The Fount of Every Blessing

My birthday has rolled around again (that happens so quickly these days J).  Sometimes, I’m surprised by my own age, I’ll wake up some mornings and think I’m still in my 20’s only to jolt myself back to reality that more time has passed then I think.  We use our birthdays and anniversaries to mark the passage of time.  They call us to stop and remember what has happened since the last time we passed this way. And whether the memories are good or bad there is something in us that needs to recall, evaluate, and acknowledge what has transpired.  As I pass my milestone this year I am captivated by the words of a very old hymn penned in 1757 by Robert Robinson, “Come Thou Fount”. 

“Come thou fount of every blessing tune my heart to sing thy grace.” 

Looking back over my year and even farther past that into the years before, I find that my life is covered with evidences of God’s grace.  They are weaved into every portion of my existence and they color all of my memories both good and bad. Too easily I am distracted by the annoyances of daily living and I find myself in the middle of grumbling and self-pity.  I so desire that in this coming year He would “tune my heart” to sing of His grace to me.  As both of my children currently play the violin, I am painfully aware of how grating the sound of an out of tune instrument can be.  Without His tuning in my life I know I sound this way too.  Instead of screeching out the sounds of complaint, worry, self-pity, and judgment, I wish instead that the beautiful sounds of mercy, praise, and thankfulness would play out of me.  Because after all, “streams of mercy, never ceasing call for songs of loudest praise.” 

“O to grace how great a debtor daily I’m constrained to be, let thy goodness like a fetter bind my wandering heart to thee.  Prone to wander Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love.”

I have struggled with my purpose lately and my desire to be in this place.  It hasn’t felt as clear as it once was, but I wonder if that has less to do with this place, then it has to do with me.  When my eyes are fixed on myself, my needs, my security, my happiness, and my desires, I take them off of the Fount of Blessings.  In doing that I forget so easily what a debtor to grace that I am.  All of the good things in my life I owe to Him.  He has poured grace upon grace into me in the form of life, health, family, friends, forgiveness, peace, and eternal security.  Recognizing His goodness is the thing that pulls me back from my restless wandering into a place of quiet peace.  It reminds me that it is in thankful service to Him that I find the joy and contentment I seek.  “Here’s my heart o take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above.” 

“Here I raise my Ebenezer,  hither by thy help I’ve come.  And I hope by thy good pleasure safely to arrive at home.”

I am often reminded in life how important it is to set up remembrances to the blessings of God in my life.  Remembering what He has done always inspires confidence in what He will do.  So as I mark another year off, I am reminded to raise up my stone of remembrance and acknowledge that I’ve only come this far by the loving grace of God in my life.  Continuing on will also surely depend on His continued mercy and grace poured out on me.  And to help my heart stay fixed on that fact, I need to be proclaiming His grace out loud for others to hear, but mostly for myself to hear and remember.  In the shadow of that grace I can move forward with confidence. 

I have been blessed by the evidence of this grace in the lives of 2 women this month, 1 is a young American mother of 3 small children who is battling cancer while she almost daily writes of things she is thankful for.  I think she grows more beautiful ever day because of His grace shining so clearly through her life.  The second one is a Chinese woman who is serving as my 2^nd mom and quasi-grandmother to my baby for this portion of our lives.  She has slowly shared with me her story, and it is full of more loss and hardship then I was prepared to hear.  But despite this, she approaches every day with a smile and a joyful optimism that God is her helper and in Him she has all she needs.  These women and many others like them inspire me to pull close to the heart of God and proclaim His grace no matter what the circumstance.  I hope that is the story of this next year of my life as I look forward to this:

“O that day when free from sinning we will see thy lovely face, full arrayed in blood washed linen, how we’ll sing thy Sovereign grace.  Come my Lord no longer tarry, bring thy promises to pass, for we know thy hand will bring us safely home with thee at last.”