Here's My Heart, O Take and Seal It

"Consolator" by Carl Bloch

This was an interesting week. On Monday, I learned that my longtime friend and mentor, Ronald W. Walker, had died after a long battle with cancer.  I had seen Ron just a few weeks ago and he had been anxious about plans for additional articles.  The two of us had planned to meet just a couple of days later to discuss a project that would assist his work.  But the day that we were supposed to meet, Ron wrote to me and informed me that he would have to reschedule, as his health had been bad since we had last met.  We never got to have that rescheduled meeting.

Ron's death was difficult for me for many reasons.  On the one hand, I had known just how bad his health had been for a long time now.  This past year, it was evident that the cancer was taking a serious toll and would eventually take his life.  And so I was happy to see my good friend released from pain and suffering.  But on the other hand, I was losing a man to whom I owe much of my history career.  More than that, I was losing a friend.  Coming as it has on the heels of my Dad's unexpected death, Ron's passing seemed all the more difficult.

On Friday, I attended Ron's funeral.  It was a beautiful occasion and fostered thoughts about Ron, but also a lot of thoughts about my Dad.  The music was most fitting.  Ron's grandchildren sung "Beautiful Savior," a hymn that had also been sung at my Dad's funeral.  His son sung Antonín Dvořák's beautiful hymn "Goin' Home."  And his children sung a lovely rendition of my long time favorite, "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing."

I first became acquainted with "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing" as a young missionary in Memphis.  I was particularly struck by these words:

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;

Here's my heart, O take and seal it,

Seal it for Thy courts above.

I love this beautiful reminder of my own deep need for the Savior, and of His constant goodness to me.  I came to understand that I am indeed, "prone to wander" and "prone to leave the God I love," as are each of us.  Accordingly, my humble prayer became "Here's my heart, O take and seal it, Seal it for Thy courts above," hoping that the Lord, in His goodness, would help me to stay steady and to rise above my own natural imperfections.

The rendition that Ron's children sung at his funeral included the fifth verse, which I had not been aware of, but whose words struck me:

O that day when freed from sinning

I shall see Thy lovely face;

Clothed then in blood washed linen

How I'll sing Thy sovereign grace;

Come, my Lord, no longer tarry,

Take my ransomed soul away;

Send thine angels now to carry

Me to realms of endless day.

These beautiful words were a comfort to me as I pondered the loss of a good friend, and more particularly the loss of my Dad.  Both of them had been among the best of men.  Through their good lives, they had prepared to meet the Lord, and had been ushered through the veil by angels whose faces they knew and immediately recognized.

There is no more important truth for us to grasp, than the truth of the Savior's victory over death.  Sooner or later, each one of us will face a loss, the extent of which will be so great, that it would be impossible for us to deal with it were it not for the Savior.  But because of the Savior's suffering, death, and resurrection, we are blessed with an assurance of future blessings and future reunions with those whose faces we most desire to see.  For this I am eternally grateful.

Brett