The Unbreakable Love of Christ
written by Pastor Brent Brondyke
O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go: A Hymn That Endures
O Love that will not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in thee;
I give thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.
George Matheson was a Christian minister in Scotland in the mid to late nineteenth century. He preached and wrote prolifically, but without question, the work for which he is most remembered is his little poem written in 1882 and set to music a few years later by Albert L. Peace, “O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go.”
It has long been a favorite of mine for its simplicity, deeply devotional thought, Christ-centered focus, and, perhaps most of all, the oft-repeated story behind it.
The Pain Behind the Hymn
Matheson struggled with deteriorating eyesight for most of his early years and learned as he was ready to go off to college at the age of fifteen that he would eventually be completely blind. Undeterred, and with the help of his sisters, he pursued his scholarly ambitions and eventually achieved renown as a scholar and preacher—and did, indeed, become completely blind.
He penned the famous hymn on
“the day of my sister’s marriage…Something happened to me, which was known only to myself and which caused me the most severe mental suffering. The hymn was the fruit of that suffering.”
He also wrote,
“It was composed with extreme rapidity; it seemed to me that its construction occupied only a few minutes, and I felt myself rather in the position of one who was being dictated to, than of an original artist.”
What was the pain to which he referred?
It has often been said that it must have been the remembrance of the rejection by his fiancé at the news of his impending blindness many years before.
Or, it may have been that because of his sister’s marriage, his own situation and her assistance to him might be changing.
No one really knows. He said the cause of the pain was “known only to myself.”
While it is easy to find references to the story about his fiancé, I’ve not been able to find any historical evidence for the story from him or from any contemporaries. While it may be true, I’m hesitant to repeat it as the impetus for the hymn.
Without question, the hymn sprang from the inward fountain of pain.
The Poetry of Christ’s Love
O Joy that seekest me thru’ pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow thru’ the rain
And feel the promise is not vain
That morn shall tearless be.
Anyone dealing with a trial like blindness might have many causes for pain. We all struggle with the “problem of pain.” No doubt, this is a major reason the hymn has resonated with so many and become a staple of Christian hymnody.
The simple hymn is rich in poetic imagery, personifying Christ as Love, Light, Joy, and Cross.
“My heart restores its borrowed ray,”
“I trace the rainbow through the rain,”
“And from the ground there blossoms red” are just a few of its memorable lines.
I must heartily concur that the poem was the fruit of inspiration, albeit poetic, not divine.
So much could be written on this hymn and has, but I want to focus on the final stanza, “O Cross.”
The Missing Verse: O Cross
Recently, a beautiful choral version of this poem was published with a marvelous new tune. Inexplicably, the composer—and I cannot possibly pretend to know the motivation—only used the text of the first and third stanzas, omitting entirely the final glorious stanza presenting Christ as the Cross.
O Cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from thee;
I lay in dust life’s glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be.
Our choir has sung the song but changed the words to include the final stanza. I could not, in good conscience, do it any other way.
That is the theme of this blog.
Suffering, Sin, and the Cross
Suffering is a universal of the human condition.
At its root, suffering is caused by sin. In other words, there would be no suffering if there were no sin.
In Eden, before sin, there was no suffering.
In heaven, where sin cannot and will not exist, there will be no suffering. God will wipe away all tears from our eyes!
However, while sin is the root cause of all pain, it is not the direct cause of all pain.
This is the story of Job.
Job was suffering, but he knew he was not suffering for his sin. Matheson wrote and preached prolifically and famously—including by special invitation before the Queen—on Job and the problem of pain. His famous hymn was born of his personal experience of pain.
People understand pain!
I am not sure the omission of the Cross was intentional in the choral version I cited, but it is instructive.
Everyone wants a Love, a Christ, Who will not leave us.
He will not. He has promised He will not (Hebrews 13:5). We can surely and faithfully draw assurance from this, even and especially in our darkest hours!
No doubt the hymn owes much of its popularity to this fact.
However, we must go to the Cross to fully comprehend and even to fully believe this promise, but especially to fully live in light of this promise.
I know Jesus will not leave me nor forsake me, not just because He said those words. He proved those words on the cross.
Jesus did not just say, “I love you.”
“God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8, ESV)
The Cross: Proof of Unbreakable Love
The Cross is instructive beyond just the magnitude of the love shown, love even to death.
We know that some people do love in a way that sacrifices even to the point of death, in fact, many do. Parents will, soldiers will, spouses will—many will die for a friend or loved one.
In fact, Paul says some people would even die “for a good person,” perhaps implying that people might die even for someone they do not have a close relationship with if that person were “good” or “righteous” (Romans 5:7).
The Cross teaches us not only of the magnitude or strength of God’s Love in Christ but also its breadth. Yes, Christ loved me and died for me. But, oh how incomprehensible the thought that Christ loved me, even me, and died for me, unworthy as I am.
Yes, this cross-love allows me to revel in the truth of the unbreakable nature of Christ’s love in my darkest hour.
I can draw assurance that whatever the pain, it must be for His glory and my good because He loves me, and He always will.
I can do nothing to earn it, and I can do nothing to keep it!
But, the lessons of the cross do not end here, and the hymn does not end here.
The Cross assures me that His “Love Wilt Not Let Me Go.”
The Cross also teaches me to die. It teaches me I must die.
Pain can be physical pain. We know because of the resurrection, one day, all our physical pain will end.
Death itself will end.
This is the truth of the resurrection, and it is why “we sorrow not even as others which have no hope” (I Thessalonians 4:13).
We have hope!
So much of our pain, however, is the pain of loss, the mental anguish of which Matheson spoke.
Believers often expect that we should have freedom from this kind of pain. Job may have thought that. We might ask,
“If I ‘have all things in Christ,’ why do I not have this that I so much desire?”
Here, it is the “Cross that liftest up my head.”
How so?
When I realize that, yes, Christ has called me to one day live with Him in glory, but that my path to glory is the path of death, then, and only then, can I fully know Him.
I’ve lost something or someone.
My loss is unjust! It may well be.
But whatever my loss, whatever the injustice, it cannot compare to Christ’s loss (for me!) nor to the injustice done to Him on the Cross.
My head is “lifted up” when I lay my glory, my possessions, my ambitions—myself in the dust with Him! My path to the glory of the resurrection will lie through death, just as Jesus’ did!
My path to victory in Christ will lie through the death I die to myself each day!
I can then say with Paul,
“That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death; If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead” (Philippians 3:10-11).
I can never fully understand the unbreakable Love of the Savior without the Cross.
I can never live in light of that Love without the pain of loss, death to self.
Please don’t leave that verse out of the hymn!
Please don’t expect to leave that truth out of the Christian walk.
Embrace the full truth of Christ’s love—one that not only comforts but also calls us to the Cross.
O Light that follows all my way,
I yield my flick’ring torch to thee;
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in thy sunshine’s blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be.