All right, I’m finally back where I started two days ago. I’m actually going to tell you what I set out to tell you on Tuesday morning. Remember I told you I was asked to lead a couple of songs during our education building dedication ceremony, and then yesterday I told you about Faithful Love? Well when all of this started I intended to tell you about It Is Well with My Soul.

This song seems to speak to a lot of folks. It touches people in different ways and some are really touched by the first verse. 

What ever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say,

It is well It is well with my soul.

And isn’t that a great way to look at life? Can you grasp how much more peace there would be in this world if we could actually live at peace no matter what the circumstances in our lives? That doesn’t mean to just sit in your current situation and not strive for more, but it does mean to be at peace where you are while working to change, or improve you current status.

Now in my mind the song just gets stronger with each verse. If we have been convicted that our sin has caused us to be lost, and this is a problem for a lot of folks, there is no way we cannot be touched by the words;

My sin, not in part but the whole, Is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more:

Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul.

Once a person has been convinced that they are lost, and that Jesus is the only way to salvation, these words have a meaning, a personal significance that brings peace and joy like no other words can.

Finally the third verse is there, and to me it is the one that brings chill bumps every time I sing the song. You know different people like to sing this song in different ways. What I mean by that is that some folks like to put special emphasis on the second verse by slowing down the tempo, and singing the verse quietly. Others like to bring it way down at the start of the course after singing loudly through the verse. I like to go against the songwriters, or publisher’s suggestion when beginning the third verse. The instruction is to sing this verse faster than we have sung the previous verses, but I just can’t do that. When I lead this song I bring it way down in volume and tempo at the start of the verse, and then build both back into the song as we continue through finishing with a bold conviction as I sing, “Even so it is well with my soul.”

And, Lord, haste the day when the faith shall be sight,

The clouds be rolled back as a scroll,

The trump shall resound and the Lord shall descend.

Even so it is well with my soul.

And then I bring it back down to an almost whisper for the course so I can build it to a broad refrain, and sing with a passion that shakes the walls of hell,

 It Is Well, It Is Well with My Soul!

Friends let me offer a truth at this point. If you can’t sing the words of this song with honesty, if you can’t mean it when you sing, “the Lord shall descend, Even so it is well with my soul,” if those word frighten you, if you don’t have peace in the meaning of the words, you need to change the you live. It’s just that simple.

 Till next time,

Grump 

(words of the song by Horatio G Spafford)