The Bright Forever

Every experience God gives us, every person he puts in our lives is the perfect preparation for the future that only he can see. That's a quote by Corrie Ten Boom. Every experience God gives us, every person he puts in our lives is the perfect preparation for the future that only he can see. Welcome to the Bright Forever. Welcome to the Bright Forever. I am Andy Peavyhouse and I will be your host and your guide on this journey as we rediscover the power and the richness of found in some of the greatest hymns of the church. Now, this is a podcast that is a long time in the But the idea of me doing a podcast at all, I have wanted to record a podcast for a very, very, very long time and have just never done it. I've had all the equipment. I went and got all the equipment. My wife was very nice and let me get all the equipment that I needed because I was going to start a podcast and never did for a lot of reasons. One being it's really hard to find time to sit by yourself in a quiet room where there's little to no distractions when you have two, soon to be three, little girls all wanting and vying for your attention. Whether it's with their newest toy or a drawing or they're arguing or on and on and on, it can get pretty hectic. And I have an amazing life. Don't get me wrong. It's just always gotten in the way of me doing a podcast. Life is funny that way. So this is all new for me. This is me doing something that I never felt I had the time or the discipline to actually do. This is me having the time, having the direction, and hoping to speak into the lives of others who want or maybe need to hear what I have to say. The topic of this podcast is something that over the last few months has become increasingly more important to me. I look at my girls and the one on the way, and I think I haven't really given them the information that I was given by their age. I haven't given them that sense of awe with regards to faith and music and hymns that I had. I grew up in a First Baptist church. My aunt was my choir director for pretty much all of elementary school. I think all of elementary school, actually. And one of the things that she strived to do in us and in that choir was for us to learn hymns. We had prizes for if we memorized hymns. And so I I memorized hymns like crazy and I loved doing it. I got these hymns instilled in my heart. Like I know them. I know some hymns as well as I know scripture. And it's because I just loved music and I love singing. And so I started thinking about this and going, I want to impart this to my girls. I want to impart this knowledge of this faith that I found in hymns to them. And I really haven't done it. And so I'm not saying that we're not involved in church and that they're not involved in church. They absolutely are. My 10-year-old runs the screens and is a whiz at running ProPresenter at the age of 10 and has been running it For about a year and a half now, she actually started when she was nine and she loves to serve. She absolutely loves to serve. My eight-year-old stands in the middle of the congregation and sings her heart out. We have heard from multiple people how she brings them such joy when they see her because of just the exuberant praise and worship that she sings. And it really is amazing to behold. I can be standing on stage leading a song and I can hear her voice in the congregation praising God at the top of her lungs. I can look at my girls and think, wow, thank you, God, for girls that love and want to serve. I absolutely can do that. But at the same time, I stop and I think, have I ever told them What songs have meant to me and what necessarily music has meant to me. Because honestly, for a kid who grew up with a speech impediment, and many of you are listening right now and going, you don't have a speech impediment, dude. Because either one I edited out or because I'm sitting alone by myself talking to myself, which I rarely stutter when I'm talking to myself. But music became my way of expressing myself because I stuttered, because I couldn't speak fluently, but I didn't stutter when I sang. So singing became my way of expressing what I wanted to say without having to speak. Music became infinitely more important. The words I sang became infinitely more important. And why I sang. became infinitely more important. My wife is a huge fan of the movie Elf, and I'm reminded of that scene where Jolie says she can't sing, and Buddy the Elf says, oh, it's easy. It's just like talking, except louder and longer, and you move your voice up and down. And no offense to Buddy the Elf, but for me, singing and talking were not the same thing. They were totally different. And where talking terrified me, singing seemed to set me free. Singing became a freeing experience for me. It was different from talking where I felt trapped by words. Public speaking horrified me. So you can imagine my surprise when I felt God calling me to be a pastor and a worship leader and later a teacher. I never in a million years would have thought that I would be on a stage in front of thousands of people singing and speaking, leading and teaching. My inner child is sometimes inside me going, what in the world are you doing? Step away from the mic before somebody gets hurt. Are you insane? People will hear you. They will point at you. They will laugh at you. They will make fun of you. What are you thinking? Music and singing became my way of dealing with or coping with the fact that I couldn't speak. So what music did I listen to? Well, obviously, I'm a Christian. So what music did I grow up with? Very simple. James Taylor. Simon and Garfunkel. John Denver, Johnny Cash, Vanilla Ice, MC Hammer and of course Bill and Gloria Gaither. Speaking of MC Hammer, though, I actually remember getting my first MC Hammer CD when I was 12. I turned 12 in 1990, and his album came out, I think it was earlier in that year, and I just wanted that album so