If you're visiting us, you're more than welcome. We're doing something slightly different tonight.
Normally we would have a service, we'd sing some songs, we'd crack open a portion of scripture and look at it together.
But because this is our last evening service before the summer, we thought we'd do something a little different.
I thought it would be a treat. Well, I think it's a treat, but you'll have to tell me afterwards whether it was a treat.
We're going to look at the life of Isaac Watts.
Paul exhorts the Colossians and he says this.
Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.
That's what Paul writes and there's a really enlightening assertion in that exhortation.
Singing, according to Paul, and we know this from experience, has a peculiar ability to penetrate the heart and resonate in the soul.
Looking back over your life, I dare say you can remember the choruses you sung at Sunday school much better than the memory verses that you learnt.
I bet you can remember the top 40 songs growing up much better than you can the paragraphs of the books that you read.
Therefore, what we sing isn't just a filler of time.
It's not just an option for the enthusiastic.
It's not just an opportunity to showcase our musical abilities.
Singing is a God-ordained means to grow hearts that are overflowing with the message of Christ.
We sing to help us learn of, focus on and respond to God in corporate worship.
So if this is the case, then Isaac Watts is a man worthy of our study.
The man aptly described as the father of hymnody, the pastor hymnologist, the scribe of experiential doctrine.
And his whole point was this, that theology must lead to doxology.
As we learn truths about God, it must lead us into authentic worship of God.
If you just have theology with no doxology, you've just got cold, dry orthodoxy.
That you know all the right stuff, but it hasn't penetrated your heart.
If you just have doxology without theology, then you're just singing for the sake of singing and it's an idol.
Because it's not informed about knowledge of God.
This was the big thing in Isaac Watts' life.
He wanted to teach truth, apply truth, and show people the right response to that truth.
And so that's who we're going to look at tonight.
So let's pray, and then we'll have a look at the life of Isaac Watts together.
I want to pray one of Isaac's hymns.
Let's pray.
Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly dove, with all thy quickening powers,
kindle a flame of sacred love in these cold hearts of ours.
Look how we grovel here below, fond of these trifling toys.
Our souls can neither fly nor go to reach eternal joys.
In vain we tune our formal songs, in vain we strive to rise.
Hosannas languish on our tongues, and our devotion dies.
Dear Lord, and shall we ever live at this poor dying rate?
Our love so faint, so cold to thee, and thine to us so great.
So come, Holy Spirit, heavenly dove, with all thy quickening powers.
Come shed abroad the Saviour's love, and that shall kindle us.
Amen.
The year is 1674.
The year of Isaac Watts' birth, and Britain is deeply troubled.
Eleven years before Isaac Watts was born,
the bubonic plague had swept through the country,
killing more than 100,000 people in London alone,
which was about a quarter of the total population of the capital city.
The city of Southampton, where Isaac Watts was born,
had almost been completely depopulated.
The town records talk about streets being overgrown with weeds,
because there was no one going along the thoroughfares.
1666 saw the great fire of London,
that had largely levelled the nation's capital.
So these big events add to the trouble that Britain was in,
but it was also in a tumultuous state,
when it looked at the religious and the political.
These affected Isaac Watts' life more than anything else.
The first half of the 18th century,
the 17th century saw the Roman Catholic Stuart monarchs
tried to assert their divine right to rule as absolutists
over both the church and the state.
Parliament became increasingly tokenistic,
and the two were inevitably to come to blows.
In 1642, Charles I engaged in a civil war with Parliament,
and he lost.
And he didn't just lose the battle, but he also lost his head,
because they beheaded him.
Oliver Cromwell assumed the role of Lord Protector,
and commenced efforts to unite the country in what was called the Commonwealth.
But he quickly found, as so many people in the past have,
real trouble with Scotland,
and with the Presbyterian Church in particular,
and so another civil war ensued.
Finally, in 1660, Parliament
invited Charles I's son, Charles II,
to assume the throne again,
thus reinstating the monarchy.
Think of all the monarchs in history,
Charles II definitely has the best hair.
Charles II, again,
sought to assert his divine right to rule
over both church and state.
This meant that he passed a law
that the Anglican Church was the only legitimate church,
and that everyone in the realm must attend
only an Anglican service.
The state of the Anglican Church is depicted in this painting by William Hogarth.
Hogarth depicts the minister preaching,
and his head is deeply buried in the books.
He's been going on a long time,
because the hourglass is almost completely empty of sand.
Not only has he been going on a long time,
and you can see it from the hourglass,
but all the congregation have fallen asleep.
Some of them have their mouths open,
and they're obviously snoring quite profusely.
