In the year 1926, a young student sat in Salisbury
Church, Edinburgh, listening to an address on the ordination of a
student colleague, but with his mind something he had noticed as
he looked at one of the stained glass windows, which illustrated
the Christmas story and bore the text "GLORY TO GOD IN THE
HIGHEST". It so happened that a ray of sunshine passing
through a tiny fault in the glass obscured the second "E".
The text read, "GLORY TO GOD IN THE HIGH ST."
The student that day was Edgar P Dickie, and he used the
message a few months later in a series of religious meetings in
Dunblane. The magazine of the United Free Church, The Record,
quoted part of the address, emphasising the truth of the
Christian's inevitable involvement in social work. From there it
passed to Dr George MacLeod, who used it in modified form in
various addresses and in his book "One Way Left"
:*
"A boy threw a stone at a stained glass window of the
Incarnation. It nicked out the "E" in the word 'HIGHEST'
in the text,'GLORY TO GOD IN THE HIGHEST.' Thus, till
unfortunately it was mended, it read , 'GLORY TO GOD IN THE HIGH
ST' .
At least the mended E might have been contrived
to swivel so that in wind it would have been impossible to see
which way it read. Such is the genius, and the offence, of
Christian revelation. Holiness, salvation and glory are all come
down to earth in Jesus Christ our Lord. The Word of God cannot be
divorced from the Action of God.
As the blood courses through the body, so the spiritual is
alone kept healthy in its interaction in the High Street. God's
revelation of Himself was not a series of mighy acts done to
Israel but a series performed in and through Israel
as a community in the totality of its life ."
Subsequently the illustratiion has appeared in a wide
variety of books and magazines, such as The Reader's Digest, The
Friendship Book of Francis Gay, World Digest and the website of
West Ham United Football Club. Sometimes it tells of an autumn
leaf settling on the letter "e", sometimes, (as above) a
small boy who had thrown a stone, sometimes set in the days of the
Blitz in wartime London describing a church damaged by a bomb.
It's importance lies not in the truth of the setting, but
in our realisation of the basic point; God has reached out to us
in his Son, Jesus Christ, who meets us where we are, in the High
Street as much as in the sacred places.
*From "One Way Left" by George MacLeod M.C D.D
Founder of The Iona Community
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