Golden Days
H How can one hope to ever present,
A All that’s happened, event to event?
P Pretty high school girl, Winton Woods “date.”
P Pretty Tennessee bride, life’s soul mate.
Y Young marriage? Yes. God, His wisdom sent.
F Finances were often super tight
I In spite of work and homemaker’s might.
F Finished (always wed) B. A. degree,
T Teaching Hobe’s literature was to be.
I It introduced us to the sea’s sight.
E Eventually, teaching changed a bit,
T The Bible became more life’s great “hit.”
H Helping prepare workers for the field,
W Wishing to increase the Master’s yield,
E Ended in Friendsville – God’s timing fit.
D Dining, other duties tired my wife,
D Dual/triple “chores” consumed my own life.
I In eighty-five pulled out for AK:
N New roads, tent, campsites filled every day,
G God’s given pleasures, only slight strife.
A Andrew, Lincoln, Laura, and Heather
N Nested in Bryan’s nest together.
N Nice to each other, nice to Mom, Dad,
I In times when little was all we had.
V Vacations? – with long or short tether.
E Eventually each sought/found a mate.
R Rightly, their finds would be hard to rate,
S Seventeen “grands” bless Martha and me,
A A few near, but most “over the sea.”
R Rich we are – this side heaven’s grand gate.
Y Yield (all!) so you’ll live beyond the blue.
B Babe, you’re good for me, hope me you.
A Always ‘member, I’ve loved you always.
B Blessings on our own fiftieth days.
E “Edgar and Martha,” happy “young” two.
– eab,6/23/11
Separate-Holy 
Christopher Wordsworth – birth, Oct. 30, 1807
Posted in born today, poet British, today in history, uncategorized, tagged 10/30/1807, 127 hymns, 1807, 1885, archdeacon of Westminster, bishop of Lincoln, Bocking, born this date, Christopher, Christopher Wordsworth, Church of England, died 3/20/1885, England, Essex, Greek scholar, Harrow Boys School, Lincoln, nephew to William Wordsworth, O day of joy and light, O day of rest and gladness, published commentary of the Bible, today in history on October 30, 2009| Leave a Comment »
O day of rest and gladness, O day of joy and light,
O balm of care and sadness, most beautiful, most bright:
On Thee, the high and lowly, through ages joined in tune,
Sing holy, holy, holy, to the great God Triune.
On Thee, at the creation, the light first had its birth;
On Thee, for our salvation, Christ rose from depths of earth;
On Thee, our Lord, victorious, the Spirit sent from heaven,
And thus on Thee, most glorious, a triple light was given.
Thou art a port, protected from storms that round us rise;
A garden, intersected with streams of paradise;
Thou art a cooling fountain in life’s dry, dreary sand;
From thee, like Pisgah’s mountain, we view our promised land.
Thou art a holy ladder, where angels go and come;
Each Sunday finds us gladder, nearer to heaven, our home;
A day of sweet refection, thou art a day of love,
A day of resurrection from earth to things above.
Today on weary nations the heavenly manna falls;
To holy convocations the silver trumpet calls,
Where Gospel light is glowing with pure and radiant beams,
And living water flowing, with soul refreshing streams.
New graces ever gaining from this our day of rest,
We reach the rest remaining to spirits of the blessed.
To Holy Ghost be praises, to Father, and to Son;
The church her voice upraises to Thee, blessed Three in One.
Christopher Wordsworth was born this date 10/30/1807, Bocking, Essex, England. He was a nephew to William Wordsworth the poet. He was headmaster of Harrow Boys School and a member of the Church of England was archdeacon of Westminster and later bishop of Lincoln. Christopher was an outstanding Greek scholar and published many works, including a commentary of the Bible. Today we remember him for one of his 127 hymns “O Day of Rest and Gladness.” He died 3/20/1885 at Lincoln, England.
His statement about hymns is worth knowing, “It is the first duty of a hymn to teach sound doctrine and thence to save souls.”
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