Sunday, June 26, 2011

Dear God,

"...glorify thy name in all the earth." At church we sang out our hearts so full of gratitude and praise. Sometimes a person just can't keep it in.

Our choir didn't sing this Sunday so I sat in the second pew with my husband and two granddaughters. As we slipped up our hands to select a favorite hymn, I asked to sing #377. It is Well with My Soul is a glorious song, my dearest God, because I am convinced you placed it in the heart of Horatio Spafford. How else could a broken hearted man who had lost all his children at sea write such a song if not for your powerful and loving grace filling him up? How could anyone sing it is well with my soul if not for a great measure of faith?

Every time I sing it, I close my eyes as if to blot out the world around me drawing me closer to you. For me the song is a song of trust, a song of faith. It is a song of commitment and confidence. In the midst of everything that breaks us down, that twirls us around and throws us down, if we can still sing the song, then we too stand with Horatio on the ship at the place where his daughters drowned. I believe we join all the angels and saints in singing out our belief in you who takes our sorrows to the cross and cries with us. There in that dark, lonely place, the sun shines through the pain and warms us with love that never ends. Strength and courage well up within us and we are enabled to breathe, to hold steady, and to move forward.

I will never ever forget the time in New Mexico when my blood pressure was well beyond the critical numbers. I had a blinding headache and with no cell phone service, I had to drive 30 minutes up a scary dirt road to a remote monastery to pick up church friends. It was their only means of transportation. In those fearful minutes you sang excerpts from the song to me, just those lines that speak of help in troubled times. You were my calm, my serenity, my savior. I will never forget your generosity in perhaps the most frightening time of my life.

Gracious and Loving God,
no one else
loves us
like you.
No one
gives greater care
than you.
Sing to us,
O Lord,
I pray,
so that
we can sing
right back.

Love, Andrea