(Portrait of Rudyard Kipling)
GOD OF OUR FATHERS, KNOWN OF OLD
“God of our fathers, art not Thou God in Heaven?” (2 Chronicles 20:6)
INTRO.: A hymn which identifies the God of our fathers with the God of heaven is “God of Our Fathers, Known of Old.” The text was written by Joseph Rudyard Kipling, who was born on December 30, 1865, at Malabar Point, Bombay (now Mumbai), in the Bombay Presidency of British India, to John Lockwood Kipling and Alice (née MacDonald) Kipling. His father, a sculptor and pottery designer, was the Principal and Professor of Architectural Sculpture at the newly founded Sir Jamsetjee Jeejebhoy School of Art in Bombay. Kipling’s days in Bombay ended when he was five and he and his three-year-old sister Alice (“Trix”) were taken to Southsea, Portsmouth, in the United Kingdom to live for the next six years with a couple who boarded children of British nationals living abroad. In the spring of 1877, Alice returned from India, removed the children, and took them to Goldings Farm at Loughton. In January 1878, Kipling was admitted to the United Services College at Westward Ho!, Devon, a school recently founded to prepare boys for the army. Near the end of his schooling, Kipling’s father obtained a job for him in Lahore, where the father served as Principal of the Mayo College of Art and Curator of the Lahore Museum. Kipling was to be assistant editor of a local newspaper, the Civil and Military Gazette.
From 1883 to 1889, Kipling worked in British India for local newspapers such as the Civil and Military Gazette in Lahore and The Pioneer in Allahabad. Kipling was discharged from The Pioneer in early 1889 after a dispute. Kipling decided to move to London, as the literary centre of the British Empire. In London, Kipling had several stories accepted by magazines. In the next two years, he published a novel, The Light That Failed, and a collection of his short stories on the British in India, Life’s Handicap. On January 18, 1892, Carrie Balestier (aged 29) and Rudyard Kipling (aged 26) married in London at All Souls Church, Langham Place. Kipling and his wife settled upon a honeymoon that took them to the United States, settling near Brattleboro, VT, where they lived from 1892 to 1896. Their first child, Josephine, was born here on the 29th of December, 1892. It was also here that the first dawnings of The Jungle Books came to Kipling. In a mere four years he produced, along with The Jungle Books, a book of short stories (The Day’s Work), a novel (Captains Courageous), and a profusion of poetry, including the volume The Seven Seas. In July 1896, the Kiplings packed their belongings, left the United States, and returned to England. Kipling was now a famous man, and in the previous two or three years had increasingly been making political pronouncements in his writings. The Kiplings had welcomed their first son, John, in August 1897.
Kipling had begun work on two poems, “Recessional” (1897) and “The White Man’s Burden” (1899), which were to create controversy when published. In 1907, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. At the beginning of the First World War, like many other writers, Kipling wrote pamphlets and poems enthusiastically supporting the U.K. war aims of restoring Belgium, after it had been occupied by Germany. After the war, Kipling was skeptical of the Fourteen Points and the League of Nations. In 1920, Kipling co-founded the Liberty League which focused on promoting classic liberal ideals as a response to the rising power of communist tendencies within Great Britain. Kipling scripted the first Royal Christmas Message, delivered via the BBC’s Empire Service by George V in 1932. Kipling kept writing until the early 1930s, but at a slower pace and with less success than before. On the night of January 12, 1936, he suffered a hemorrhage in his small intestine. He underwent surgery, but died at Middlesex Hospital in Fitzrovia, London, England, less than a week later on January 18, 1936, at the age of 70, of a perforated duodenal ulcer, and was buried at Westminster Abbey.
Kipling’s poem “Recessional” has been used as a hymn. I first saw it was in The New Hymnal for American Youth edited by H. Augustine Smith and published in 1930 by the D. Appleton-Century Co. Inc. of New York City, NY, with a tune (Lest We Forget) composed, apparently for Kipling’s words, in 1898 by George Frederick Blanchard (1856-1926). Cyberhymnal suggests an anonymous tune (Folkingham) taken from the Supplement to the New Version compiled by Nahum Tate and Nicholas Brady in 1700, and gives as an alternate a tune (Melita) composed by John Bacchus Dykes in 1861 for the hymn “Eternal Father, Strong to Save.” The Broadman Hymnal of 1940, edited by Benjamin B. McKinney and published by Broadman Press of Nashville, TN, sets the first three stanzas of Kipling’s text to a tune (St. Catherine) composed by Henri F. Hemy and usually associated with Frederick W. Faber’s hymn “Faith of Our Fathers.” So far as I know, “God of Our Fathers, Known of Old” has never appeared in any hymnbooks published by members of the Lord’s church for use among Churches of Christ.
The song reminds all nations of their dependence on God
I. Stanza 1 points out that God is Lord of al
God of our fathers, known of old,
Lord of our far flung battle line,
Beneath whose awful hand we hold
Dominion over palm and pine—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!
A. Jehovah is the God of our fathers, known of old: 1 Chron. 29:18
B. He is Lord of heaven and earth: Acts 17:24
C. Yet He has given man dominion over the creatures of earth: Gen. 1:28
II. Stanza 2 points out what sacrifice God wants
The tumult and the shouting dies;
The captains and the kings depart:
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!
A. The nations of earth will always have their tumults that last a while and then die: Amos 3:9
B. Their captains and kings come and go: Ps. 68:11-14
C. But God still accepts the sacrifice of a humble and contrite heart: Ps. 51:16-17
III. Stanza 3 points out that God is the ultimate Judge
Far called, our navies melt away;
On dune and headland sinks the fire:
Lo, all our pomp of yesterday
Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!
Judge of the Nations, spare us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!
A. Navies cannot ultimately protect us: 1 Ki. 22:48
B. Those who depend on military power may end up like Nineveh and Tyre: Zeph. 2:13-15, Zech. 9:1-4
C. The Lord is the judge of all the nations on earth: Ps. 110:6-7
IV. Stanza 4 points out that God’s law is for all nations
If, drunk with sight of power, we loose
Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe,
Such boastings as the Gentiles use,
Or lesser breeds without the Law—
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!
A. A nation can be drunk with power: Nah. 3:11
B. It can boast of its invulnerability: Obadiah vs. 2-4
C. Yet no nation is above God’s law: Hos. 8:1-3
V. Stanza 5 points out how much we need God’s mercy to protect us
For heathen heart that puts her trust
In reeking tube and iron shard,
All valiant dust that builds on dust,
And guarding, calls not Thee to guard,
For frantic boast and foolish word—
Thy mercy on Thy people, Lord!
A. There are those who trust in the armaments of mankind alone to protect them: Isa. 31:1
B. Like many nations of old, they have forgotten God: Ps. 9:17
C. Instead, we should look to the Lord’s mercy to save us: 2 Ki. 19:14-19
CONCL.: The words of this hymn were originally written and published in the London Times during Queen Victoria’s Jubilee celebration. Kipling wrote, “That poem gave me more trouble than anything I ever wrote. I had promised the Times a poem on the Jubilee, and when it became due I had written nothing that satisfied me. The Times began to want that poem badly, and sent letter after letter asking for it. I made more attempts, but no further progress. Finally the Times began sending telegrams. So I shut myself in a room with the determination to stay there until I had written a Jubilee poem. Sitting down with all my previous attempts before me, I searched through the dozens of sketches till at last I found just one line I liked. That was ‘Lest we forget.’ Round these words ‘The Recessional’ was written.” In whatever nation we may live, we should always encourage everyone to remember, look for guidance and direction to, and seek favor from the “God of Our Fathers, Known of Old.”
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