Skip to main content

Category: Christianity

An Early Christian Hymn

Mashkioya 4 Comments

I’ve been studying Biblical Greek from quite a young age, and at times I wondered about the songs the first Christians sang. I figured many of them must have been in Greek, but have any of these hymns survived to the present day? As I researched this question recently, I discovered that there actually are Greek Christian hymns that have come to us through the ages from the early years of the church. That is, we have the hymns themselves, but not the music to which they were set.

However, in Oxyrhynchus, Egypt, someone came across a very unique papyrus–one of a kind, in fact–on which someone had written a Christian hymn to the Trinity, along with Greek musical notation.

You may not have known that the Greeks knew how to write music. Well, they did, and were quite advanced in their ideas of modes and music theory. But the importance of this little piece of papyrus that someone threw in an Egyptian rubbish heap ages ago is not that it has music (there is a good amount of extant Ancient Greek music), but that it is a spiritual song from the time when most all such songs were written with only the words–if they were written at all. Read More

The Geologic Timetable

Mashkioya Leave a comment

If you go to a museum and look at fossils, you can be almost certain that they will tell you of millions or billions of years ago when these fossils were made. The evolutionists have constructed what is called the Geologic Timetable. It is displayed in most places as if it were fact, just as a timeline of American history might be displayed at a museum, although in fact it is nothing but a list of geologic strata put together from an evolutionist’s imagination. Wayne Jackson described it well in “The Geologic Timetable,” an article printed in the Gospel Advocate:

“The truth of the matter is, this timetable is nothing more than a graphic conglomeration of assumptions that has been thrown together arbitrarily in an attempt to support the unprovable hypothesis of evolution. The concept of the geologic timetable conflicts with both the biblical record and the evidence of science.”

There are many facts that show the timetable to be incorrect, and here are a few of them:

  • Nowhere does the entire stack of geologic strata occur, and in some places they are out of order!
  • Human footprints have been found in the section of the timetable called the Paleozoic age, 250,000,000 years before people were supposed to have evolved!
  • Evolutionists say that the coal present today was formed in the same age, supposedly two-hundred and fifty million years before people. However, many different man-made objects such as tools and hats have been found embedded in coal.

As you can see, it is ridiculous that one would think that this Geologic Timetable is correct! However, it is a shame to go to museum after museum and see the same timetable displayed. At Palo Duro Canyon State Park, there’s even a big picture of it.

Sing an Old Song to the Lord!

Mashkioya 2 Comments

Of late my wandering interests have entered the territory of traditional hymnody, sparked by my acquisition of an 1854 copy of William Walker’s Southern Harmony & Musical Companion. This hymnal introduced me to the style of sacred music that is well known in modern times as “Sacred Harp,” after a popular hymnal that has seen continuous use until the present day.

Although I will probably have more to say about such music in subsequent posts, here I shall remark upon the differences between this and modern sacred music.

As a member of the church of Christ, the singing I have grown up with is not as different from the early 19th century hymns, as compared to the music of the denominations. Read More

The Parable of the Lost Sheep

Mashkioya Leave a comment

And he spake unto them this parable, saying, What man of you, having a hundred sheep, and having lost one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it? And when he hath found it, he layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he cometh home, he calleth together his friends and his neighbors, saying unto them, Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost. I say unto you, that even so there shall be joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine righteous persons, who need no repentance.
(Luke 15:3-7)

In this parable, Jesus uses the example of a man who had lost one sheep out of his flock of one hundred, who left the ninety nine to save the one.
Jesus compared this to a sinner repenting, and that there is more joy in heaven over one sinner that repents than over ninety nine righteous people.
What Jesus was saying is similar to what He said in Mark 2:17:

And when Jesus heard it, he saith unto them, They that are whole have no need of a physician, but they that are sick: I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.

The scribes of the Pharisees had previously asked Jesus why he ate and drank with the publicans and sinners, and He replied by telling them that people who are in good health have no need of a physician, only those who are sick. Jesus was pointing out that he had come “to seek and save that which was lost.” (Luke 19:10).

In the same way, the shepherd in the parable was more worried over the one sheep which had strayed than the ninety and nine which were safe.

As Christians, we should be more aware of all the lost people we come in contact with each day. Often we stay with our Christian friends and never go out in the world to teach the gospel to sinners. We need to remember that “there shall be joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine righteous persons, who need no repentance.”

The Work of the Maker

Mashkioya Leave a comment

As from afar I gaze upon
The forest’s beauty, and then beyond,
With eyes of awe I soon can see
The leaves and boughs of every tree.

A close inspection now is meet,
So I, now stooping, near my feet
Behold the vein茅d grass’s leaves
And tiny ants as small as fleas.

I hear a rustling in the grass–
And see a shining beetle pass.
What wondrous things I see and hear:
A bird’s song falling to my ear.

Though some may scoff and others laugh
And deem our pious faith but chaff,
Here is the answer all have sought:
What wondrous things that God hath wrought!

Nature’s splendor thrills me so,
To see the nimble spider go,
To watch the vulture in the breeze;
There is design behind all these.
And that ’tis true, I surely know
For God in His Word tells me so.