The only person awake is the church clerk,
who's using the opportunity of a slumbering woman
to admire her ample bosom,
and to top it all.
You probably can't read it,
but the minister's text,
come to me, all who are weary,
and I will give you rest.
Thus, the act of uniformity,
saying you can only go to the Anglican Church,
was passed in 1662.
On the passing of the law,
2,000 Anglican ministers left the Church of England,
and became what are known as dissenters,
or non-conformists.
These Anglican ministers thought that the liturgy
of the Church of England
was still far too Roman Catholic,
and organised more by the traditions of men
than the content of the Bible.
These non-conformists were considered
a threat to the government,
and a potential cause of civil unrest.
There were a series of laws
inflicting heavy penalties
on those not conforming.
These included huge fines
that could be up to five years' wages
for a normal person.
They could be hefty prison sentences,
and people were even hanged
for not conforming.
If you didn't go to an Anglican service,
you were putting yourself in real danger.
It's at this time that we get the character
John Bunyan,
who was put in prison in Bedford for 12 years,
during which time he penned Pilgrim's Progress.
There was another non-conforming minister
called Nathaniel Robertson in Southampton.
He was the minister of All Saints Church,
but at the passing of the Act of Uniformity,
he left and started a new church
called Above Bar Church,
which continues to this day.
In fact, Roger Carswell was preaching there
this morning, and he will be preaching.
Well, probably not yet,
in about eight minutes tonight.
My parents went to Above Bar Church
when they lived in Southampton.
One of the church leaders of Above Bar Church
was a deacon,
whose name really helpfully
was also called Isaac Senior Watts.
He was a cloth maker.
He ran a boarding school.
And so on the 17th of July, 1674,
the day of Isaac Watts Jr.'s birth,
his father, Isaac Watts Sr.,
was serving a second prison sentence
for being a non-conformist.
His mother, Sarah Taunton Watts,
was a descendant from a French Protestant family
who had fled France in 1572
after the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre.
She would nurse Isaac on the steps
outside the prison,
conversing and encouraging her husband,
who was paying the highest price
for his convictions
about the way church was supposed to happen.
Isaac Watts Sr. would be in and out of prison
for all young Isaac's childhood,
and when not locked up,
he'd be in forced exile in London.
However, even in absence,
Isaac Watts Sr. took great responsibility
for bringing his children up
in the things of God.
In total, Isaac Sr. and Sarah
would have eight children,
of which Isaac Watts Jr. was the oldest,
but their two youngest daughters
wouldn't live beyond a year of life.
We have a lovely letter
preserved from Isaac Watts Sr.
to the family
during one of these exiles in London.
And I think it gives us an insight
into what a spiritual man he was
and what an influence he was
in the life of this man
that we're here to study, Isaac.
He starts the letter like this.
My dear children,
though it has pleased God
to suffer the malice of ungodly men,
the enemies of Jesus Christ
and my enemies for his sake,
to break out so far against me
is to remove me from you
in my personal habitation,
thereby at once bereaving me
of that comfort
which I might have hoped for
in the enjoyment of my family in peace,
and you of that education
which my love as a father
and duty as a parent requires me to give.
Yet such are the longings of my soul
for your good and prosperity,
especially in spiritual concernments,
that I remember you always with myself
in my daily prayers
addressed to the throne of grace.
Then he writes some further instructions.
He writes this about their Bible study.
I charge you frequently
to read the Holy Scriptures
and not as a task or burden laid on you,
but get your hearts
to delight in them daily.
He then writes about their sinful nature
and God's salvation.
He says to his six remaining children,
consider seriously
and often the sinful
and miserable estate
you are in by nature
and that you are liable
to eternal wrath thereupon.
Also think upon the way
of fallen man's recovery by grace
according to the foundational principles
of the Christian religion
which you have learnt in your catechism
and beg of God by prayer
to give you understanding in them
and faith to believe in Jesus Christ
and a heart willing to yield obedience
to his gospel commands in all things.
He says,
learn to know God
according to the discoveries
he has made of himself
in and by his word,
in all his glorious attributes
and infinite perfections.
Especially learn to know him
in and through the Lord Jesus Christ
and to be acquainted
with this blessed redeemer
of God's people.
He finishes the letter
with these words,
do not entertain any hard thoughts
of God or of his ways
because his people
are persecuted for them.
For Jesus Christ himself
was persecuted to death
by wicked men
for preaching the gospel
and doing good
and the holy apostles
and prophets
were cruelly treated
for serving God
in his own way.
Then he writes this,
consider your mother.
She is left alone
to bear all the burdens
of bringing you up
and is, as it were,
a widow.
