The Praise! hymnbook: an open letter to David G. Preston
By Alan Macgregor
This letter, written by Rev. Alan Macgregor, minister of Wickford Reformed Baptist Church, is a response to David Preston’s article on the Praise! Web site (www.praise.org.uk). Although not originally intended for publication, we are grateful to the author for his kind permission to publish it in this form and to distribute it with the current Quarterly. We believe that many will find Mr. Macgregor’s letter helpful and that it will be of great use in the continuing debate over the publication of Praise! and the alarming downgrade that this new hymnbook represents. Malcolm H. Watts
Dear Mr. Preston,
I have recently read your response to John Thackway’s critique of “Praise!” and was very saddened by it. I do not in any sense object to your right to defend your publication if you earnestly believe that the honour of the Lord is better served by it. Healthy, reasoned debate is always helpful and can often be challenging. I personally believe that your efforts are misguided and that they will ultimately weaken the reformed position. Nonetheless, each of us must ultimately give an account to the Lord and must be bound by our consciences. What disturbs me, however, is the tone of your response. It is exceedingly strong and vehement. It seeks to wear the guise of righteous indignation, while underneath it is nothing more than a personal attack on a very gracious and godly man, who is seeking to uphold the Word of God and the glory of Christ in these wicked and evil days.
Regrettably, it seems to me that most of your arguments are nit-pickings blown up out of all proportion, while elsewhere you have sought to distort the truth of what Mr. Thackway is actually saying. “Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how to answer every man” (Colossians 4:6). This is no bar to forthrightness if it is in the right spirit, as I sincerely believe Mr. Thackway’s critique to be. After all, the apostle Paul writes in Galatians, chapter 2:11, “But, when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed.” It is an entirely different matter when forthrightness stoops to personal abuse.
You begin with an uncalled for remark, sarcastically saying “In October 2000, only two months after the publication of the Full Music Edition of ‘Praise!’ there appeared in the Bible League Quarterly a ferocious attack on the book, purporting to be a careful, objective review.” Firstly, it seems you choose to confuse the difference between forthrightness and ferocity. Then you insinuate that Mr. Thackway had but two months to read “Praise!” and write his article, seeking to suggest that his work was rushed, unresearched, and therefore invalid. You know full well that the Words Edition of “Praise!” came out in May 2000, and that there were pre-launch editions before that date. Mr. Thackway referred to this when he wrote on page 5 of his critique, “It has been a well trailed publication. A ‘Praise!’ preview appeared in 1998.” Why do you feel the need to blur the truth with the unnecessary and irrelevant mention of the Music Edition? Why not be open and honest, admitting that Mr. Thackway had much more time than you seek to suggest? “Be not a witness against thy neighbour without cause, and deceive not with thy lips” (Proverbs 24:28).
Sadly, your opening remarks reflect the whole tone of your article, which appears to be designed to score points dishonestly and ridicule Mr. Thackway. It appears to have nothing to do with upholding the honour of the Saviour.
You write of Mr. Thackway, “He assures us he has ‘carefully gone through’ the contents (page 6). It is not altogether clear what he means. When in BLQ the Appendix lists the first lines of all the CH hymns dropped by ‘Praise!’ it included no less than 11 that are in our book.” It seems to me that you are attempting to mislead your readers by suggesting that Mr. Thackway’s remarks also refer to the appendix list of those hymns missed out by “Praise” when in actual fact his remarks are aimed at the content of “Praise”. What he says is, “Like any book, however, its contents are what matters. As I have carefully gone through these, I have tried to be objective and fair.” He is honest in saying he did a “quick count,” which, “reveals that out of its 976 items, 502 are by living authors, or by those who have recently died” (Page 6). A “quick count” does not, as you seek to imply, suggest that he took the same care in adding up the number of items, as he did with his consideration of the contents.
As you point out in your article, he is slightly out in his figures, but that hardly undermines his arguments that, so much of the book is contemporary material leaving much less room for well-established hymns.
You make great play of saying, “Another alleged absentee was ‘Come, O Fount of every blessing’ … Mr. Thackway’s careful study missed it altogether. How that could be I cannot comprehend.” The remark is again unnecessarily sarcastic. If you turn to page 29 of Mr. Thackway’s critique – The Appendix – he writes “If ‘Praise!’ is adopted the following hymns from Christian Hymns would no longer be sung.” I looked down the list of omissions from ‘Praise!’ and the aforementioned hymn is not listed, indicating that it is not an omission from your book. Even if he had listed it, your point would only be a very minor one. This hardly brings a monumental blow to Mr. Thackway’s case.
I noticed that in your efforts to ridicule Mr. Thackway’s critique you only refer to Luther’s hymn in the German: “Ein feste Burg.” Is that because the rendering in “Praise” is so different that it may not be easily recognized as “A Safe stronghold our God is still” by anyone looking through the Index, and therefore could genuinely be overlooked? The same no doubt could apply to other hymns that were missed.
