NIGHT PRAYER: Monday 7/27

Two of my high school classmates went home to God last week. Each loss is great but two in such a short time makes it even more difficult.   In a class of '65 text group, one member wrote, "What's going on?  This is hard..."  In response, I wrote and shared a prayer which I'm offering to you this evening...

We’re at that time in our lives
when the friends we grew up with,  

people we loved so much and held so dear,
who shaped and shared
our best and fondest memories:
    now they’re going home to you, Lord,
    and leaving us behind… 

We shouldn’t be surprised,

we knew this time would come

but  what long seemed far away

is now so close to hand

and demanding

what we find so hard to do:

to let go into your hands, Lord,

into your everlasting peace,

   the greatest gifts you gave us,

   the treasures of our hearts…

 

We hope, we pray, we trust, Lord,

that they are now with you,

that in your kindness and your mercy

you’ve brought them home to heaven:

   home to where they came from,

   your heart, your love, your arms…

 

And the time will come for us, Lord,

as it has for those we miss,

time at last to leave behind us

all we've known and all we've loved, 

and to fall into your warm embrace,

your mercy and your peace,

there to greet again and meet again

the treasures of our hearts:

   all together, once again,

   in the home you are for us… 

Protect us, Lord while we're awake

    and watch over us while we sleep

that awake, we might keep watch with you

    and asleep, rest in your peace...

Amen. 

 

Tonight's song is a contemporary musical setting of a poem by George Matheson, a blind, 19th century Scottish minister, scholar and poet.  This setting includes the first and third of Matheson's 4 stanza poem, O Love.  I've included the whole poem (along with the poet's note on the piece) following the video.

 

 O Love That Will Not Let Me Go

  by Elaine Hagenberg

    performed by Beckhorst Singers

      lyrics from a hymn by George Matheson 

  

If a video doesn't appear below, click here!

 

 

 

 Matheson's comment on O Love and all four verses...

 

 My hymn was composed . . . on the evening of the 6th of June, 1882, when I was 40 years of age. I was alone in the manse at that time. It was the night of my sister’s marriage, and the rest of the family were staying overnight in Glasgow. Something happened to me, which was known only to myself, and which caused me the most severe mental suffering. The hymn was the fruit of that suffering. It was the quickest bit of work I ever did in my life. I had the impression of having it dictated to me by some inward voice rather than of working it out myself. I am quite sure that the whole work was completed in five minutes, and equally sure that it never received at my hands any retouching or correction . . . this came like a dayspring from on high.

O Love that wilt not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in Thee;
I give Thee back the life I owe,
That in Thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.

O Light that followest all my way,
I yield my flickering torch to Thee;
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in Thy sunshine’s blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be.

O Joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to Thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain,
That morn shall tearless be.

O Cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from Thee;
I lay in dust life’s glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be.

~ George Matheson   

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