Her time is filled up
with many cares
and therefore do not grieve her
by any rebellious
or disobedient ways
but be willing to learn
from her
and be ruled by her
that she may have
some comfort
in seeing your obedient courage
and that it will rejoice me
to hear these things.
These things I charge
and command you
with the authority
and love of a father.
Now commending you to God
and what I have written
to his blessing
upon your hearts
through Jesus Christ
with my dear love
to your mother.
It's quite a letter,
isn't it,
to send to small children
but it shows the gravity
with which he took
the responsibility
as a parent
and particularly
his earnestness
that they knew God.
Isaac was a precocious child.
He was literally a genius
and that word is so overused.
He started to learn Latin
from his father
at the age of four.
He started learning Greek
at nine,
French at ten
and Hebrew
at thirteen.
When he was six,
he started the free school
in Southampton,
now called
King Edward VI Grammar School
that has as its alumni
none other than
Dr. Robert Gemmell.
When once was seven,
his mother found
some handwritten poems
in his room
and asked whether Isaac
had written them.
Isaac said he had,
but his mother doubted
that a child so young
could write such verse.
So she got Isaac
to sit at the kitchen table
with a quill and paper
and said,
write something.
Instantly,
he wrote this,
I am a vile polluted lump
of earth,
so I've continued
since my birth.
Although Jehovah
grace does daily give me,
as sure as this monster
will deceive me,
come therefore,
Lord,
from Satan's claws
relieve me.
Wash me in thy blood,
O Christ,
and grace divine impart,
and search and try
the corners of my heart,
that I in all things
may be fit to do
service to thee
and sing thy praises too.
What if he did that
at six,
at seven?
Which is amazing
in itself,
but when you look
at the first letters
of each line,
it spells Isaac Watts.
It's pretty handy.
It was also while
at the free school
in Southampton
that he writes this
in his journal.
1698,
fell under considerable
conviction of sin.
1689,
was taught to trust
in Christ.
On leaving the free school
in 1690,
Watts had a massive
decision to make.
He was a real celebrity
by now,
this child genius
in Southampton,
and a really wealthy local
called Dr. Speed
took a keen interest
in Isaac.
And he said to the parents,
I want to pay for you
to go to university.
There were only
two university options.
One was Oxford.
The other was Cambridge.
It obviously wasn't
that special
to go to Oxford
or Cambridge back then
because you couldn't
go anywhere else.
There was only
one problem though.
You couldn't go to,
you could only go
to Oxford or Cambridge
if you were
an Anglican.
And so if you were
a non-conformist,
it wasn't open.
So he had a real choice
to make education
or conviction.
He declined the offer
from Dr. Speed
and set out
as a committed
non-conformist.
He enrolled
in a dissenting academy
which is where
non-conformists went
in Stoke Ewington
just outside London
under the tutelage
of Mr. Rowe.
He writes in his journal,
1690,
left grammar school
and came to London
to Mr. Rowe's
to study philosophy,
et cetera.
That word et cetera
is shorthand
for Latin, Greek,
Hebrew, maths,
history, geography,
natural sciences,
logic, rhetoric,
ethics, metaphysics,
anatomy, law,
and theology,
philosophy, et cetera.
This was in the midst
of the Enlightenment
where a revolution
of thought
was taking place.
Traditional education
of maxims
and givens
was being undercut
by investigation
evidence
and reason.
And so this is
a real interesting time
to be educated.
And we'll see
Watts has a lot
to say about this
in a little while.
One Sunday
in 1690,
Watts was home
during a holiday
from the
dissenting academy.
The family
were on a walk
after the church service.
When Isaac shouted,
the singing
of God's praise
is the part
of worship
closest to heaven,
but its performance
among us
is the worst
on earth.
Church singing
at the time
was almost
exclusively
psalm singing
with the occasional
singing
of the Lord's Prayer
or the Ten Commandments.
I mean,
the Ten Commandments
has got to be
a tough worship song.
Watts described
them as
ugly hymns
and that
he was offended
by the gawkiness,
dullness
and crudity
of expression.
He's not there
saying that he
didn't like the psalms
that they were ugly,
but he really hated
the way they'd been
translated
and tried to put
into some kind
of hymn form.
Isaac Watts
Sr. replied
to young Isaac's
outburst.
If you do not like
the hymns,
young man,
then give us
something better.
That afternoon,
Watts
inked his quill
and wrote a hymn
of eight stanzas
based on Revelation
chapter 5
verses 6 to 12.
This is the hymn.
Behold the glories
of the Lamb
amidst his
Father's throne.
Prepare new
honours for his
name and sing
songs before
unknown.
Let elders
worship at his
feet,
the church
adore around,
with vials
full of odour
sweet and harps
of sweeter sound.