You also write of Mr. Thackway, “The only good word he has to say about the book is on page 20.” Again, this is not true. On Page 6, he writes, “Physically, ‘Praise!’ is like no other hymnbook. It has a distinctive narrow shape; sturdy covers in a striking shade of blue, and attractive silver grey lettering. This makes for a beautiful looking volume.” On page 9, he writes, “It opens with a section entitled ‘psalms’, and contains 150 psalm versions. This is similar to Spurgeon’s Our Own Hymn Book, and its modern successor at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, ‘Psalms and Hymns of Reformed Worship.’ Sometimes alternative versions are given. Restoring the whole Psalter to a worthy place in Christian worship is a necessary and excellent thing”. He also writes on page 20 (which you also chose to omit in your response), “It is reassuring to see the retention of references to the blood of Christ, the wrath of God, etc, which are often omitted in liberal hymn books.”
You write on page 2 of your article of Mr. Thackway’s use of “vague generalisations” and then you proceed to take phrases out of context in an effort to support your own rhetoric. You quote “a huge amount, page 7,” but to what is Mr. Thackway referring? You carefully do not tell us, yet it is clear he is making a comparison with “Christian Hymns.” He says “… nearly two-thirds (you quote 56.6%) of the hymns we have sung for more than twenty years are dumped in favour of a huge amount of modern material.” From your own careful count you acknowledge “366 modern hymns and songs: 44.3%.” Mr. Thackway is perfectly entitled to call that “a huge amount of modern material.”
Again, you quote “an inordinate amount, page 10.” Once more, we must look at the context. Mr. Thackway writes “However, the psalm versions in ‘Praise!’ are all, with the exception of a handful, modern renderings, quite loosely paraphrased. Apart from 9, all are by modern authors, and most of these by Christopher Idle and David Preston (34 and 43 psalm versions respectively). This is an inordinate amount of material from just two men.”
It is a right and just concern in these days of spiritual barrenness in the land – where much of the professing Church is like Laodicia, “neither cold nor hot” – that this is not the time to be discarding in abundance much which came by the grace of God from former ages, when the Church was in a much healthier state. Putting it in this context, we are nearly all of us spiritual dwarfs compared to the godly giants of the past; and in this sense, I believe 77 psalm versions by two living authors is “an inordinate amount.” I do trust that your barbed attack had nothing to do with the fact that you wrote 43 of them.
Again, you quote from Mr. Thackway, “a lot of this psalm, page 11.” Once more, it is necessary to look at it in context. Mr. Thackway writes, “Space forbids further analysis, but compressing 20 verses into 5 double ones means a lot of this psalm is lost or merged into other verses.” Here again facts are stated.
Your piecemeal quotes are heaped together and out of context in an attempt to make the Bible League critique appear unfounded and vague in its assertions. The “vague generalisations” seem to be coming from you, and sadly, they seem to be calculatingly vague in order to discredit Mr. Thackway. This dishonest tactic of seeking to discredit is once again seen in your next paragraph where you write of Mr. Thackway, “His review starts with an error (page 5).” You continue “’Praise!’ is not the first major Reformed hymnbook since the 1970’s. Dr Masters’ fine ‘Psalms and Hymns of Reformed Worship’ (PHRW) appeared in 1991.” You know full well, or ought to, if you have researched the matter, that as fine as “Psalms and Hymns of Reformed Worship” is, it was published mainly for the members of the Metropolitan Tabernacle, and though some other churches have purchased it, the numbers are not great. It has not gained wide acceptance, and so, in that sense, it is not major in terms of its use. However, once again your comments reveal that you are clutching at straws in your attempts to discredit Mr. Thackway. You are majoring on minor points, which do nothing to overturn the thrust of Mr. Thackway’s critique.
The manipulating style of your response is once again evident when you write of Mr. Thackway, “But here his ignorance of hymnbooks in general, and Reformed hymnbooks in particular, becomes apparent. Does he not appreciate that PHRW ‘dumped’ over 480 items (53.6% of CH including ‘All people that on earth do dwell’, ‘All hail the power of Jesus’ Name,’ ‘Thine be the Glory,’ and all of Vernon Higham.)…etc.” Yes, it is true that over 480 items that appear in “Christian Hymns” do not appear in PHRW, but they were replaced by other old hymns with strong doctrinal content that do not appear in “Christian Hymns.” Mr. Thackway’s point, as you well know, is his concern about the number of modern hymns and songs in “Praise!” that replace those which were written in a more godly age. He questions the wisdom of having over 30 Graham Kendrick items in what purports to be a major reformed worship book. Your comparisons do not hold up.
