Eric Reece
The beautiful Springtime brings to memory one of my favorite hymns: “Great is Thy Faithfulness,” written as a poem by Thomas Chisholm in 1923.
The chorus goes:
Great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness;
Morning by morning new mercies I see;
All I have needed thy hand hath provided;
Great is thy faithfulness, Lord unto me.
Born in Franklin, Ky., in 1866, Chisholm started teaching school at age 16. He became his hometown newspaper editor for five years and later served as a Methodist minister. Because of poor health, he had to step down from preaching and sold life insurance.
Along the way, he wrote many poems, which some were set to music and became well loved hymns in the church. The website “Hymnary” lists 319 of his songs in hymnals.
He believed hymns should not be sentimental, but be grounded in scripture. “Great is Thy Faithfulness” was not written out of any suffering, but inspired from his confidence that God is at work in our human lives each day.
He wrote, “God has given me many wonderful displays of His providing care, for which I am filled with astonishing gratefulness."
His inspiration came from Lamentations 3:22-23, “It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.”
This scripture is the reading for Holy Saturday, remembering the day our Savior laid in the tomb before he rose from the dead.
The Greek translation of Lamentations added an introduction to the book:
“And it came to pass, after Israel was taken captive, and Jerusalem made desolate, that Jeremias sat weeping, and lamented with this lamentation over Jerusalem, and said…”
From this Jeremiah – the weeping prophet – was seen as the author of the book.
The Book of Lamentations is a collection of five separate poems. It was written during the desolation and destruction of Jerusalem by Babylon in 586 B.C. The poems share the deep human grief we experience in loss with protest, anger and hope for future justice.
Laments were prayers to God during personal times of grief. It was a way to name our suffering and address our situation. After pouring out sorrows to God, laments closed with a word of confidence and hope God was going to bring restoration for the future.
What can we learn from Jeremiah and his laments? Laments are a form of prayer that help us communicate to God what we are going through. It helps us to bring all our pain to God and once all that is spoken, voice our confidence in God’s grace and mercy to bring healing.
Whatever you may be experiencing in life, take time to pray, lift up your laments to God. God will hear and bless you.
Eric Reece is the faith columnist for The Graham Star. He is pastor of Robbinsville United Methodist Church and can be reached via email, ereece@wnccumc.net.