Those are the
prayers of the
saints,
and these the
hymns they raise.
Jesus is kind
to our complaints,
he loves to hear
our praise.
Eternal Father,
who shall look
into thy secret
will,
who but the Son
should take the
book and open
every seal.
He shall fulfill
thy great decrees,
the Son deserves
it well.
Low in his hand
the sovereign keys
of heaven and
death and hell.
Now to the Lamb
that once was slain
be endless blessings
paid, salvation,
glory, joy remain
forever on thy head.
Thou hast redeemed
our souls with blood,
has set the
prisoner free,
has made us kings
and priests to God,
and we shall reign
with thee.
The worlds of nature
and of grace are put
beneath thy power,
then shorten these
delaying days,
and bring the
promised hour.
It's not bad for your
first go at a hymn,
I don't think.
I think you might have
a real future when it
comes to hymn writing.
And the most amazing
thing is it's not just
a new hymn,
but it's a new hymn
about new hymns.
So he's really a clever,
clever boy.
That night it was sung
for the first time
at Above Bar Church.
It was met with great
enthusiasm and joy
and they proceeded to
sing it nine times.
So if you have a problem
with repeating choruses,
it's really nothing near.
What's left the
dissenting academy in
1694 and returned home?
He simply writes in his diary,
dwelt at my father's house
two years and a quarter.
No one really knows
what he was doing
for two and a quarter years.
And then in 1696,
Isaac Watts was asked
by Sir John Hartop,
a wealthy, influential,
and devoted nonconformist,
to become the tutor
of his children.
He had six daughters
and one son.
Watts accepted a move
into the family's estate,
which was back
in Stoke Newington,
where he'd studied.
He performed this role
for three years.
During this time,
he wrote lots and lots
of textbooks for children
on all sorts of things,
on biology and astronomy,
on anatomy,
for use primarily
by the children,
but they were so good
that they were replicated
and everyone was using them
across the country.
Watts also took the responsibility
of teaching the Hartop children
about the Christian faith
and became very skilled
at communicating the gospel
to John Hart,
something that he's going
to become famous for
in a little while.
While he was there,
he also wrote this book,
which if you can't quite read,
it says,
Logic,
the right use of reason
in the inquiry
after the truth,
with a variety of rules
to guard against error
in the affairs of religion
and human life,
as well as in the sciences.
It was a book
that kicked back
against the Enlightenment,
that said,
actually,
everything we know,
we can find out ourselves.
And yet,
Isaac Watts wanted to say,
no,
there are some things
that need to be revealed
to us.
It was such a good book
that it became
the core textbook
on logic
at Oxford,
Cambridge,
and Yale,
the very institutions
institutions
that said,
we don't want you
as a non-conformist.
One of the great threads
of Isaac Watts' theology
is to try and say
that the Christian faith
is reasonable.
He was,
if you like,
an 18th century apologist.
He writes a lot
of theological textbooks.
He writes about 28 in all.
Some of them
are absolutely brilliant,
and some of them
are awful.
especially his stuff
on the Trinity,
where he tries to make
the Trinity
sound reasonable,
which is really impossible.
And in his attempt
to make it sound reasonable
using all sorts of systems
and illustrations,
he actually makes it
far more complicated
and much further advanced
than we could ever imagine
to the point of being
utterly irrational
and unbelievable.
In 1698,
on his 24th birthday,
he writes in his diary,
preached my first,
oh,
let the game away
a little early.
He preached his first sermon
at Mark Lane Church
in London.
Mark Lane Church
is a very famous
non-conformist church.
One of the two pastors ago,
the pastor was John Owen,
who's a very big theologian,
particularly of non-conformism
and the state of the church.
The current pastor
was a guy called Dr. Chauncey.
This was the church
that the Hartop family attended.
And in his sermon,
Isaac preached
a very straightforward message,
full of exhortation
and illustration.
And it was met
with great warmth
by the congregation.
In 1699,
he writes in his diary,
preached first sermon
as Dr. Chauncey's assistant
at Mark Lane Church.
And suffered after
with fever and weakness.
This will be another thread
that runs right through
Isaac Watts' life.
He is always ill.
He's always plagued
with fever and illness.
Dr. Chauncey,
the guy he was the assistant to,
was a learned and able pastor,
but the Mark Lane Church
was not doing well
under his leadership.
It had shrunk to about 60 members.
And from the church records,
it seems to have been
in large part
due to Dr. Chauncey.
He's described as one
who was stubborn in controversy,
tedious in preaching,
and rigid in matters
of church discipline.
So it seems that his congregation
were voting with their feet.
Two years after Watts
became assistant,
Dr. Chauncey resigned.
