Do you remember the Beatles first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, singing “I Wanna Hold Your Hand?”  It was a pivotal point in US history, as the rock and drug scene then exploded.

Songs bring us back to where we were, what we were doing, what we were FEELING.

There’s a song, also written by a British man, that changed my life.

During a protracted, devastating time in my family’s life, when I was seven years old, my mother bought me one of those box record players for a birthday present.  Some of you remember those primitive machines!  We would put a little plastic piece in the center of a 45rpm record, move the arm and place the needle on the record, and listen again and again.

My mother, raised in an Orthodox Jewish home, ‘inadvertently’ picked Abide With Me (along with Roll out the Barrel and another title I can’t recall.)  Someone in the Great Somewhere knew I needed the words.  Obviously my mother did not know that Abide With Me was a Christian hymn!

I have included all the words from the song at the end of this post.  All I remember from the 45rpm record were the words, “When other helpers fail, and comforts flee, Help of the helpless, O Abide with me.”

As a seven year old, I already knew I was helpless.  My family was facing the humanly unsolvable problem of an incurable disease and certain death.  Looking back, knowing I was ‘helpless’ was a gift.  I did not have to wait until I was old, and hence waste a lot of time, before reckoning with that harsh reality regarding the human condition.  It was, as someone has described this type of thing, “a severe mercy.”

I did not know what the word ‘abide’ meant intellectually; however, I did know, intuitively.  I asked the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, whom I had heard about in Hebrew school, to “abide with me”.   A child’s faith is precious in God’s sight because it is unencumbered by attitude, pre-conceived notions or presumptions.   No demanding, no doubting, no sense of entitlement.  I simply asked.

His hand of mercy and blessing followed me.  I came to know this One, who not only was “holding my hand”, but also really wanted to hold my hand, through life’s difficulties.  He ultimately brought revelation knowledge to me when I was seventeen, showing me that Yeshua, Jesus of Nazareth, was my Messiah.

Yeshua said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”   (John 12:24)

It is tragic that Henry Francis Lyte died from tuberculosis three weeks after writing Abide With Me.  As the grain of wheat that died, he didn’t know that his creation bore much fruit. His hymn became a favorite of King George V and Mahatma Ghandi!  It was sung at the wedding of the future Queen Elizabeth II.  It was played at annual military services in India;  it is played at the annual Anzac Day services honoring  Australian and New Zealand troops who fought in World War I; the first verse of the hymn is played before the The Football Association Challenge Cup (FA) Cup finals, the oldest association football competition in the world, since 1871-1872; the famous jazz musician “Thelonious Monk recorded a simple yet remarkably elegant instrumental version of the hymn with his jazz septet under the title “Abide with Me” as start of the 1957 album Monk’s Music;”  Elton John had it on his Carnival Rainforest album;  it was on TV shows such as Lost and Touched By An Angel!” ¹

He didn’t know that 116 years after these simple, yet profoundly anointed words were birthed out of his suffering and impending death, the life of a devastated little Jewish girl in New York City would be powerfully impacted, and that they would be influential in introducing her to the Eternal One and a life of hope and comfort; and that she would, herself, go on to influence thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, with the same hope and comfort, all because of the outpouring of Henry Lyte’s heart in suffering.

I don’t think that 45rpm record contained the complete hymn.  It is clear that Mr. Lyte, suffering with TB,  was preparing for his possible death, as he quoted 1 Corinthians 16:55: “O Death, where is your victory?  O death, where is your sting?”  Though this is a well known New Testament passage, its origin is in the Hebrew Scriptures:  Hosea 13:14!  “O Death, where are your thorns?  O Sheol, where is your sting?”

As a little girl, I knew that my loved one’s impending death certainly stung!  But no one told me what the Scriptures declare:  That death is an enemy, not just part of the life cycle.  The One Henry Lyte and I hope in “…must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet.  The last enemy that will be abolished is death.”   (1 Corinthians 15:25-26)

Please note that the writer of 1 Corinthians was Rav Shaul (The Apostle Paul), a learned orthodox Jewish man who met his Messiah Yeshua (Jesus) in a life changing experience on the road to Damascus (Acts 9).  He was thoroughly familiar with the Hebrew Scriptures, and perhaps, when writing to the Corinthian believers, was thinking of this passage from the Hebrew Prophet, Isaiah:

“And on this mountain He (Yehovah Tzvaot-the LORD of hosts) will swallow up the covering which is over all peoples,
Even the veil which is stretched over all nations.
He will swallow up death for all time,
And the Lord GOD will wipe tears away from all faces,
And He will remove the reproach of His people from all the earth;
For the LORD has spoken.”  (Isaiah 25:7-8)

Whether you are facing death or disappointment, there is One who longs to hold your hand, to “abide with you”.

Ask Him to abide with you.  Know that He has made it simple to come to Him, because He already provided the Way, through  Messiah Yeshua, who gave His life as an atonement, that you might have life.

Abide With Me

Abide with me; fast falls the eventide;
The darkness deepens; Lord, with me abide;
When other helpers fail and comforts flee,
Help of the helpless, oh, abide with me.
Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day;
Earth’s joys grow dim, its glories pass away;
Change and decay in all around I see—
O Thou who changest not, abide with me.
I need Thy presence every passing hour;
What but Thy grace can foil the tempter’s pow’r?
Who, like Thyself, my guide and stay can be?
Through cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me.
I fear no foe, with Thee at hand to bless;
Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness;
Where is death’s sting? Where, grave, thy victory?
I triumph still, if Thou abide with me.
Hold Thou Thy cross before my closing eyes;
Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies;
Heav’n’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee;
In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.

¹ “Abide with Me.” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. 3 Jul 2009, 22:56 UTC. 3 Jul 2009 <http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Abide_with_Me&oldid=300134360>.