Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States - Lutheran Seminary God Pause - Moved by the Promise for Sunday, 1 June 2014 "I Love to Tell the Story" ELW 661

Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States - Lutheran Seminary God Pause - Moved by the Promise for Sunday, 1 June 2014 "I Love to Tell the Story" ELW 661
1. I love to tell the story
of unseen things above,
of Jesus and his glory,
of Jesus and his love.
I love to tell the story,
because I know it's true;
it satisfies my longings
as nothing else would do.
Refrain
I love to tell the story;
'twill be my theme in glory
to tell the old, old story
of Jesus and his love.
2. I love to tell the story:
how pleasant to repeat
what seems, each time I tell it,
more wonderfully sweet!
I love to tell the story,
for some have never heard
the message of salvation
from God's own holy word.
Refrain
I love to tell the story;
'twill be my theme in glory
to tell the old, old story
of Jesus and his love.
3. I love to tell the story,
for those who know it best
seem hungering and thirsting
to hear it like the rest.
And when, in scenes of glory,
I sing the new, new song,
I'll sing the old, old story
that I have loved so long.
Refrain
I love to tell the story;
'twill be my theme in glory
to tell the old, old story
of Jesus and his love.
The hymn, "I Love to Tell the Story," prompts me to tell a story about seminary life in those years before women were allowed to attend. 
Several seminary students approached the president one day to ask if it would be possible to have the mail distributed in their boxes before their 8:00 a.m. classes. The seminary president wondered what was so important about that mail that it couldn't wait until the 10:00 o'clock break, the regular time for the distribution of the mail. Of course the president realized that these young men were single students who all had a rather intense program of correspondence with their respective sweethearts.
The president decided to probe a little further. "Gentlemen," he said, "is there really anything so terribly new in those letters that you couldn't wait until the 10:00 o'clock break?" "Well," one of them answered, "there really isn't anything so new in them; but, Sir, it's who they're from."
The message of the gospel is like old love letters, letters that tell the old, old story of Jesus and his love.
Loving Savior, I pray that I might always have the excitement of a young lover waiting for a letter from one's sweetheart. And I pray that my ears will never grow deaf to the "I love you" that God has revealed in Jesus Christ in those love letters of the Bible. Amen.
Selmer "Sam" Hatlestad
Watertown, S.D. 
Master of Divinity , 1964
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