Written by Sarah Flower Adams and published in 1841, “Nearer My God to Thee” is considered by students of hymnology to be the finest hymn ever written by any woman hymn-writer. It is also a common hymn associated with sadness, as it is often sung at funerals. Personally, I’m not the kind of person who fancies labeling songs for different occasions, but unfortunately, that’s the way it works most of the time.
Two years earlier, I was asked to sing a song at my engagement ceremony by family and friends. I wasn’t in support of the idea but couldn’t escape the pressure after my mother-in-law-to-be called up and told my mom to ask me to sing cuz she had heard I sing well.
After a lot of thought (considering the fact that I was getting engaged that day and being mature enough to understand that marriage isn’t exactly a bed of roses), the only song that kept ringing in my mind was ‘Nearer My God to Thee’ (Frankly, I was more distressed than excited thinking about the fact that I was no longer going to be single and my mind kept saying “God, what am I getting myself into?”). And I knew the exact reactions I would get if I told everyone that I was going to sing this song.
I wasn’t planning to change my mind so, taking a deep breath, I went to tell my mom. She just stared at me reactionlessly. I could clearly read the words Are you out of your mind?!? on her face.
“People are going to think that you’re bemoaning your engagement!” she said. “You do know we only sing it at funerals here.”
“But we also do sing it at church during praise and worship,” I pointed out, for which she didn’t have a reply. “Just cuz everyone likes singing it at funerals doesn’t mean it’s meant for sad occasions.” She nodded.
“Mom, look at the words, there’s nothing about dying in that song,” I said, trying to explain. “Besides, you don’t always need only a sad occasion to be nearer to God.”
She agreed, and that’s the song I sang at my engagement. My introduction before starting off said the same thing, that we don’t always need a sad occasion to feel nearer to God, but that happy occasions are a good time to feel nearer to Him as well. Not sure how the guests took it cuz very few people commented on it. One of my aunts was frank enough to tell me that the song was awesome, except that she thought I should have picked something different. I smiled, appreciating the fact that she was being open, and then gave her the same explanation I gave mom. She just smiled and walked away.
I actually thought no one understood what I was trying to convey through my choice of song until another aunt commented on it when we met later.
“You know, Shefrin, your song really opened up my eyes,” she said, to my surprise. “The introduction really made sense and made me look at the song from a totally different perspective. I’m never going to look at it the same way again!”
Wow, I thought. So it did strike home. For some people at least. And that was nice to hear.
Almost two years later, a couple of months ago, two people who were very close to me had to go through sad times as their loved ones passed away. It broke my heart to watch the proceedings at the funeral and I was down the entire week as both these events took place during the same week. It got me asking myself a lot of questions about life, death and God’s purpose in every individual’s life.
As the hymn ‘Nearer My God to Thee’ was sung at the first funeral, tears welled in my eyes as a certain reality dawned on me and flashbacks from my engagement ceremony struck me.
We as humans are always channeled by tradition and society to look at things in just one angle. As Christians, we are channeled by our churches and denominations about the right ways to worship and other (sometimes) meaningless observances that we follow as a routine without questioning ourselves or thinking about the inner meaning behind them and what the Bible actually tells us about them.
We do not need a bad day or sad time to remember God or feel nearer to Him. In fact, we need to feel nearer to God every second of our lives, cuz our very existence would be impossible if He did not will it. So whether you’re going through the bad times or the good times, whether you’re down in the dumps or on cloud number 9, whether your day feels like hell or you feel like you’re in 7th heaven, it is always a good time to sing a good hymn you feel like singing. And we need to remember this: As much as we remember to feel nearer to God during our bad days and sad times, we especially need to remember to feel nearer to God during our good days and happy times as well!
