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Titles to be Ridiculed

Today, the English Baptist pastor Robert Robinson (1735-1790) is best known as the author of the hymn, Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing. Though he was loved by many, his teachings and ways were considered strange to many others. The "gravity and even pomposity assumed by many of his ministerial colleagues was abhorred by him. He disliked and ridiculed the titles which they gave to themselves. ‘I wonder,’ he once said, ‘any man should be so silly as to call me Reverend.’ To him this was an epithet which could be ascribed only to deity." [Psalm 111:9 – "He sent redemption unto his people: he hath commanded his covenant for ever: holy and reverend is his name."]