The congregation decided
to look for a replacement
whilst keeping Watts on
as the assistant.
However, Watts was not well.
In June 1701,
just after Dr. Chauncey's resignation,
his notebook says,
went to Bath
by advice of physicians.
Bath that place
with good water by the sea
that you went to get well
if you were wealthy.
A few months later,
the church was still vacant
and the church record says,
assistant pastor Watts
under continued indispositions
of body and weakness
in the country,
he has given us
little encouragement
to expect his return
amongst us.
After that,
the church held a day
of prayer and fasting
specifically for the restoration
of Mr. Watts' health
and for the provision
of a pastor for this church.
The two ended up
to be intrinsically linked.
After five months away,
Watts returned to London
and the church called him
to be the senior pastor
of Mark Lane Church.
Watts hesitated
in accepting the call,
claiming that his illness
would prevent him
from preaching twice
on a Sunday.
The congregation persisted
and Watts wrote to them
this letter.
Your perseverance
in your choice and love,
your constant profession
of edification
by my ministry,
the great probability
you show in building up
this famous
and decayed church of Christ
if I accept the call,
and your prevailing fears
of its dissolution
if I refuse,
have given me ground
to believe that your corporate voice
is the voice of Christ.
I accept your call,
promising the presence
of God and his saints
my utmost diligence
in all the duties
of a pastor,
so far as God
shall enlighten
and strengthen me.
And I leave this promise
in the hands of Christ,
our mediator,
to see it performed
by me unto you
through the assistance
of his grace
and spirit.
He was ordained
as the pastor
of Mark Lane Church
on 18th of March,
1702,
and Thomas Rowe,
his tutor
from the Dissenting Academy,
preached the sermon.
He preached on Jeremiah 3,
verse 15,
and I will give you pastors
according to mine own heart,
which shall feed you
with knowledge
and understanding.
Under Watts' ministry,
the church started to grow.
Within two years,
they had to move out
of Mark Lane Church
and go to Pinner's Hall.
Two years after that,
they went to a purpose-built hall,
and the membership
was up to 428
from the 60 that he'd inherited.
However,
once his health
continued to plague him,
he regularly writes
in his notebook things like,
seized with violent jaundice
and colic,
had very slow recovery
from most recent bout
of fever,
eight or nine weeks ill,
at this time,
Watts employed
a personal assistant
to write for him
and read for him,
and he says
the reason he did that
was because
of my great indispositions
of body
and weakness of head.
However,
after the church
moved to the new premises,
Watts enjoyed
a sustained period
of reasonably good health
over the next decade
and was able to minister
without significant interruptions.
Watts also started
to become known
as an author.
He'd not only written
all these textbooks
and this book of logic,
but now he started
to author things
for general use
that were becoming
really famous.
In 1706,
he had a book of poems
called
Horai Lyrike,
published.
It spread like wildfire
and was a bestseller.
In 1707,
he received great acclaim
for an essay entitled
Against Uncharitableness.
And later that year,
in 1707,
he published his first book
of hymns called
Hymns and Spiritual Songs.
This first book of hymns
was revolutionary.
By the time he died,
41 years later,
it was in its 16th edition.
It was used by Whitfield
in his outdoor preaching
and it was translated
for an American audience
by Benjamin Franklin.
Watts writes this
in the preface
about why he wrote
the hymns.
These songs are suited
for the expression
of the general state
of the gospel
and the most common
affairs of Christians.
I have aimed
at making these songs
recitable by large numbers
with smoothness of sound
and endeavoured
to make the sense
plain and obvious
to all.
Watts was not the first person
to write hymns
for the church.
Some had endeavoured
to do so before.
Watts, therefore,
is not called
the father of hymnody
because he was the first,
but because he wrote
better and more
than all those before him.
Before him was a trickle
of new hymns.
He broke the dam.
In this first volume,
he writes this hymn,
which I think
is my favourite.
Alas, and did my saviour bleed,
and did my sovereign die,
would he devote
that sacred head
for such a worm as I.
The body slain,
sweet Jesus thine,
and bathed in its own blood,
while all exposed
to wrath divine,
the glorious sufferer stood.
Was it for crimes
that I had done,
he groaned upon the tree.
Amazing pity,
grace unknown,
and loved beyond degree.
What might the sun
in darkness hide
and shut his glories in
when God the mighty
maker died
for man,
the creature's sin?
Thus might I hide
my blushing face
while his dear cross appears,
dissolve my heart
in thankfulness
and melt
my eyes to tears.
But drops of grief
can ne'er repay
the debt of love I owe.
Here, Lord,
I give myself away.
Tis all that I can do.
