Glimpses of Truth

“Amazing”

Among all the words which describe us, “amazing” doesn’t seem to fit.  I encounter rude people and considerate people.  I deal with happy people and sad people, angry, upset, frustrated - - it seems that we find it easier to describe those who have things wrong rather than describing those who have things going good.  “Amazing?”  Well, maybe a little less. 

Yet, for believers, it’s a great word.  It describes what the Lord has done, is doing, and shall do for us.  To be truthful, “We’ve A Story To Tell” to the nations that shall lift their hearts to the Lord.  These words were written by an English musician, H. Ernest Nichol, in 1896.  They are “Amazing,” or at least they tell us that the story itself is “Amazing.”  Another author, Robert Harkness, wrote a beautiful hymn, “Why Should He Love Me So?”  In the daily grind of life, when things are down more than up, when things are tough rather than easy, it’s then that I am called to the words of this hymn.  “Why should He love me so, why should my Savior to Calvary go?”  The why is “Amazing.”  Way back in 1860, Ann Warner penned the words of a little song sung by young and old alike, “Jesus Loves Me.”  A story is told of a brilliant professor at Princeton Seminary who always left his graduation class with these words:  “Gentlemen, there is still much in this world and in the Bible that I do not understand, but of one thing I am certain – ‘Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so’ – and gentlemen, that is sufficient!”  It is “Amazing.”

George Bennard was a man who had committed himself to ministry, but of course that did not make him immune to the struggles of life.  Yet Mr. Bennard knew his Source, and while spending days in prayer and in the Word, he found words which gave him the relief and the courage to move forward.  He wrote, “The Old Rugged Cross, so despised by the world, has a wondrous attraction for me. . . So I’ll cherish the old rugged cross, till my trophies at last I lay down; I will cling to the old rugged cross, and exchange it some day for a crown.”  It’s “Amazing” to me.

When Paul wrote to the believers in Corinth, he had many things to teach to them, but one neat statement is found in II Cor. 9:8:  “And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times . . . you will abound in every good work.”  Well, a boy by the name of John Newton who, at age 11, left school, calling himself a “wretch,” lived up to his words and lived an ungodly life.  Finally he was capturing and selling slaves from West Africa.  But while in a fierce storm, Newton began reading “The Imitation of Christ” by Thomas a’ Kempis.  God changed his heart.  God changed his life.  It was truly “Amazing.”  Later in life he wrote the beautiful hymn, “Amazing Grace” – “how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me.”

Shortly before his death, he proclaimed very loudly, “My memory is nearly gone, but I remember two things:  that I am a great sinner and that Christ is a great Savior!”

That’s “Amazing” Grace.