A Serious Call to Sing Our Song

In my Renovaré Book Club, we’ve been studying William Law’s spiritual classic, A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life.  Reading A Serious Call was a serious commitment for me to make. The other three books the club read this year were written by more modern authors (at least 20^th century) addressing more practical topics. But this one was first published in 1728 and while the writing has been updated a for modern consumption, the writing style still reflects that time period.   There are long run-on sentences I had to read several times to understand.  At times, I felt like the same thing was said five different ways within a few pages.  At moments when I’m reading, I just want to say, “Okay, William, were you paid by the word?  We get it.  Move on.”

 

Although I hesitated at the start, and despite its somewhat archaic writing style, I’ve enjoyed reading A Serious Call.  I begin to see why the book is considered a “classic,” having influenced the formation of John and Charles Wesley, George Whitfield, John Newton, and William Wilberforce, among others.  While Law and I certainly part company theologically at moments (e.g., his overemphasis on works-righteousness and rigid, legalistic descriptions of practices), having now read through a good chunk of the book, I now begin to see that Law had a method to his madness.  He was trying to get the attention of the people of his time, many of whom had become lukewarm in their pursuit of holiness and needed a wake-up call.   He wanted to remind his readers that the Christian life isn’t a passive endeavor. As the title of the book implies, the choice to follow Jesus is not to be taken lightly.  It’s a “serious call” that is worthy of our best effort to pursue growth in holiness and devotion.  While we never can do enough to earn our salvation, we always need to put forth maximum effort in pursuit of it.   

 

Law’s choice of writing style was most likely quite intentional.  He used the age-old writing technique of hyperbole to emphasize the urgency of the subject matter he discusses.  He intended to provoke his readers to take action—now—to grow in holiness.  I think the book is a classic precisely because, if we can get past the somewhat archaic wording, his words have the potential to issue the same “serious call,” and provoke the same reaction in us today.

 

Paul counsels the Philippians to: work out your own salvation with fear and trembling—Philippians 2:12.   It strikes me that the word workout is used in today’s vernacular to describe physical exercise.  We expect to exert effort in this context; sometimes we use the adage, “no pain, no gain.”  We expect to sweat when we work out our bodies.  But what about spiritual workouts?  Do we expect them to be similarly strenuous?  Or do we expect spiritual growth to just happen with minimal effort on our part?  

 

Law, I think, would think it as absurd to suggest that spiritual growth can happen without serious—and ongoing—effort on our part, as it would be to think we can improve our physical body without a commitment to getting sweaty on a regular basis. 

 

The theme that carries throughout A Serious Call is that God does much more than merely forgive our disobedience, God also calls us to obedience and to a life completely centered in God.  That implies a lifetime of maximum effort on our part to grow as a follower of Jesus.  If we do our part, however, then we can trust God to do the part that only God can do.  

 

Law himself says it this way: “If you will here stop and ask yourself why you are not as pious as the primitive Christians were, your own heart will tell you that it is neither through ignorance or inability, but because you never thoroughly intended it.” 

 

Law resonates with Dallas Willard and other authors and theologians throughout history who have emphasized the vital role of intention (making up our mind to do something—and to make it a priority) in linking our vision of doing something we cannot presently do with the acquiring the means to pursue it.  Dallas Willard used the clever acronym V–I–M: Vision–Intention—Means—which reminds us of vim and vigor, which is used to describe something alive and thriving; another related v-word is vitality.  We can think of intention as the bridge to a thriving spiritual life.  Intention links vision to reality via various means of grace or spiritual practices.  

 

Willard echoed Law when he said in one of his books: “Grace is not opposed to effort, it is opposed to earning. Earning is an attitude. Effort is an action. Grace, you know, does not just have to do with forgiveness of sins alone.”     

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One technique Law uses that is rather clever is the use of what I might call “case studies.”  Throughout the book, he introduces us to individuals who embody the traits (whether positive or negative) that he’s been emphasizing in that chapter.  For example, in Chapters 7 and 8, Law discusses the proper use of one’s estate to serve God.  To illustrate his points, Law contrasts the lives of two sisters: Flavia and Miranda, whose parents died twenty years ago and left them a substantial estate.  Flavia talks a good game when it comes to religion, but her actions don’t match her words.  She chooses to primarily spend her wealth on herself, giving to others only what she has “left over” or when it benefits her to do so.  Miranda, on the other hand, walks the talk.  She keeps only what she needs for herself and gives the rest of her wealth away to the poor and to charity.  

 

Via these case studies, abstract theological concepts like those Law discusses in A Serious Call take on flesh and blood.  I have no idea if Law based Flavia and Miranda, or the others we meet in A Serious Call, on people he knew from his life in 18^th century England.   Whether the people are “real” or merely meant to serve as archetypes, I think it’s fair to say when we meet them we quickly “recognize” them.  That is, we’ve seen the traits in ourselves and/or in others we know.  They resonate with us because, adjusting for our 21^stcentury context—they are us.   

