Standing Up for Jesus
On Monday evening, when I was writing the post for yesterday, I wondered if wise men was one word or two, so I looked it up in an online dictionary. I was heartbroken when the dictionary made no mention of the wise men who came to see Jesus. My husband Ray is no reactionary, but he said that he believed there must have been a conscious decision not to mention it. I am very sad about that.
Noah Webster would be sad, too. In the late 1700s and early 1800s, he believed that America needed a dictionary with words Americans used every day, plus new scientific and technical words (he was “on the cutting edge”). When he published his Compendious Dictionary of the English Language in 1806, he defined 37,000 words. About one-eighth of those words were new words American authors used. Americans were enthusiastic. They felt patriotic about his truly American dictionary.
Webster continued to publish new editions. He reviewed the Greek, Latin, and Hebrew he had learned in college. He did research in America, England, and France. He studied Anglo-Saxon, Danish, French, German, Old Irish, Persian, Welsh, and other languages to better understand the origins of English words. Webster wrote on paper with a quill pen. After many years, he completed what he really wanted to finish, a dictionary with 70,000 words. He published his final version of the American Dictionary of the English Language in two volumes in 1828 at age 70. He recalled:
When I had come to the last word, I was seized with a trembling which made it somewhat difficult to hold my pen steady for writing. The cause seems to have been the thought that I might not then live to finish the work, or the thought that I was so near the end of my labors. But I summoned strength to finish the last word, and then walking about the room a few minutes, I recovered.
Webster’s definitions were excellent. Many people thought it was the best English dictionary in either America or England. His 1828 dictionary has many quotations from the Bible. Webster often used a Bible quotation or a Biblical teaching to explain a word’s meaning.
The powerful classic hymn that is coming to my mind this week is “Stand Up for Jesus,” written by George Duffield in 1858. Read the words and wonder with me what “unnumbered foes” Duffield was thinking of and then think about the unnumbered foes who want to remove so much of what we hold dear and what we know is true.
Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus
Stand up, stand up for Jesus
Ye soldiers of the cross;
Lift high His royal banner,
It must not suffer loss:
From vict’ry unto vict’ry
His army shall He lead,
‘Til ev’ry foe is vanquished,
And Christ is Lord indeed.
Stand up, stand up for Jesus,
The trumpet call obey;
Forth to the mighty conflict
In this His glorious day:
Ye that are men now serve Him
Against unnumbered foes;
Let courage rise with danger,
And strength to strength oppose.
Stand up, stand up for Jesus,
Stand in His strength alone;
The arm of flesh will fail you,
Ye dare not trust your own:
Put on the gospel armor,
And watching unto prayer,
Where duty calls, or danger,
Be never wanting there.
Stand up, stand up for Jesus,
The strife will not be long;
This day the noise of battle,
The next the victor’s song:
To him that overcometh
A crown of life shall be;
He with the King of glory
Shall reign eternally.
We must stand up for Jesus. Our children are depending on us.
Finally, be strong in the Lord
and in the strength of His might.
Put on the full armor of God,
so that you will be able to stand firm
against the schemes of the devil.
For our struggle is not against flesh and blood,
but against the rulers, against the powers,
against the world forces of this darkness,
against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places . . . .
Ephesians 6:10-12