Part 7 (1/2)
But the fruit of God's love is peace As Grundtvig, in the hyiven below he sings of God's peace The translation is by Pastor Doving
Peace to soothe our bitter woes God in Christ on us bestows; Jesus wrought our peace with God Through His holy, precious blood; Peace in Him for sinners found Is the Gospel's joyful sound
Peace to us the church doth tell 'Tis her welcome and farewell Peace was our baptis hour Peace be with you full and free Now and in eternity
In this peace Christians find refuge and rest
The peace of God protects our hearts Against the te falls As when the golden ht for us In agony upon the cross, And when He up to heaven soared, His peace He left us in His word
His word of peace new strength imparts Each day to faint and troubled hearts, And in His cup and at the font It stills our deepest need and want
This blessed peace our Lord will give To all who in His Spirit live And even at their dying breath Its co of death
When Christ for us His peace hath won He asked for faith and faith alone By faith and not by merits vain, Our hearts God's blessed peace obtain
Peace be with you, our Savior saith In answer to the word of faith Whoso hath faith, shall find release And dwell in God's eternal peace
Grundtvig's hy rank with the finest ever written He hates and fears death, hoping even that Christ may return before his own hour coht with him
Lord, when my final hours impend, Come in the person of a friend And take Thy place beside me, And talk to ain And all Thy joy betide h he knows he cannot master the enemy alone, if the Savior is there-- Death is but the last pretender We with Christ as our defender Shall engage and put to flight
And His ill dispel all fear of the struggle: Like dew upon the meadow So falls the word of life On Christians in the shadow OfIs balone is like a breath The bitterness of death
Like sun, when night is falling, Sets stilly in the west While birds are softly calling Each other from their nest, So when its brief day closes That soul in peace reposes Which knows that Christ the Lord Is with it in His word
And as we shi+ver slightly An early suhtly Announce a day new-born, So h death's portal That through its final strife Beholds the Light of Life
He could therefore exclaim: Christian! what a morn of splendor Full reward for every fear, When the ransomed host shall render Praises to its Savior dear, Shall in heaven's hall of glory Tell salvation's wondrous story, And with the angelic throng Sing the La
[10]Another translation: ”Take away the signs of ” by P C Paulsen in ”Hymnal for Church and Ho's Later Years
Grundtvig's later years present a striking contrast to the years of his earlier manhood The lonely Defender of the Bible becarowing religious and folk movement, both in Den years of continuous struggles were followed by years of fruitful work and an extensive growth of his religious and educational ideals until he was generally recognized as one of the most vital spiritual leaders of Scandinavia
The first break in the wall of isolation that surrounded hiroup of students to ”the excellent historian, N F S Grundtvig, who has never asked for a reward but only for a chance to do good,” to deliver a series of historical lectures at Borch's Collegiuen These lectures--seventy-one in all--were delivered before packed audiences during the summer and fall of 1838, and were so enthusiastically received that the students, on the evening of the concluding lecture, arranged a splendid banquet for the speaker, at which one of thele Did you bravely fight, Bearing scorn without co hisonce coe: ”Speak to the people of yesterday, and you will be heard by the people of toreat satisfaction to him that the first public honor bestowed upon him should be accorded him by his nation's youth
Frorew steadily He became an honored member of several influential societies, such as the Society for Northern Studies, and the Scandinavian Society, an association of academicians fro a closer spiritual and cultural union between them He also received frequent invitations to lecture both on outstanding occasions and before special groups His work as a lecturer probably reached its culsbanke, a wooded hill on the borders of Slesvig, where he spoke to thousands of profoundly stirred listeners, and at a greatof Scandinavian students at Oslo, Norway, in 1851, to which he was invited as the guest of honor and acclaiian people When Dendom in 1848, he was a member of the constitutional asse
Meanwhile he worked ceaselessly for the development of his folk and educational ideals After his conversion, he felt for a time that his new outlook was incompatible with his previous enthusiasm for the heroic life and ideals of the old North, and that heof the Gospel But the for the early part of the nineteenth century and the failure of his preaching to evoke any response from an indifferent people caused him to suspect a closer relationshi+p between a people's religious and national or folk-life than he had hitherto recognized Was not the folk life of a people, after all, the soil in which the Word of God must be sown, and could the Word bear fruit in a soil completely hardened and unprepared to receive it? If it could not, was not a folk awakening a necessary preparation for a Christian?