bad. And I remember getting it, and I remember that same night I got it for my birthday, I got it taken away, once my parents saw what the lyrics said, which I think is hilarious when you think about it, because... The words and the ideas that are sung about and spoken about in songs today would make your grandma blush. And MC Hammer would literally today be called a clean rapper. But I got it taken away because of his lyrics. But I digress, which I'm guessing you will probably hear a lot of in this podcast. At least while I'm getting my feet wet with what I'm doing in this podcast, you're going to hear a lot and you're going to be suddenly going, wait a minute. I thought he was talking about hymns and I'm down this rabbit trail going a totally different way, but hopefully you will enjoy it. And hopefully you will get something out of it and have fun listening to all the rabbit trails that I end up going down. Um, wow. We are already at 10 minutes and I wasn't even expecting some of these to last 10 or 15 minutes, but we're already at 10 minutes. And so, um, And we haven't even started talking about the hymn that I want to talk about yet. But this podcast is called The Bright Forever. And so we're going to talk a little bit about that. We're going to talk about this hymn. So I say all of that to say this podcast begins with my kids. I want them to know what music has meant in my life and particularly how hymns have shaped me into the man I am today. I'll be introducing a new hymn to them each week, and we'll be talking through it and talking about who wrote it and why, what is significant about it to me and to maybe through history and the history of the church and things like that. And we'll be talking about the theology found in these hymns. And so this podcast will be kind of like a telling or at some point, and sometimes maybe a retelling of this journey with my girls. And what I'm learning along the way. So let's begin. The Bright Forever is actually the title of a hymn. By probably one of the most prolific hymn writers in history. And that would be Frances Jane Crosby. Or how she's widely known, Fanny Crosby. She was born in March of 1820. And at the age of 95, she was laid to rest in February of 1915. Having written over eight albums. Now, you can say a lot about her, but she was not a one-hit wonder. 8,000 hymns. By the end of the 19th century, Fannie Crosby was a household name. She became a public celebrity, personally acquainted with U.S. presidents and other notable people of her day. She was the first woman to formally speak in the chamber of the U.S. Senate in Washington, D.C. when she was asked to read one of her own poems. So suffice it to say, Fanny Crosby was quite an amazing woman. She wrote so many amazing hymns that have stood the test of time. Just off the top of my head, I can think of Blessed Assurance, Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior, I Am Thine, O Lord, To God Be the Glory, Take the World but Give Me Jesus. I can't even think of all of them because they're just swirling around in my head. She wrote so many priceless hymns of the church. One that I came across got me thinking, and it was called The Bright Forever. I love this hymn for two reasons. One, and you can find this on YouTube as well, but I'm going to go ahead and play it for you here. We have an Edison phonograph recording of this song from 1910, which to me is pretty cool. I sometimes wonder even if she was there when it was recorded. Probably not, but she was alive. So it's just a neat thought to actually think about, was she actually there when it was recorded? But here's a quick listen to the song recorded in 1910 by the Edison Quartet.

Breaking through the clouds and gathers, all the Christians made those skies. and beams like floods of glory fill the soul with glad surprise and we all won't hear the echo of the pure and holy song in the bright the bright forever in the summer land of song on the Okay, I just

think it's pretty cool. To have recordings like this from 19... The innovation of recording music owes everything to Thomas Edison, who invented the phonograph in December of 1877. The concept of wax cylinders as the best medium to produce sound on disc came about through his competition with Alexander Graham Bell. But Edison eventually beat Bell to the patent post by releasing his 1888 perfected phonograph. The phonograph's initial use was meant to archive and for transcription purposes. But at the turn of the century, it opened up the market for musical recordings with the introduction of these molded cylinders. And hymns enjoyed their heyday at this time. hymns were being recorded left and right. It's funny that a man by the name of Arthur Sullivan, who is actually credited with the first recorded song, The Lost Chord, was astonished at this technology, but he had reservations about it at the same time. At the time when he recorded this, he said, I can only say that I am astonished by And somewhat terrified at the result of this evening's experiments. Astonished at the wonderful power you have developed. And terrified at the thought that so much hideous and bad music may be put on record forever. Which is so true. How much bad music do we have recorded? recorded and archived for posterity forever and ever. So that's one of the reasons why I call this podcast The Bright Forever is because of this song. And I just kind of fell in love with this song and hearing the recording from 1910. But it's really the second reason that I love this song that explains everything. She's writing about the clouds breaking forth and the night skies and the golden fields and the evening shade in this bright forever on the banks beyond the river. She paints this beautiful picture of what we will see in heaven. But what is so astonishing about it is that she was blind. For all but the first six weeks of life, she couldn't see. Yet in her mind, God had painted a picture, a