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“Blessed Assurance”

March 5, 2023

Genesis 12:1-4a  |  Psalm 121  |  Romans 4:1-5, 13-17  |  John 3:1-17

The appointed lessons, Psalm and Gospel readings for this Second Sunday in Lent are laden with profound promises, possibilities and poetry, – all worthy of pondering. Which do I choose for this reflection? What is the common thread?

In reading through them, an old hymn – a “chestnut” – came to mind, easily found in the many hymnals we have here in our homestead. Grandpa was a Baptist (his mother was a card-carrying member of the WCTU); Grandma was a Swedish Lutheran (her father’s Swedish Psalter is still here). There’s even a Methodist hymnal, along with a Quaker one from Moses Brown School.  At some point (a story for another time), their children, – my mother and her brother – started attending St. Luke’s in their early teens, so we have four versions of the Episcopal hymnal, dating back to 1892.

The aforementioned “chestnut,” “Blessed Assurance,” never made it into the Episcopal hymnals.  Written in 1873, 150 years ago, by Fanny Crosby and Phoebe Knapp, I learned it as a student at the non-denominational Christian college I attended, where it was frequently sung with gusto at Chapel, and other faithful gatherings:

Blessed Assurance, Jesus is mine!
Oh, what a foretaste of glory divine!
Heir of salvation, purchased of God,
Born of His Spirit, washed in His blood.

In the Old Testament lesson from Genesis, God establishes His covenant with Abram (later Abraham), directing him to leave his country and travel to “the land that I will show you.”  Just pack up and go. Stay tuned for further instructions. Yikes. Yet Abram believed and obeyed God, as he and his family were led to Egypt, and then to Canaan. “I will make of you a great nation,” God tells him, “and I will bless you…and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

Blessed Assurance

Continuing his journey of faith, Abraham and his wife, Sarah, became parents of Isaac, a miracle in itself. God blessed them, but then told Abraham to offer his precious son as a sacrifice. Unthinkable. But Abraham trusted God, took his son up the mountain, and prepared to give up what he loved most, for the God who had established a timeless covenant with him. As we know, God provided at the final moment, so Isaac was spared. “For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the laws but through the righteousness of faith,” Paul states in his Epistle to the Romans. He was justified – saved – by his faith, not by his works.

Blessed Assurance

Psalm 121 is a lyrical poem of comfort, often recited at funerals, and a source of musical inspiration (think of Brahms’ “He watching over Israel…slumbers not nor sleeps.”). I love the imagery of the sun and the moon, day and night, and looking up to majestic mountains or green hills. Even when coming into Town, kayaking out of Greenwich Cove, or walking along Main Street, I look upward for St. Luke’s beautiful steeple, there on the Hill, offering Light and constancy in a changing world.

Blessed Assurance

A number of years ago, I was trying to find a buyer for my mother’s 1967 Rambler Rebel, which had languished in her driveway, not driven, for too many years after she had moved out of the house. Though it had attracted a lot of attention when she drove it around Edgewood, up until 2006, it wasn’t considered a sought-after model, and wasn’t in the greatest shape. Finally there was a credible response to my Craigslist posting, some back-and-forth communication, and an agreement to meet at the house to complete the sale. I was anxious, for a number of practical and sentimental reasons. Was the buyer reliable, and would bring the cash? Did he have the right equipment to transport the car safely? Will he really restore her and show up at those cruise nights, as he said? Was this what my mother would have wanted? 

The flatbed truck pulled up, with a tow, and the fellow jumped out and approached. A kind face.  Nice guy. And he was wearing a black knitted cap with “John 3:16” stitched in the front. 

This was going to be all right, I thought.

Blessed Assurance

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son,” Jesus tells Nicodemus, “so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”

As many times as we’ve heard, read and recited these eternal words of Jesus, they never lose their impact, their comfort and their promise, so central to what makes us Christians. This passage, from John’s Gospel, will be read at today’s services, and raised in music as the Choirs sing John Stainer’s timeless anthem, “God So Loved the World.”

Blessed Assurance

This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Saviour, all the day long;
This is my story, this is my song,
Praising my Saviour, all the day long.

Laura Sullivan