"Take Us on the Quest of Beauty"
Eleanor B. Stock
Take us on the Quest of Beauty,
Poet, Seer of Galilee
Making all our dreams creative
Through their fellowship with
Thee.
Take us on the Quest of Knowledge
Clearest Thinker man has known!
Make our minds sincere and
patient
Satisfied by Truth alone.
Take us on the Quest of Service
Kingly Servant of man’s needs
Let us work with Thee for others
Anywhere Thy purpose leads.
All along our Quest’s far
pathways
Christ our Leader and our Guide
Make us conscious of Thy presence
Walking always at our side.
Beauty, knowledge, service - what a life! Such a far cry from so much of what passes for evangelical Christianity. I hate hype and hypocrisy, and tend to distrust anything that smacks of celebrity. I want authentic, intelligent, creative, calm, and compassionate. I want whatever has the real Jesus walking and talking within it. Let our dreams mingle with him, meditate and muse on him, and we too shall be poets and seers, truth tellers and servants of humankind for the gospel. This is the Grand Adventure. This is the Quest of Beauty, Truth, Service, and Jesus.
I love these obscure vintage hymns, this one another serendipitous discovery on my browse through the Brethren hymnal, one of many that I inherited from my grandmother. My other favorite "beauty" hymn is actually the most popular one in my Strength in Hymn series: Let the Beauty of Jesus Be Seen in Me
The photos? They were taken at Lake Johnson in Raleigh, North Carolina, while I was visiting my sweet cousin Jean. (See here for more pictures from the same set: A Raleigh Good Time.) Jean embodies the ideals of this hymn, and it's good to walk this quest of life with her friendship and prayers and example to cheer me along the way. I am so grateful for all of my family and friends who do the same!
Virginia Knowles
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