Mercy & Grace – 40 Days with the Music of Amy Grant

Day 40 – Holy Saturday

These Reflections which take the music of Amy Grant as their theme, were originally published in Lent 2015.  They are being republished during the Covid19 pandemic which is affecting the whole world

  

To Read:  

From the Scriptures:

¹ See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and that is what we are. The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. ² Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is. ³ And all who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.                    (1 John 3.1-3)

 

From Amy Grant:                      “Love Has A Hold On Me”

I have found the perfect mystery
Love has a hold on me
Long before my life had come to be
Love had a hold on me
Love has a hold on me

Where do I come from?
What does life mean?
Is it not to know the one who made me…?

As I’m looking down the road ahead
Love has a hold on me
Someday when I breathe my dying breath
Love has a hold on me
Love has a hold on me

Where will I go?
When this life is through?
Back into the light that made me and you…?

Love has a hold on me
Something opened up my eyes to see
Love has a hold on me
Love has a hold on me

I don’t have the answers to all of the questions
Running inside of my mind
But I can’t help believe that
Understanding comes in time

Love has a hold on me…

If I run, if I hide, I know inside of me
(Your love has a hold on me)
Tell me yes, tell me no, my heart will follow
(Your love has a hold on me)

 

To Listen:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B714GnjkD1I

 

To Reflect:

I suppose the phrase ‘faithful agnosticism’ could be called an oxymoron but it is one with which I am comfortable.  Judging by the verses from 1 John above I imagine there are others who find it fits into their faith as well.  ‘What we will be has not yet been revealed’, the writer of the letter seems to shrugs his shoulders at the prospect of heaven.   As to our eternal destiny he is an agnostic.  However he turns quickly to this statement of faith, ‘What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him.’

We don’t know where we are going, but we know we are going to be like Him.  That sounds like a good enough plan for me!  This love, that crouched helpless in a cradle and suffered arms outstretched on a cross, is so big, so comprehensive that, whatever the future and the life after life may hold, it can hold every single one of us.  No wonder that Amy, along with me and the author of 1 John, can shrug our shoulders about the details of the future; 

Where will I go?
When this life is through?
Back into the light that made me and you…?

It doesn’t matter because this great love holds us.  Having shown this love from crib to cross how can we ever doubt that?

Today is the waiting day, the day in-between this life and the promise of the life after life.  It can be an empty day in which we breathe a sigh of relief that we have made it through this journey of Lent and then go back to our old life after Sunday.  Or it can be a full day, a day pregnant with new life and the promise of things never ever being the same again.

Today we have the opportunity to choose to put our faith in the familiar and remain as we have been or to place our confidence in the mystery of the love that holds on to us.  This love held on to the cross for you and for I and stands eager to banish death.  I do not know everything about the future and the mystery of the life after life. I do know, however, were I have been in the past.  I am absolutely convinced that I would rather trust an unknown future with the One Who Loves us Best than ever go back to where I used to be.

 

To Do:

Look again at the commitments you made at the beginning of Lent.  Ask yourself if any of the disciplines you undertook can now become part of your life and not just a forty-day habit.

 

To Pray:

We come to God not by navigation, but by love.
(Augustine of Hippo in Pilgrim – Book 5)

 

 

Acknowledgements:

All of the music on the video clips from YouTube is © Amy Grant.  If you enjoy listening to her songs please consider buying her recordings.  A full discography and other information about Amy can be found on her website http://www.amygrant.com

Scripture quotes are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America

Prayers from Pilgrim are copyright © 2015 Stephen Cottrell, Steven Croft, Robert Atwell and Paula Gooder.