egyptian hieroglyphics to be deciphered for the first time, by Jean-François Champollion in 1822. It now resides in the British Museum in London.
Pretty cool.
Here are a few things from the internet.
Yesterday was the first anniversary of the passing into glory of the great John MacArthur. Here’s a video reflecting on his life and ministry.
Interesting! Here’s a video about a German who moved to America to get married, only to discover most of what he thought he knew was wrong. “Two years ago, on July 1st, I moved from Germany to the United States of America. And I did not just move countries. I moved from a culture of caution into a culture of courage. And I was not ready for what [that] would do to me.”
Good advice! “The 80-year-olds I admire most were not born different. They made a thousand small choices, over decades, that compounded in their favor. You are making those same choices right now, whether you notice them or not. It is never too late, nor too early, to begin.”
And here’s a little Billy Strings for your Wednesday music treat:
Have a good day. Watch an old movie. Read an old book. Listen to some good Bluegrass music.
Well, June is gone and half the year has flown by with it. We are under an extreme heat warning here–it reached 98 degrees on Monday. Par for the course, as we like to say in flyover country. Thank goodness we have air conditioning and know how to use it so our senior citizens don’t die in droves. Personally, I get my chores done and run my errands early so I can stay home when it’s really hot. I can’t complain.
I found this essay to be insightful and rich in food for thought. “We cannot follow Jesus if our eyes follow everyone else. Chances are, if we spend significant time dwelling on our neighbors’ irksome habits and measuring their blessings against our own, we see little of God. Jesus redirects our gaze. If we study God’s infinite beauties, then when Jesus says, “Follow me!” no one will be able to stop us.” I dealt with envy early on, but I have suffered with a critical spirit most of my life. Seriously, I learned to be critical in kindergarten. I regret to say, I still wrestle with this particular sin. It is an ongoing battle…
Here’s good news! Scotland is not entirely lost. “First, the idea of buying and renovating an old granite Presbyterian church in downtown Aberdeen was impossible, then it was difficult, then it was done.” And thank God for Sinclair Ferguson!
Check out the beautiful plains coreopsis (Coreopsis tinctoria) in Don’s yard!
Yesterday the psalm of the day in my Bible reading plan was #95:
Oh come, let us sing to the Lord! Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation. 2 Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving; Let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms. 3 For the Lord is the great God, And the great King above all gods. 4 In His hand are the deep places of the earth; The heights of the hills are His also. 5 The sea is His, for He made it; And His hands formed the dry land.
6 Oh come, let us worship and bow down; Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker. 7 For He is our God, And we are the people of His pasture, And the sheep of His hand.
Today, if you will hear His voice: 8 “Do not harden your hearts, as in the rebellion, As in the day of trial in the wilderness, 9 When your fathers tested Me; They tried Me, though they saw My work. 10 For forty years I was grieved with that generation, And said, ‘It is a people who go astray in their hearts, And they do not know My ways.’ 11 So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’ ”
Immediately upon reading this I was transported back to the Episcopal church I attended as a child where we did Morning Prayer three Sunday mornings a month. We sang (or intoned) the Venite:
O come, let us sing unto the Lord; * let us heartily rejoice in the strength of our salvation. Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving * and show ourselves glad in him with psalms.
For the Lord is a great God, * and a great King above all gods. In his hand are all the corners of the earth, * and the strength of the hills is his also. The sea is his, and he made it, * and his hands prepared the dry land.
O come, let us worship and fall down, * and kneel before the Lord our Maker. For he is the Lord our God, * and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand.
O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness; * let the whole earth stand in awe of him. For he cometh, for he cometh to judge the earth, * and with righteousness to judge the world and the peoples with his truth.
(BCP, Rite I)
In this way, week after week, we memorized it. This is a good system in many ways–especially the intoning which aids memorization I think. Unfortunately in most Episcopal churches nowadays Morning Prayer is seldom read anymore. It is relegated, if at all, to an early morning weekday service no one attends. I also noted when I checked in my BCP that in Morning Prayer Rite II the final verse of the Venite is left out. Do they no longer believe that the Lord is coming to judge the world? Hmm.
Well, let’s just say that I thought that when I left I would miss the Episcopal liturgy a lot more than I do. In other words, not at all. And I still have multiple BCPs to read if I feel the urge.
On Tuesday night I went to the Strawberry Festival at Mudd’s Grove sponsored by the Kirkwood Historical Society. Since I’m on the board I felt compelled to go and eat ice cream with fresh strawberries on top. It was a lovely June evening…
…and I was proud of myself for choosing a seat at a table where I knew no one. I spent a pleasant hour talking to an old man who had lived his whole life in Kirkwood and remembered when it wasn’t such a fancy place. We shared a few good chuckles.
Anyway, it was nice to be out and about.