Surely, in these days when the Reformed Faith is under such attack it is unwise to choose as many as 34 items by an author who is far from reformed. You write, it appears with some smug satisfaction, “On page 1 of his preface to OOHB (Our Own Hymnbook), Spurgeon wrote, ‘Whatever may be thought of our taste we have used it without prejudice, and a good hymn has not been rejected because of the character of its author, or the heresies of the church in whose hymnal it first occurred; so long as the language and the spirit commended the hymn to our heart we included it, and believe that we have enriched our collection thereby.'” Do you honestly think that Spurgeon would approve of 34 items by an unsound author when the Reformed Faith is under severe attack? Spurgeon wrote those words well before the Downgrade Controversy and he was referring to one or two hymns. It is well known that Kendrick comes from a tradition seeking to bring entertainment into the Church under the guise of lively worship. C.H. Spurgeon had this to say on such matters, “By semi- dramatic performances they make houses of prayer to approximate the theatre. They turn their services into musical displays, and their sermons into political harangues or philosophical essays. In fact, they exchange the temple for the theatre, and turn ministers of God into actors, whose business it is to amuse men.” The items you have chosen by Kendrick may not conflict with reformed doctrine, but they are hardly packed with theology such as the likes of Isaac Watts, and the inclusion of so many of Kendrick’s items sends a signal that he is a trusted and sound author. Would it not be more discerning to have “carefully chosen …. a wide spectrum of Christian doctrine,” from some other more reliable source, rather than flippantly saying, “Which of these texts does Mr. Thackway object to?”
Again, there is great sarcasm, when you write “Mr. Thackway’s last paragraph is quite staggering. ‘The unique value of psalm-singing is that we offer to God in worship the very words He has inspired and authorised,’ (I wonder if that last word is a Freudian slip).”
It is clear from your remark that you are no lover of the Authorised Version but what, I ask, is so staggering about the people of God wanting to worship Him in the very words He has inspired and authorised? The Psalms are unique, in that they are the only hymns we have which are inspired by God for His people to sing. The Scottish Metrical Psalter is a translation of the Hebrew text in metrical form. Whilst I accept that no translation of Scripture can ever be perfect because man’s efforts are involved, nevertheless, is it not a noble object to seek to sing the Psalms in the closest possible form? I fully accept that not all believers see that necessity, but surely, such a desire in some can hardly be described as “staggering.” Perhaps what is “staggering” is that you should think it so.
You write, “Mr. Thackway protests against editorial changes to texts, as though that were something unusual. This is yet another area where he simply does not know his
3
facts.” Again these are very ungracious and pointed remarks which only serve to twist the truth. Mr. Thackway clearly points out that Wesley’s alteration of Watts’ paraphrase of Psalm 100 was a good thing. He writes, “No one would deny that this was a valuable improvement.” He goes on to say, “Neither would anyone quibble at the altering of some expressions that make sacred poetry sound ridiculous today.” Your remarks are a fabrication, designed to undermine the integrity of a godly man. What Mr. Thackway is rightly concerned about is changes that water down or alter the doctrine of the original hymns.
You accuse Mr. Thackway of “a battery of pejorative expressions,” all of which, you say, are groundless. In your concluding paragraph, you make the accusation that Mr. Thackway and his like are “hurling abuse at our fellow believers in 1990s slang.” In relation to other derisive comments in your final paragraph, it is worthwhile noting that the Metropolitan Tabernacle has probably grown more under the Lord in the last 30 years than any other reformed work in the country. There were but a handful of members in the early 1970s, yet now that very large building is practically full with many, many people being wonderfully saved. It has a very diverse ethnic mix, a huge Sunday School, and a great worldwide influence. It has been wonderfully blessed by the Lord, and all this on what you scathingly refer to as 17th century scriptures, 18th century singing, 19th century praying and 20th century preaching. What right have you to make such assertions? The Metropolitan Tabernacle is by no means the only favoured and blessed church practising what you here deride.
I am sure that I am not the only one who is greatly saddened that, as a professing Christian, you should seek to mock and ridicule another in such a personal and abrasive manner. It is one thing to stand for the truth: it is quite another to hurl personal insults. You accuse Mr. Thackway, “his hectoring tone are typical devices of the intellectual terrorist.” Perhaps you had better read your own article again. Mr. Thackway’s article was a critique born of a heartfelt concern for spiritual integrity; yours is, I fear at times, a thinly-veiled character assassination. Let me quote from John Newton:
Zeal is that pure and heavenly flame
The fire of love supplies;
While that which often bears the name
Is self in a disguise.
True zeal is merciful and mild,
Can pity and forbear:
The false is headstrong, fierce, and wild,
And breathes revenge and war.
Your response reveals you to be a scholarly man with a weak argument. Sadly, it also displays at times a spirit of injured pride that seems intent on unfair and uncalled-for humiliation in an attempt to strengthen your own argument. For all your protestations, your argument when examined, does not really address the main concerns of the Bible League critique.
You cannot throw out good church heritage and replace it with weaker theology (such as Graham Kendrick’s work) just because it is modern, without expecting to be challenged. Someone has challenged this, and you have dismissed him as ignorant, stuck in the past and irrelevant. Surely, if you wanted your argument to be taken seriously it would have been better to have addressed the challenge, rather than to personally attack Mr. Thackway. Your remarks may appeal to some. They do nothing for the honour of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Yours Sincerely,
Alan Macgregor