It's also in this volume
that we get
what's his most famous hymn,
When I Survey
the Wondrous Cross.
Charles Wesley,
who wrote 6,000 hymns,
said I would give
all 6,000 up
if I could have written
this one.
He also wrote
in this volume
Joy to the World,
but it's about
six months too early
to crack that one out.
It was during this period
when he started
to become known
as an author
that Isaac Watts
had his only romantic
encounter.
A lady called
Elizabeth Singer
had read Watts' poetry
and loved it.
She loved it so much
that she wanted
to meet the author.
However,
Isaac,
though brilliant,
was not an attractive man.
He's described
as short,
sallow face,
deathly pale,
and had a crooked,
hooked nose.
Miss Singer,
by contrast,
was very beautiful.
They,
after lengthy
letter correspondence,
did eventually meet,
and Watts was smitten
and proposed
to her.
And Miss Singer's
response has to be
the best put down
ever.
Ever.
She said this,
Mr Watts,
I only wish
I could say
that I admire
the casket
as much as
I admire the jewel.
I only wish
that the beauty
that flowed
from your pen
seeped into
your person.
In other words,
I love your poetry,
but you're far too ugly
for me to spend
the rest of my life
with.
In 1712,
the old tiresome
sickness returned
and what's effectively
left pastoral ministry
for the next four years.
One biographer
speaks of his ailment
being a violent fever
which introduced
a state of nervous
agitation of the most
painful and distressing
kind.
His assistant
at the church,
Samuel Price,
was appointed
as co-pastor
during this time,
something Isaac
was greatly
in favor of
because of his
incapacitation.
The state of illness
became known
by Sir Thomas Abney.
Sir Thomas Abney
was the Lord Mayor
of London.
He was the first
director of the Bank
of England,
one of the first
directors of the Bank
of England
and also for a period
became like a royal
advisor.
Sir Thomas was a
genuine,
generous benefactor
and zealous
Christian.
The Abneys
invited Isaac
to stay with them
in their
Hertfordshire estate,
Herefordshire estate,
Abney Park,
to regain his health.
Watts intended
to stay for two
weeks so as not
to be a burden.
He ended up
staying for 36
years.
It was at Abney
Park where Watts
died,
aged 75.
This time at the
Abney estate was
very productive
in the life of
Isaac.
In 1715,
he wrote a book
called Divine
Songs Attempted
in Easy Language
for the Use of
Children.
Much of his
skill in teaching
children had been
honed during his
time with the
Hartop children
as their tutor
and in fact
this book was
dedicated to
Sir John Hartop
himself.
The words in the
preface again are
worthy of note.
He writes,
To all that are
concerned with the
education of
children,
you have been
given an immense
and important
charge.
The seeds of
misery or happiness
in this world
and that to
come are
often times
sown very
early and
therefore whatever
may conduce to
give the minds
of children a
relish for virtue
and religion must
be your primary
concern.
He also defends
verses and
effectual means of
teaching children
saying that the
truths they sing
will resonate with
them far longer
than any other
lessons they learn.
Just to give you
an example,
he writes this
chorus about the
excellence of the
Bible.
Great God with
wonders and with
praise on all
thy works I
lurk, but still
thy wisdom,
power and grace
shine brighter in
your book.
The stars that in
their courses roll
have much instruction
given, but thy
word informs my
soul how I may
climb to heaven.
The fields provide
me food and show
the goodness of the
Lord, but fruits of
life and glory grow
in thy most holy
word.
Here are my choices,
treasures hid,
here my best comfort
lies, here my
desires are satisfied
and hence my joys
arise.
Lord, make me
understand thy law,
show what my
faults have been,
and from thy gospel
let me draw pardon
for all my sin.
Here would I learn
how Christ has died
to save my soul
from hell, not all
the books on earth
besides such heavenly
wonders tell.
Then let me love my
Bible more and take
a fresh delight by day
to read these wonders
over and meditate
by night.
He also writes a book
called Prayers for
Use and Imitation
of Children.
No one had paid much
attention to children
and he writes them a
song book and a book
about prayer.
And the third thing he
does is he writes
them a catechism,
a way that they can
learn the foundations
of the Christian faith.
These catechisms were
so useful and so
successful in teaching
children the gospel
that Charles Haddon
Spurgeon, a century
after Watts' death,
would make the
following comment about
their use in his
upbringing.
Dr. Watts' catechism,
which I learned
myself, is so simple,
so interesting, so
suggestive, that a
better conversation of
scriptural knowledge
will never be written.
And the marvel is
that such a tool of
instruction should have
been laid aside by so
many Sunday school
teachers.