perfect picture of heaven that would one day be revealed to her. Fannie Crosby was born with sight, but was blinded at the age of six weeks and She had had some problems with her eyes and her regular doctor, the family doctor that they had was out of town. And so they brought in this country doctor who tried this remedy on her eyes that actually burned out the corneas in her eyes and she was left blind. But her lack of sight never deterred her. As a child, she didn't consider herself to be handicapped or different from any other children. In fact, she was able to do many of the other things that children that could see could do. She accepted her blindness with an outlook and an attitude of contentment. And this could be seen through a poem she wrote when she was just eight years old. Oh, what a happy soul am I, although I cannot see. I am resolved that in this world contented I will be. How many blessings I enjoy that other people don't. To weep and sigh because I'm blind. I cannot. And I won't. Years later, Fanny would say that these words that she wrote when she was just eight were the motto of her life. So I kind of have this weird kind of connection here. in the fact that she was blind for her whole life and I've stuttered my whole life. And we both have this thing that others would call a disability. But I will tell you this, I didn't have the positive outlook on my stuttering that Fanny had with her blindness. For a while, honestly, I resented God for it. It took a long time and a hard-fought journey to finally understand what it meant to be fearfully and wonderfully made. To see my stuttering not as a burden, but as a blessing. Another songwriter, a bit more contemporary, named Laura Story, wrote these words that truly changed my perspective on what is, quote-unquote, my disability. She writes this, What if my greatest disappointments or the aching of this life is the revealing of a greater thirst this world can't satisfy? And what if the trials of this life, the rain, the storms, the hardest nights are your mercies in disguise? Once when Finney Crosby was asked whether she wished she had her sight back, here's what she answered. Do you know that if at birth I had been able to make one petition, it would have been that I was born blind? Because when I get to heaven, the first face that shall ever gladden my sight will be that of my Savior. Now, I'm not sure I'm there yet. But I will say this. I'm a pretty sarcastic guy. Sometimes a little too sarcastic. And I think I stutter. Well, I think God knew that if I didn't stutter, I would be a jerk. I would be that guy that nobody wants around because he always has some quick-witted response or snappy retort or some snarky thing to say about somebody to bring them down or to pull them down. And sometimes I still do. But I can't even begin to tell you how many times I have not said something because I was afraid I was going to stutter when I said it. And it turned out to be the greatest blessing in disguise. God helped me, at least in part, to learn how to control my tongue through stuttering. Instead of being that mean, biting, sarcastic jerk, I've learned to stop and to think and to speak with at least a little compassion. So while Fannie Crosby is excited for that bright forever in which she will open her eyes and the first thing that will gladden her sight will be her savior's face. I'm excited for that bright forever. When I get to open my mouth and speak the name of my Lord and my savior with nothing hindering me, because there will be no more disfluency. There will be no more stuttering. There will be no more pain. There will be no more bullying. There will be no more sadness, no more sorrow. As she says, breaking through the clouds that gather or the Christian's natal skies, distant beams like floods of glory fill the soul with glad surprise. And we almost hear the echo of the pure and holy throng in the bright, the bright forever in the summer land of song. Yet a little while we linger, ere we reach our journey's end. Yet a little while of labor, ere the evening shades descend. Then we'll lay down to slumber, but the night will soon be o'er. In the bright, the bright forever, we shall wake to weep no more. Oh, the bliss of life eternal. Oh, the long unbroken rest in the golden fields of pleasure in the region of the blessed. But to see our dear Redeemer and before his throne to fall, there to bear his gracious welcome will be sweeter far than all. On the banks beyond the river, we shall meet no more to sever. In the bright, the bright forever, in the summer land of song. Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. Thank you for starting this journey with me. Please subscribe to the podcast either through Apple Podcasts or Spotify, Google, Stitcher, any of the ones you can find us on. You can also find us at www.thebrightforever.com and copy our RSS feed and put it into whatever podcast app you want. Also, we would love to hear from you. We want to hear what you think about the podcast. So send us your comments at podcast... at thebrightforever.com. Again, that's podcast at thebrightforever.com. Again, thank you for joining me. Thank you for listening. I hope you'll continue to enjoy this as we go through. And let me offer this prayer as we go. Father, thank you so much for who you are. Thank you for your word. Thank you for your son, Jesus Christ. Father, as we start this podcast and as we continue to go, help us to learn some amazing hymns. Help us to learn about some amazing hymn writers. Help us to deepen our theology and our understanding of who you are. And God, help us to see you do amazing things in us and in our families that yield eternal significance. God, we give you all of this This podcast, who we are, and everything that we can possibly be, we give it to you. In Jesus' name, amen. Have a great week, and I'll see you back here next week. Same bat time, same bat channel. See you later.

Thank you.