Under the spur of this question he undertook the translation of the sagas and developed his noidely recognized ideas of folk life and folk education, which later were eian folk schools The first of these schools was opened at Rodding, Slesvig in 1844 The war between Denmark and Germany from 1848 to 1850 delayed the establishment of other similar schools But in 1851, Christian Kold, the 's idea of a school for life--as the folk schools were frequently called--opened his first school at Ryslinge, Fyn From there the movement spread rapidly not only to all parts of Denmark but also to Norway, Finland and Sweden The latter country now has ian type than Denmark, and Norway and Finland have about have as many[11]
To extend the influence of the yanized in al died, he had the satisfaction of seeing his work bear fruit in one of the most vital folk and educational movements of Scandinavia, a movement which has made a tremendous imprint upon all phases of life in the Northern countries and which today is spreading toheld that the life of a nation, Christian as well as national, never rose above the real culture of its common people To be real, a culture had to be national, had to be based on a people's natural characteristics and developed in accordance with native history and traditions The ai and enrich The naturalpresentation of a people's own cultural heritage, their native tradition, history, literature and folk life But in all cases the , that is the spoken word by men and women ere themselves spiritually alive Christianity, in his opinion, had not come to destroy but to cleanse and vivify the folk life of a people, and, since the latter was the soil in which the for inter-action so that national life ht become Christian and Christianity national
In the practical application of these educational theories, Grundtvig took no active part Aside from his conception of the idea and the developreatest contributions to their work are probably, his innus that were and are used in the schools
Meanwhile he by no ious work Rationaliselicalthe church, and he could therefore concentrate his energy on a further develop his years of struggle A his later years the splendid Enlightens of Our Christian Childhood, published 1855-1862; The Seven Stars of the Churches, published 1854-1855; and The Church Mirror, a series of lectures on the main currents of church history, published 1861-1863
Although Grundtvig's views, and especially his distinction between the ”living” and the ”written” word, were strongly opposed by many, his profoundly spiritual conception of the church, as the body of Christ, and of the sacrareatly influenced all branches of the Danish church In e of Christ in the creed and sacraments, he visualized the real presence of Hiational worshi+p with a realisical dissertation can ever convey Nor did he feel that in so doing he was in any sense diverging from true Lutheranism The fact that Luther himself chose the creed and the words of institution of the sacrament as a basis for his catechisreat Refornized their distinction
Despite frequent charges to the contrary, Grundtvig had no desire to engender a separatist ainst any such tendency In a closing speech to the Meeting of Friends in 1863, he said, ”You can no ians than those whom Luther called to the Lord could forbid anyone to call them Lutherans, but do not yourself adopt that name For history shows that some have let themselves be called Lutherans until they have almost lost the name of Christians If anyone wishes to naht to tell the unto salvation except what the Christian church has taught and confessed froeneration To or froe without reservation that word of faith which Paul says is believed to righteousness and confessed unto salvation Thethat faith so that the Old Adam may be put off and the new put on, we hold to be a uided by Grundtvig, as we are guided by Luther, only in so far as we are convinced that he has been guided by Scripture and the Spirit We also disclai our conception of Scripture an article of faith which 's folloould, no doubt, have profited greatly by re this truly liberal view of their leader
Thus his years passed quietly onward, filled with fruitful labor even unto the end In contrast to his often stor's private life was quite peaceful and commonplace, subject only to the usual trials and sorrows of hureater part of his life he was extreer returns froifts from friends For his own part this did not trouble him; his wants were few and easily satisfied But he ”liked to see shi+ning faces around him,” as he once wrote, and he had discovered that the face of a child could often be brightened by a sive ”But if ould follow the Lord in these days,” he wrote to a friend, ”we s for His sake and cast out all these heathen worries for dross and chaff hich we as Christians often distress ourselves”
Grundtvig was thrice , died January 4, 1851, after a long illness Her husband said at her grave, ”I stand here as an old rave by burying the bride of my youth and the mother ofloyalty shared alldid not appear to be growing old During the following su of Scandinavian students at Oslo, where he was hailed as the youngest of them all And on October 4 of the sarievedMarie Toft, of Rennebeck's Manor, a wealthyand his junior by thirty years And despite dire predictions to the contrary, the ent and spiritual-minded woman holeheartedly shared her husband's spiritual views and ideals; and her death in 1854 ca blow In a letter to a friend a feeeks after her death, Grundtvig writes, ”It onderful to be loved as unselfishly as Marie loved ave and He took; and despite all objections by the world and our own selfish flesh, the believing heart reatness of the treasure that the Lord gave to e, I confess that it probably would have proved beyond ood days; for had I not already become critical of all that were not like her, and indifferent to all things that were not concerned with her?”
