On the drive home from the west side, Third Day’s live rendition of Blessed Assurance came on my iPod. The lead vocalist started by telling the audience, “This is one of those songs we all sang growing up.”
And that’s true. I must have sung Blessed Assurance dozens of times as a kid in chapel, church, and youth group. It’s possible I sang it close to 100 times, but it never grabbed my attention the way it did tonight.
That’s not unusual. Songs often don’t bear any relation to the events of our lives the first or second or tenth time we hear them. Lyric is limited. But life isn’t. And as life passes, it often reconnects with a lyric we’ve heard many times before. Tonight was such an occasion.
My life experience over the last half year has not been pleasant. The road has been tragic, and the tragedy is almost final. It was as I was grieving that this song came on tonight. The lyric at the start of the chorus got my attention: “This is my story. This is my song.”
I’ve grieved a loss these last six months. I’ve lost a lover, a friend, a confidant. Even still, I’ve taken comfort in knowing that God never promised I wouldn’t lose anyone. Instead, He promised to guide me through the loss.
So that’s my story, one of His provision when I was in need. And that’s my song, one of a Father’s love amid his child’s grief.
Thank you, Father, for making the old new.
far from, but right at, home 