Well-Said, Horatio

Sunday night, Dec 21st, Jennifer coerced Sue and me to go to a Christmas service with her. It was nice. Some Christmas carols, an entertaining message, even glow-in-the-dark programs (I kid you not). As the service drew to a close, I slowly realized that things were sounding familiar – the pastor was using words/phrases from a familiar hymn. And then the music started, and a ringing began in my ears – a faint buzzing that made the sounds and flashing lights seem far, far away. They were playing “It Is Well With My Soul.” The last time I heard that hymn was at Mama’s funeral. I bowed my head and let my hair drop on either side of my face, shielding me from the room, and fought hard – I am NOT doing this, I am SO NOT doing this. I didn’t want to let it in. It’s been so long since I’ve completely let the grief wash over me, since I’ve completely given into the sobs.

But I was trapped – there were tons of people between me and exit – and so I bowed my head and felt the grief come. Hard, gasping, wrenching sobs. I was sitting in the church again, with Mama’s beautiful cherry casket just a few feet in front of me on that roller trolley thing. Susanna was sitting on my left. Jennifer was sitting on my right. Just like we were that day. Jennifer reached for my hand and I reached for Susanna’s hand, and we gripped each other so hard our knuckles turned white. With our heads bowed, sobbing for our mother, whose favorite hymn was being sung once again, and for ourselves, three motherless daughters at a Christmas service during the second of countless motherless Christmases.

I’ve been thinking about that hymn… why that particular hymn, out of thousands, was Mama’s favorite. I read the story behind the hymn, a story which I had heard before but which I had never really read. It’s not a coincidence that Mama’s favorite hymn, the one that we’ll never be able to hear without being transported back to our mother’s funeral, is a song that is written about grief and death and loss.

In the late 1800’s, Horatio Spafford was a successful lawyer in Chicago. In 1870, his 4-yr-old son died of scarlet fever. In 1871, a devastating fire wiped his law firm out. In 1873, the family decided to go on a much-needed vacation. His wife & four daughters went ahead with plans to meet him at their destination – their ship sank, and all four children died. He immediately boarded a ship to join his surviving wife. As his ship passed over the area of the ocean where his daughters had died, he wrote the words to this song.

How amazing that in the face of his overwhelming grief, he could still write such beautiful words. There’s no anger, no bitterness, no cursing of God or the shipbuilder or himself. No, there’s only acceptance, resignation, peace in knowing that no matter what hurtles down on him, his soul is well. We sang this song on the Thursday following the Monday that my mother died, but they were just words. They were chosen because Mama loved them, because we wanted everything about that service to be a celebration of who she was and is. We knew that six verses was a lot to sing at a funeral… but we sang all six, damn it, because this was Mama’s day and this was her favorite hymn and we were going to sing them all, even if there were 16 verses.

That day, they were only words – everything we said, everything we did was just words, just robotic actions. It’s taken me 15 months and a Christmas service ambush to truly consider the significance and beauty of these words, and WHY they were my mother’s most cherished hymn. She felt drawn to that hymn for a reason – for herself, and for her daughters, who would one day experience that sorrow that Horatio Spalding was writing through, writing because of, and writing in spite of.

“It Is Well With My Soul”

When peace, like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrow like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say,
It is well, it is well, with my soul.

Chorus:
It is well, with my soul,
It is well, it is well, with my soul.

Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come,
Let this blest assurance control,
That Christ has regarded my helpless estate,
And hath shed His own blood for my soul.

My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!
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!

For me, be it Christ, be it Christ hence to live:
If Jordan above me shall roll,
No pang shall be mine, for in death as in life
Thou wilt whisper Thy peace to my soul.

But, Lord, ’tis for Thee, for Thy coming we wait,
The sky, not the grave, is the goal;
Oh, trump of the angel! Oh, voice of the Lord!
Blessed hope, blessed rest of my soul!

And Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be in 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.