Stornoway Minister’s Blog

The following is a monthly article written by Rev Kenneth Stewart to the Stornoway RCS congregation…

Dear congregation,

I hope it is as edifying for you as it is for me to be singing the psalms in the worship of God. For myself, it is a particular privilege to be able to sing them in a congregation where they are ably led, by several precentors, and heartily sung – two qualities belonging to our sung praise which are being enhanced, with our gratitude, by the work of John-Ross in the psalm class.

Professor R A Finlayson, much appreciated and respected as a preacher and as a teacher of theology in what was the Free Church College in the mid-20^th century, was a powerful advocate of exclusive psalm singing in worship. Incidentally, and as this extract will show, he also appreciated songs other than the psalms out with the context of worship.

I don’t know where I came across this extract (if any of you recognise it, let me know!) but it is from an address given to the Women’s Foreign Missions Association in May 1965. Somehow, it came to be stored on my computer! I’m fairly sure, from the form of the extract, that it is extracted from the spoken than the written word. In light of that, I have made one or two slight adjustments none of which affect the sense of what was said – which is as follows:

‘Some years ago, I was on a visit to the Hebrides at a communion season and I met there a Harris lady, an elderly lady, who interested me greatly because she had very definite bardic gifts. I had read a song of hers, years before, that had deeply touched me. It was on the love of God. In the song, she traced the everlasting love of God as an undercurrent through the Old Testament until it surfaced at Calvary where the well was opened for sin and for uncleanness.

Read the rest of this post on the Stornoway website.