The last remark, perhaps, refers to a complaint by his friends that he had becos If this had been the case, he nowhimself into a whirl of activity that would have taxed the strength of ayears, he wrote part of his formerly mentioned books on the church and Christian education, delivered a large nu and, of course, attended to his groork as a pastor As he was also very neglectful of his own comfort in other ways, it was evident to all that such a strenuous life th unless someone could be constantly about hih-endreich Reetz, entered into th of the reatest assets her country possessed
Grundtvig once said of his es that the first was an idyl, the second a ros But Asta Grundtvig paid no attention to the scandal ers A very earnest Christian woy to create a real Christian ho had always lived much by hiathering place for all his friends and co-workers In this she succeeded so well that theirwas frequently croith visitors from far and near,the richest experiences of their life
Grundtvig's fiftieth anniversary as a pastor was celebrated with impressive festivities on May 29, 1861 The celebration was attended by representatives froovernment and the church as well as by a host of people from all parts of Scandinavia; and the celebrant was showered with gifts and honors The king conferred upon him the title of bishop; the former queen, Carolina Aold from women in Norway, Sweden and Denift of three thousand dollars from friends in Denmark and Norway to finance a popular edition of his Hys for the Danish Church; and another friend, Gunni Busck, presented hiraved with his likeness and a line froation of Vartov
Many of those who participated in this splendid jubilee felt that it would be of great benefit to theain for ious and national questions And with the willing cooperation of Asta Grundtvig, it was decided to invite all who 's eightieth birthday, Septe of Friends--as it was named--proved so successful that it henceforth became an annual event, attended by people fro earnestly desired that these ned to be, htenment, his own part in them was naturally important His poere still unimpaired, and his contributions were rich in wisdo hi heartiness and power that ettable experiences to many
Thus the once loneliest e honored by his nation, surrounded by friends, and besieged by visitors and co-workers, seeking his help and advice He was always very approachable In his younger days he had frequently been harsh and self-assertive in his judgment of others; but in his latter years he learned that kindness is alwaysin his easy chair and s pipe, he talked frankly and often wittily with the many who caian, tells us that his conversation was admirably eloquent and interspersed it and huren, writes: ”Sos ofI doubt that I have ever ht was an inspiration and his heart was in every word he said”
Grundtvig's outward appearance, especially during his later years, was extre white locks and a full beard bore the imprint of a profound spiritual intellect and a benevolent cal with hi has a most beautiful countenance, and he attracted me at once by his indescribably kind and benevolent appearance What an interesting man he is, and what a pleasure it is to listen to his open and forthright conversation”
And so, still active and surrounded by friends, he saw his long, fruitful life drawing quietly toward its close In 1871, he opened the annual Meeting of Friends by speaking from the text: ”See, I die, but the Lord shall be with you,” and said in all likelihood thiswould be the last at which he would be present He lived, however, to prepare for the next , which was to be held on September 11, 1872 On Septe an exceptionally war he passed away quietly while sitting in his easy chair and listening to his son read for him
He was buried September 11, three days after his 89th birthday, in the presence of representatives frooverny and a vast assembly of people from all parts of Scandinavia