O Love That Wilt Not Let me Go

I appreciate followers of Jesus who are willing to be honest about their struggles. They minister and encourage through their pain. I want to be that kind of Christ-follower . . .

When my “torch flickers”

When the pain is seemingly unending

God is there. He is.

Amazing grace. . .

Words: George Ma­the­son, in the Church of Scot­land mag­a­zine Life and Work, Jan­u­a­ry 1882. Music: St. Mar­garet (Peace), Al­bert L. Peace, 1884 (MI­DI, score). Alternate tunes: Hampstead (Davies), H. Wal­ford Da­vies, in In hoc Sig­no, 1915, num­ber 31 (MI­DI, score) Wyke, Les­lie H. Hew­ard (1897-1943) (MI­DI, score). Hew­ard is said have writ­ten the tune while a choir boy at Man­ches­ter Ca­thed­ral.

Matheson said about this hymn:

My hymn was com­posed in the manse of In­ne­lan [Ar­gyle­shire, Scot­land] on the ev­en­ing of the 6th of June, 1882, when I was 40 years of age. I was alone in the manse at that time. It was the night of my sister’s mar­ri­age, and the rest of the fam­i­ly were stay­ing over­night in Glas­gow. Some­thing hap­pened to me, which was known only to my­self, and which caused me the most se­vere men­tal suf­fer­ing. The hymn was the fruit of that suf­fer­ing. It was the quick­est bit of work I ever did in my life. I had the im­press­ion of hav­ing it dic­tat­ed to me by some in­ward voice ra­ther than of work­ing it out my­self. I am quite sure that the whole work was com­plet­ed in five min­utes, and equal­ly sure that it ne­ver re­ceived at my hands any re­touch­ing or cor­rect­ion. I have no na­tur­al gift of rhy­thm. All the other vers­es I have ever writ­ten are man­u­fact­ured ar­ti­cles; this came like a day­spring from on high.