It was also at
Abney Park staying
with Lord Abney that
Watts produced his
greatest work, a
re-rendering of
psalms, the psalms
Christologically.
As Watts described
them, the previous
translation is offensive
and gawky.
Watts asked himself,
why may we not sing
of Christ as God?
When God makes all
things new, why must
our praises remain in
the old covenant?
It was from this
question that Watts
hit upon a new way
of interpreting the
psalms, the so-called
redemptive historical
hermeneutic employed by
all the best preachers.
This is described by
J.I.
Packer as, Christ is
the subject matter of
scripture, always
written to bear witness
to him.
He is the sum of the
whole Bible, prophesied,
typified, prefigured,
exhibited, demonstrated.
He is to be found in
every leaf, almost in
every line, the
scriptures being, but
as it were, the
swaddling bands of the
child Jesus.
So Watts said about
rewriting the psalms,
but making them about
Jesus.
He writes this in the
preface.
Where the psalmist speaks
of the pardon of sin
through the mercies of
God, I have added the
merits of a saviour.
Where he talks of
sacrificing goats or
bullocks, I rather
choose to mention the
sacrifice of Christ, the
Lamb of God.
Where he promises
abundance of wealth,
honour and long life,
I have changed some of
these typical blessings
for grace, glory and
life eternal, which are
brought to light by the
gospel and promised in the
New Testament.
And I am fully
satisfied that more
honour is done to our
blessed saviour by
speaking his name, his
graces, his actions
explicitly in our own
language, according to
the brighter discoveries he
hath now made, than by
going back again to the
Old Testament forms of
worship and the language
of types and figures.
So for example, he takes
Psalm 72.
The English version
begins, give the king
your justice, O God.
And clearly in context, it
is a psalm about King
Solomon and his reign
extending throughout all
the world.
But through the redemptive
historical theology
employed by Watts and his
poetic skill, it becomes a
Jesus-centred declaration of
the gospel foreshadowed in
the psalm and fulfilled in
Christ.
So we get, Jesus shall reign
where'er the sun, doth his
successive journey run, his
kingdom stretch from shore
to shore, till moon shall
wax and wane no more.
There was a lot of
opposition from some camps to
this re-rendering of the
psalms.
They accused him of tampering
with scripture.
However, there were a vast
majority who were incredibly
appreciative of what Isaac
Watts had done.
Isaac's younger brother
called Enoch, a notable
poet himself, wrote this to
celebrate his brother's
work.
Yours is the old truth,
stripped of its rags,
ragged ornaments and
upper else.
If we may say so, as
younger by ages in a new
fashionable dress, these
psalms have been clothed.
There is in the old psalms
we used to sing a mighty
deficiency of that life and
soul which are necessary to
raise our fancies and kindle
our passions.
Not so with yours.
They are incendiary to the
soul, magnifying of Christ
and glorious to recite.
I have been persuaded for
some time now that with
King David to speak English,
he would choose to make use
of your style.
We'll sing another great
Watts psalm in a few moments
to close our time.
That one, O God, our help
in ages past.
Watts continued writing and
reforming for the next 20
years.
He became not just a renowned
preacher of the gospel,
but also became very active
in social reform.
The outworking of the gospel.
He wrote about uncharitableness.
He challenged giving.
He spoke on social ills like
drunkenness, particularly gin.
He was a keen advocate for
free and accessible education
for the poor.
He was also someone who was
very caring and loving to his
congregation.
You've got countless letters
tenderly penned that express
not just a sincere love for
them, but a desire that they
would go through the various
struggles of their life in a
Christ-like, God-glorifying
way.
In 1746, just two years before
he died, Watts wrote a hymn to
introduce a new book called
The World to Come.
It's a book about death and
it's really worth a read.
It's very, very brilliant in
dealing with the topic.
This hymn that he writes to
introduce and is in the front
cover says this.
There is a land of pure delight
where saints immortal reign.
Infinite day excludes the
night and pleasures banish pain.
Their everlasting spring abides
and never withering flowers.
Death like a narrow sea divides
this heavenly land from us.
Sweet fields beyond the
swelling flood stand dressed in
living green.
So too the Jews old Canaan stood
while Jordan rolled between.
But timorous mortals start and
shrink to cross the narrow sea
and linger shivering on the brink
and fear to launch away.
Oh could we make our doubts
remove those gloomy doubts
that rise and see the Canaan
that we love with unbeclouded
eyes.
It's amazing isn't it just how
real he is when he says
timorous mortals start and
shrink to cross the narrow sea.
But even the most fervent
Christian can still be scared of
death.
It's a very pastoral book
the world to come.
There's a lot of great
exhortation in it about how to
use life well.
Watts at the end of his life met
some slightly later contemporaries.