And I laughed so hard reading this, I literally wept–Drama in Real Life. Maybe you had to have had a station wagon with a “suicide bench” in the way back to relate, but I doubt it.
Have a good day and don’t be afraid to talk to the occasional stranger!
Can you believe it is the middle of June and the year is almost half over?! Good grief.
Sunday and Monday were spectacular weather days–low humidity, blue skies and temps in the seventies. We do not take days like that for granted here in flyover country, especially in June. And, of course, the Tiger Lilies are literally everywhere.
While cleaning out a drawer this weekend, I found several packs of Bible Tabs which the OM had purchased and never used 🙄. So I got it into my head to put them to use in my Reformation Study Bible which does not have them. Well, this is not as easy as it looks, let me tell you. After several false starts and giving up on the fancy leather tabs, I soldiered on and finally got into some semblance of a rhythm around I Samuel. I finished the job, but you can see there are some obvious gaffs. C’est la vie.
I do feel a certain sense of accomplishment. Thank you.
Meanwhile, here’s a good one about Paul’s “relentless call to relentless gratitude.”
And I really like this one from Andrea about Jesus seeing and healing us one at a time.
So count your blessings and be grateful that God is doing 10,000 things in your life every day.
I had to go to the doctor’s for an annual ‘well’ visit yesterday morning so I treated myself to a daytime John Wayne birthday screening of The Horse Soldiers (1959) in the afternoon. It was great, of course, a true tonic for what ails ya. At least for me. It is important to know what your tonic is. (Hopefully not drugs or alcohol.)
On the evening of Memorial Day, after my family had gone home, I watched Twelve O’Clock High (1949), which is Gregory Peck’s greatest film (except for To Kill aMockingbird). He should have won the Academy Award for his portrayal of Brig. General Frank Savage.
As I have said before, it is incredible to me how the pilots and crews of those B-17s managed to do what they did over and over again. It is no wonder that many succumbed to battle fatigue, which is what this movie addresses. The film made use of actual combat footage during the battle scenes and the results are impressive. If you haven’t viewed it recently, treat yourself.
I also cleaned my closet and threw away/gave away a ton of old shoes that I will never wear again. That feels good.
And here’s another good one from Kevin DeYoung about What We Need Most. “Our main problem is not lack of time or resources or the annoying people in our lives. Your main problem and my main problem is that we do not see enough the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”
(Prairie Peony)
And remember this:
“Only if your god can outrage and challenge you will you know that you worship the real God and not a figment of your imagination…If your god never disagrees with you, you might just be worshipping an idealized version of yourself.”
I had a very busy day yesterday with three–count ’em–events to attend. It was crazy, but I survived.
The first was a very chichi luncheon in Tower Grove Park to which I was invited by a dear friend. I had a lovely time and caught up with another old friend and talked to some people with whom I had weird connections.
The featured speaker was a “leading voice in ecological landscape design, pioneering a plant-systems approach that anticipates a changing future”–zut alors! It was actually quite interesting.
Then I went to the opening reception of an art and photography show at the Kirkwood Performing Arts Center where my co-editor of the Kirkwood Historical Review’s work was featured. I was so impressed with Ron’s photos! He has traveled all over the world, but his pictures are not, here’s the Eiffel Tower. They’re like, here’s a wall that looks like a Mondrian painting or here’s a crack in the ceiling that looks like Winston Churchill. Who knew 90-year old Ron was an artiste!
Finally, I went to the “Poetry Corner” at the Schaeffer House at my church to, yes, read poetry and discuss. I enjoyed it, but the chairs were very uncomfortable and it had been a long day, so I went home at the earliest opportunity. As daughter #1 says, I know how to break up a party.
Well, it’s good to get outside your comfort zone once in awhile. Read some poetry!
That’s a photo of an Allium (Allium giganteum) in Don’s yard. Isn’t it impressive? I’ve always wanted one in my yard. As he says, “Who doesn’t love a ball of purple stars?”
Well, I have been crossing items off my to-do list this week. And patting myself on the back as I go.
I also did my small group homework, reading Matthew 13…
“Hear then the parable of the sower: 19 When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is what was sown along the path. 20 As for what was sown on rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy, 21 yet he has no root in himself, but endures for a while, and when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately he falls away. 22 As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. 23 As for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it. He indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.”
Those darn thorns, right? He who has ears, let him hear.
Did you hear that the Department of Education is investigating my alma mater Smith College, one of the “Seven Sisters” all-female colleges, for violations of Title IX regarding discrimination on the basis of sex? “An all-women’s college loses all meaning if it is admitting biological males,” Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Kimberly Richey, said in a statement. Smith College changed its policy in 2015 to consider any applicant who self-identifies as a woman.
I am LOL-ing so hard.
And the Babylon Bee hits the nail on the head once again:
