Thursday, May 12, 2016

"There's not an hour that he is not near us, no night so dark but his love can cheer us."

Hymn: “No, Not One” – Johnson Oatman, Jr. (1856-1922)
Tune: HARPER MEMORIAL

None of us wants to be abandoned. It’s a fear common to all of us.

When pledging a music fraternity in college, part of the initiation involved being blindfolded and driven out to the middle of nowhere in Jefferson County. Upon being dropped off well before dawn and instructed to not take off the blindfold until I had counted to 100, I heard the car speeding away. Almost immediately I ripped the blindfold off and watched as the red tail lights faded down the hill and into the distance. Were they headed back to school or were they trying to throw me off by heading the opposite direction? There I stood with an envelope of instructions I could barely read because there wasn’t a light anywhere in sight. I was abandoned and, quite frankly, terrified. Hours later I found my way back to campus in time to get ready for my first class.

Isn’t it odd what some of these hymnlines bring to my mind? Okay, I admit it: I AM odd!

As alone as I was, as forsaken as I felt – even then, I was not by myself. Deserted by my ‘friends,’ but not unaccompanied because “there’s not an hour that he is not near us, and there’s no night so dark but his love can cheer us.”

That was true for me in 1970. It is still true for me today. How about you?


No comments:

Post a Comment

You are welcome to comment on any of the posts. They are sent to ME directly. Thanks for any feedback you would like to make.

Hymnlines - Hemlines: Get it?! :)

Hymnlines - Hemlines: Get it?! :)