I Trace the Rainbow through the Rain

I’ve had a deepening appreciation for old hymns since I’ve moved here. This has been motivated in part because we sing more of the old ones here than we did at Highland, and in part because the timelessness and familiarity have been comforting to me during this time of transition. I love that these songs are the same ones I’ve been singing my whole life. I love the history of them and the sense of continuity that generations before me have found meaning and hope in these words. And I love, love, love that I can hear the sound of my grandad’s voice in some of them (he was the song leader at the little church in Bangs, Texas, where my dad grew up).

Lately, I’ve been wrapping these songs around myself like a blanket. I sing to myself in moments when I’m feeling small and lonely. I retreat into as I walk down the street, when I’m alone in my apartment, whenever life seems hard. In fact, I think singing old hymns has become my primary mode of prayer. I think I started because of the comfort of familiarity, but I find that my spirit has been renewed by the beauty of the words, and by the statements of faith in brokenness that I see in them. There seems to be an almost unanimous understanding in the best of the old hymns that life is hard, and that the only good option is to turn and cling to God, and to have faith that there is hope. And there’s an acknowledgment of the mystery and sacredness of God that is too often missing in some of the more contemporary songs.

Earlier this week I downloaded Chris Rice’s album Peace Like a River, which is a collection of many of my favorite hymns, and I’ve really been enjoying listening to it. My favorite style for recorded hymns is a sort of mixture of beauty and humility, and this album does that really well. Here are some of my favorite hymns and favorite lines from them, in no particular order.

1. O Love that Will Not Let Me: “O Joy that seekest me through pain / I cannot turn my heart from Thee / I trace the rainbow through the rain / And trust the promise is not vain / that morn shall tearless be.”

2. Abide with Me: “Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day / Earth’s joys grow dim; its glories pass away / Change and decay in all around I see / O Thou who changest not, abide with me.”

3. Great is Thy Faithfulness: “Summer and winter and springtime and harvest / Sun, moon and stars in their courses above / Join with all nature in manifold witness / To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.”

4. It is Well with My Soul: “When peace like a river / attendeneth my way / When sorrows like sea billows roll / whatever my lot / Thou hast taught me to say / It is well, it is well with my soul” (p.s. when I was little, I thought this song said, “It is well with Lysol.” And that’s how I sang it at church. Loud and proud, and a little confused.)

5. Holy, Holy, Holy: [the whole song] [and you should listen to this link. It's Sufjan Steven's version, and maybe my favorite song in existence.]

So this is the first blessing I’m counting–a heritage of beautiful hymns that are sustaining me.  What are some of your favorites, old or new?

Counting My Blessings

It’s been one of those days. You know the kind–where unpleasant things seem to pile up on top of each other until it seems like nothing is good and you want to declare to the world that you’re packing your bags and moving to Australia.

The problem is that I’ve been having those days a little too often lately. Winter has me pinned down. Just when I begin to feel like I can handle the amount of snow piled up everywhere, more comes. Just when the slush starts to dry up, it snows and/or rains and then it’s worse than before. The sun shines for, it seems, a few hours a week only, and it’s a brooding gray the rest of the time. And, somehow, I feel more isolated and alone now than I have since I’ve been here.

All of this is working against me and I’ve been grouchy and glum and feeling awfully sorry for myself. Which I hate. I’ve been trying to find ways to cope with this surreal world and my negative reaction to it, and haven’t come up with much that is gratifying. I’ve thought about buying things for myself, eating myself into a diabetic coma, and just hiding under my covers and pretending like I don’t have to go out. But, of course, none of that would actually make me feel better.

So instead of being self-indulgent, I’m going to try remembering all of the ways that I’ve been blessed. I’m going to make myself spend time dwelling one one or a few of my blessings everyday, and hope that it replaces the time I’ve been spending wallowing in self-pity. And I’m going to share it here on my blog. Everyday. I’m not usually much good at daily (or any regular) blogging, but I also know that there has to be an active component to any kind of discipline for me to actually keep at it, and if I’m sharing with other people I tend to be more committed. I may not write a lot, but I’ll write something. Starting today.