He met Whitfield who asked if he
could use his hymns in the open air
campaigns.
The Wesley brothers spoke really
nicely of him.
He lives to see the great
awakening through the preaching
of Jonathan Edwards.
Which when you consider
the church world that he
grew up in
to then see this incredible
revival break out towards the
end of his life must have been a
real thrill.
The church had seen a seismic and
glorious shift in the course of his
life from a dry emotionless
formal gathering in the 1670s
to a revival of enthusiasm and
life by his death in 1748.
All of these gatherings would have
been belted out many of the hymns
that he penned as we are today.
On the 25th of November 1748 at the
Abney Estate Watts commented to his
personal secretary Joseph Parker
It is a great mercy to me that I have
no matter of fear or dread in death.
I could if God please lay back my
head and die without terror this
afternoon or night.
My chief supports are from my view of
eternal things and the interest through
Christ I have in them.
I trust all my sins are pardoned through
the blood of Christ.
I have no fear of dying.
It would be the greatest comfort to
lie down and sleep and wake no more.
Watts in one of his meditations on
death wrote in heaven new and
unknown powers and glories brighter
flames of imagination richer scenes of
wit and fancy and diviner talents.
He talks about the new creation having
even diviner talents.
So if these what's him sound good down
here just imagine what a glorious heaven
what's him would sound like.
The last thing he wrote before his death
was these four lines.
There we shall see his face and never
never sin.
They're from the fountain of his grace.
Drink endless pleasures in.
And so that is Isaac Watts.
But what can we learn about him today?
I think just a few things.
Light and then heat.
In all his hymn writing Isaac Watts was
very careful in stating the truth and
then responding to it.
It was always theology becoming doxology.
It wasn't emotionalism.
He wasn't hyping up the crowd.
But he said these truths are true.
And then he told people how to feel about
them.
Secondly, in an age of enlightened thinking
and rationalism, Isaac Watts is
reasonable but remarkable about emotion.
When everyone was going to empirical
evidence, when everyone was saying that
we can actually find out everything,
it became very sterile.
And Isaac Watts said, no, you can feel
feel about these things.
These are things that you can be
overjoyed about.
There are situations in life where you
can cry.
And isn't that interesting for us in the
21st century?
That we don't need to just have a dry,
cold orthodoxy on a level.
But actually it's good to be overjoyed
at the gospel.
We can be fearful of what's to come.
There is the ability to feel built into
the Christian experience.
I think thirdly, gospel faithfulness
in weakness.
That Isaac Watts, as we've seen,
was ill all the time.
He was never well and sometimes he was
close to death.
And yet Watts was dependent on the
Lord amidst his weakness.
He knew he couldn't do it by himself.
His prayer journal is remarkable.
Just endlessly says, I can't do it,
so God you'll have to.
He didn't use it as an excuse for
anything.
If he literally could stand, he would
preach and then suffer the consequences
afterwards.
Fourthly, a massive investment in
children.
Despite often being ridiculed for the
time he took writing and seek to
educate children, he persisted.
He knew that God loved children and
bringing them up and teaching them the
things of God was by far the best
investment and use of his time.
We see that that was built on the
upbringing that he had.
Fifthly, Christ-centered praise.
In an age of moralism in the church and
academia and skepticism, Watts absolutely
kept the main thing the main thing.
And all of his hymns focus and center and
find their crescendo in the gospel in the
person of the Lord Jesus.
Wesley said of him, he opened his Bible
and made a beeline for Jesus as quickly
as possible.
Sixthly, he used his gifts and talents for
the highest purposes.
As you can see, he was an absolute genius.
The age of seven to pen that is pretty
good.
He could have been an actor.
He could have written books.
He could have been a playwright.
And yet he knew that the one thing that
would last forever is what he did for the
Lord Jesus.
And seventhly, something that we didn't
really cover is that he hated division in
the church.
He always sought harmony.
And he was in a time of great tumult.
And he very much stood on the truth.
He engaged with philosophers and academics.
He has a brilliant discourse with John
Locke, a leading philosopher at the time.
And this is what John Locke said.
After our conversation, I have to say,
I disagree with Mr. Watts profoundly.
But I find myself loving him more dearly as a
result of our conversation.
That he always acted graciously with integrity
towards people.
And this just endeared him to his fellows and
colleagues even more.
At his funeral service, David Jennings
prophetically said these words.
While Isaac Watts is now celebrating the new
songs of heaven, how many thousands of pious
worshippers are this day lifting up their hearts
to God in the sacred songs he taught them on earth?
Though his voice is not any longer heard by us,
yet his words, like those of the day and night,
are gone to the ends of the world.