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After laying the groundwork of his overall thesis in the first part of the book, Law gets into more specifics about the particulars of different spiritual practices like prayer, worship, and fasting that can help us deepen our relationship with God.  He gets quite exact (perhaps too exact for my taste at moments) about what he recommends as the orthodox (proper) way to do things. 

 

For example, in Chapter 15, Law suggests that a key to entering into worship is singing psalms to God.  He almost immediately anticipates that some readers will object by saying that they “can’t sing.”  Choir leaders, does this sound familiar?  But Law isn’t buying it.  He argues that no one is exempt from the call to sing psalms.  Now, that doesn’t mean we’re all called to lead public singing.  Law recognizes that some people have special gifts and training in that area and are ideal candidates to lead public singing, while others (like me) are not—even though I try it occasionally .  But as Law says it: “All things considered, it is fully as just for a person to think himself excused from thinking upon God, from reasoning about his duty to God, or discoursing about the means of salvation because he has not these talents in any great degree, as for a person to think himself excused from singing the praises of God because he has not a fine ear or a musical voice.”

 

This chapter really resonated with me because the situation we face right now as we begin to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic and reengage public worship.  When we consider all the things COVID-19 has deprived us of over the last year, we could list many things that we’ve lost.  However, when it comes to public worship, I suspect singing may rank high on many people’s list.   At my church (Good Shepherd), we resumed public worship beginning on Easter Sunday, but we’re still advising against singing for the time being.  For some, I’m sure this seems like sacrilege.  How can we possibly worship God if we can’t sing?!  I get it; sometimes I feel that way too.  It’s such a part of our Methodist DNA to sing our praises to God.  What would Charles Wesley say?  Who are we without the ability to sing our songs?  

 

It’s been an interesting experience for me the past few Sundays as we’ve returned to worshipping in person—but been asked to refrain from singing.  I’m so used to using my voice to sing—and I may need to confess to singing softly under my mask at times.  However, God has also reminded that I have other senses that I can engage during worship.  I’m realizing that even though my voice is muted temporarily, the Song goes on.  The Song can ring in my heart while someone else leads the public singing.  If the words are on the screen, I can be intentional about engaging my mind to focus on them.  I can’t always do that when I’m singing with the Praise Team or even when I sing out loud during worship.  I’ve probably gotten overfamiliar with some songs, meaning that I just rattle them from memory without thinking about the words.  I might even sing the wrong words by rote—because I’ve forgotten what the lyrics actually say.

 At other times the last few weeks, I’ve also found myself engaging my eyes, looking up at the beautiful colored glass windows that adorn our sanctuary while our song leader sings.  The windows, if you will, surround us with our Song.  Have you ever taken time to notice?  The windows create a panorama, a compelling visio divina that starts in the rear of the right side of the church (looking forward) with Creation and other stories in Genesis depicted.  It continues forward clockwise with other Old Testament stories depicted.  It then moves into the New Testament and beyond, depicting the life of Jesus, the start of the Church, the start of the United Methodist Church, and the founding and building of Good Shepherd.  The final panel looks toward the future consummation of all things when Jesus returns to judge the world.  (There’s also a large Good Shepherd window in the center, above the altar.)

 

There’s also another source of beauty that God has reminded me of recently during worship.  I see it when I pay close attention to the expressions on the faces of others—yes, even when they are masked.  The Communion of Saints is always present when we worship, but it’s easy to get caught up in ourselves during worship and never notice.  Whenever we enter the Presence of God, who is eternal, the veil between past, present thins and there’s an opportunity to get a glimpse of how God always sees things.  Perhaps because my voice must be suppressed, our post-pandemic worship gatherings have heightened my awareness of this reality.  I suspect I am particularly sensitive to the saints right now because my dad passed away recently.  I’ve felt his presence at times the last couple of weeks, as well as that of my daughter Hope, and my grandmother. 

 

So, no, we can’t sing in the way we’re used to right now at Good Shepherd, and there’s no denying that I miss that—and look forward to the day we can.  However, in the meantime, I’m finding other ways to for the Song to go on within me—and I hope you are too.  

I think of the praise song lyric, “When the music fades, and all is stripped away”—even our voices—then what’s left?  Can we still find ways to sing our Song?  I think Law would say that, just like any other thing we do in life, worship and the pursuit of God is always worthy of our best effort, and sometimes that will require “thinking outside the box.”  My guess is that if he was alive today, during COVID, Law would encourage us to get creative in figuring out new ways to continue our serious pursuit of a devout and holy life, so that we can continue to grow in grace and reach as many as possible with God’s love.