Thoughts on gatherings
In spite of all that might be said of family gatherings, they hold an important place in the Christian nurturing of relationships. We all spent this last Thanksgiving Day in various ways, alone, in grief, quietly around a table of two. At our last gathering for Thanksgiving Day, our youngest granddaughter, an accomplished violinist, accompanied us while we sang hymns together. Then she played Preludio from Bach ’Partita No. 3 and Paganini Caprice No 16.
Whether alone or at a gathering of twenty, the memory of “Thanksgiving ” provides us with a richer appreciation of our collective Christian heritage.
They can bring to remembrance songs we sang together. One I recall is Isaac Watt’s paraphrasing of Psalm 90– “O God, Our Help in Ages Past,” which he wrote in 1719.
It is the blessed assurance that those who have called upon God in the past will in each new generation call upon Him.
Donald Sheehan, in his book The Psalms of David, assures us that each new generation, by God’s love, grace and mercy shall guide us into a deeper understanding of God. His point is that it is not the psalmist’s world that changes; the mind and person of the psalmist changes. Sheehan writes, “The Psalms disclose the mind of David and in the process takes on the mind of Christ.”
I find great comfort in what Paul writes concerning what Christ alone can do for us. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Philippians 2:5-8
Paul knew by faith that Christ’s humble obedience to the cross would not end in death.
As a psychotherapist I often had the same convictions. Broken familial relationships, death, divorce, and addiction longed for wholeness. I have the same longings as a father, grandfather and great-grandfather that these relationships should end in eternal life.
These longings originate in Genesis 2:24 and are repeated by Paul. The two shall become one states that a man shall leave his parents to be united with his wife, and the two will become “one flesh.” Paul refers to this as a “great mystery” between Christ and the church which reveals a far greater spiritual reality. Just as a husband and wife are joined into one, it speaks of the greater mystery of Christ and His church everlasting.
George Mattheson wrote the hymn “O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go.” He was a blind Scottish preacher and theologian. He composed the lyrics in five minutes, inspired by a personal period of deep suffering, rejection, and grief inspired by God’s unwavering love for him. I sang the hymn at my ordination into the ministry.
O love that will not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in thee;
I give thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.
O Light that follows all my way,
I yield my flick’ring torch to thee;
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in thy sunshine’s blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be.
O Joy that seekest me thru’ pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow thru’ the rain
And feel the promise is not vain
That morn shall tearless be.
O cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from thee;
I lay in dust life’s glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be.
