Friday, September 13, 2013

"Thy promises so rich in me fulfill."



"Thy promises so rich in me fulfill."
Hymn: “I Need Thee Every Hour” – Annie S. Hawks (1835-1918)
Tune: NEED

The people who research those sorts of things say that there are over 3,500 promises of God in the Bible. In the New International Version, the word “promise” occurs 69 times… and not once in the Gospels. I found THAT interesting, don’t you?

I’m not sure how many promises I would find if I read through the whole of Scripture notating everything that I consider to be a promise of God to his people; I’d be even more confused if I tried to narrow that down to the promises that apply to ME!

I don’t need to do that, however, to know that the Word of God is filled with promises and that he has stood behind (or will yet stand behind) every one he has made. Given my personal understanding of Jehovah God, he wouldn’t ‘waste his breath’ on any promise if it were not significant… important… or as this hymn-line says rich.

I looked up the word ‘rich’ in Webster’s, and found a lot of synonyms which apply to the promises of God: abundant, of high value or quality, well-supplied, magnificently impressive, highly productive, full of nutrients, pure. Annie Hawks may not have turned to Webster when she wrote this text, but having dissected the word, I think she selected the perfect word to describe the promises and blessings of God.

Fulfill means to complete or carry out. I’ve always thought of it as being filled-full… to the point of overflowing. In this case, I think that applies and makes the prayer-line even more powerful. I guess I want to not only be standing on the promises; I want to be drowning in them!

Simply put, may this be our prayer today: Let your rich promises be realized in my life. Amen.

P. S. – As is the case in so many hymns, this hymn-line is tucked into stanza three – the one we too often skip. In fact, I couldn’t find an online recording that included it! As usual, the third stanza has the truth that has been stolen from those of us who worship corporately. Let’s add a new commandment for worship-planners: “Thou shalt not steal a stanza from any hymn that thou shalt sing with thy thinking congregants, especially the third.”



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Hymnlines - Hemlines: Get it?! :)

Hymnlines - Hemlines: Get it?! :)