Is it well with your soul?
Recently, I attended 3 funerals in a short period of time. All were senior adults (over 70) and all were more that acquaintances. In all three cases, they each had a legacy of living life to the fullest, leading when called upon and to the best of their earthly ability, fulfilling their ultimate purpose.
Each funeral had the same song played or sung. That song happens to be my ALL TIME favorite song, of any genre, of any time period.
The songs title is It Is Well With My Soul and it was written in 1873 by Horatio Spafford. His personal story is breathtaking and almost impossible to believe. Taking his personal story aside, I love just reading the lyrics to each verse and I appreciate the fact that each family of each of these saints who passed away felt the need to have this song at their loved-ones funeral.
Verse 1
When peace like a river attendeth my way
when sorrows like sea billows roll,
whatever my lot, thou has taught me to say
It is well, it is well with my soul.
Pondering and thinking on this verse you are immediately faced with this sobering thought: “Do you have enough inner peace to withstand the storms of life?”
“Are you standing on solid enough ground that you will remain standing even when all around you is falling?”
“Can you take a personal blow and still have joy?”
These are serious and even life-altering questions that come to mind when listening to or reading that first verse.
I ask you, the reader the same questions. Are you prepared emotionally for the hard days ahead? They are coming. They come for all of us. No one is immune. No one can avoid hard times, difficult time and painful times. It is not the avoiding the the bad stuff that makes someone a survivor, it is how well we deal with the bad times that matter. Is it well with you soul?
Verse 2
Thou Satan should buffet, thou trials should come,
let this blessed assurance control,
that Christ has regarded my helpless estate,
and hath shed his own blood for my soul.
Sometimes it feels like the enemy is winning. Sometime it seems that the cheaters are winning, regardless of the old school yard chant. Occasionally, there are even times when you feel almost upside down in life and there is no hope for a recovery.
Then the sun rises the next day.
Then, someone, somewhere encourages you.
Then you are reminded of the bigger things of life.
When you are a follower of Christ, you can be assured that Jesus, with his sacrifice on the cross of Calvary over 2000 years ago, that act was him thinking about us and our hopeless and helpless “estate”.
When you know that the creator of the universe is thinking about you and doing something that will give you comfort and strength in the days of trouble, it makes it well with your soul.
Verse 3
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 Oh my soul!
Sometimes it is our own decisions, our own issues and our own fleshly, selfish desires that causes our problems. This is called sin. Sin is a taboo word because for many people is makes them feel uneasy or even judged. But that is the whole definition of sin. It is our own selfish desires that create conflict between us and fellow man and us and our Creator it dooms us to a life of torment. Unless, of course, you choose to be a follower of Jesus.
When you make that choice and God, full of grace and mercy, saves you, He also delivers you from a purposeless life and delivers you from hell.
He work on the cross covers your sins and mine.
It is a blissful thought. It is a wonderful feeling. It is well with my soul.
Verse 4
And Lord haste the day when my faith shall be sight,
the clouds be rolled back as a scroll.
The trump shall re-sound and the Lord shall descend,
Even so, it is well with my soul.
For those of us who try to live a life of following Christ, being a Christian in a non-Christian world, it is hard. It truly is hard living a life of faith, believing that serving Jesus is worth the wait, worth the humiliations, worth the hardships.
In that last verse the songwriter says to the Lord, “Hurry up!” “Come back soon!”
Basically, if you have lived a life where your faith in Christ has produced some hardship, some difficulties, which it does, then you want the scrolls to be rolled back, you want the curtains to be opened you want the answers to be shown. Your life of faith is worth it, make no mistake, but it is true that one day you want to see what you have been faithfully believing. It is natural.
There WILL come a day when the trumpet shall sound and the earth we know shall be no more. Life here will be over. But for Believers, it will be well with our soul.
