“O Love, that wilt 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 penned the words of this beloved hymn well over a hundred years ago.  Insightful words of surrender and love that have withstood the passing years and continue to remain a source of comfort and encouragement for so many.

Mr. Matheson was born in Scotland in 1842.  He was well-educated and on the path to a prominently successful life.  By the age of 20, he was happily engaged to a young lady he adored, studying for ministry, and according to one source, had already written two books on theology.  What a joyful season of life this much have been, filled with such promise and expectation!

But then, tragedy touched his life.  He developed an eye disease that would eventually lead to complete and permanent blindness.  As if that grim diagnosis were not difficult enough to grasp, his fiancee’, upon learning that the doctors could do nothing to heal his sight, called off the wedding and left him.  She decided she could not possibly be married to a blind man.

The thought of losing his eyesight must have been crushing, but then to also lose the woman he loved, must have been simply devastating.

George’s sister graciously stepped in and she became his caregiver as he stepped away from the world of academics and into a life of ministry.  She tenderly cared for him while he ministered into the lives of many.   He served as a Parish Minister to two different churches and lectured at colleges.  He published many writings, including hymns, prose, and poetry.  He adjusted to the challenges in his life and continued to serve the Lord in, perhaps, a much different way that he had ever anticipated.

However, as often happens in this life, at the age of 40 another life-altering challenge came his way.  His beloved sister, upon whom he was completely dependent, fell in love and became engaged to be married.  I think he must have been joyful for her happiness, while feeling the sorrow of once again losing someone so dear to him.  I can only imagine the vulnerability that would come from being unable to see and losing the one person upon whom you are most dependent.

On the eve of her wedding, George sat alone and wrote the words to the hymn, ‘O Love That Will Not Let Me Go’.  Looking back, he later stated,

“I am quite sure that the whole work was completed in five minutes, and equally sure that it never received at my hands any retouching or correction. I have no natural gift of rhythm. All the other verses I have ever written are manufactured articles; this came like a dayspring from on high.”

He wrote the entire song in five minutes and yet, I can’t help but wonder how long he had been in thought prior to penning the words.  I envision him sitting in a chair before a small, crackling fire, thinking back through all the years, and allowing the Lord to walk him through the memories that were undoubtedly intertwined throughout with great suffering, gentle love, deep peace, and undeniable joy.  Perhaps he recalled the early years that were filled with such hope and promise before his eyesight began to dim and the doctors handed him the grim diagnosis of blindness.  Did time seem to stop in that moment as he pondered the changes that came as a result of that diagnosis?  His grief must have been deep as he remembered his beloved fiancee’ speaking the words that would break his heart and then listening to the sounds of her footsteps walking forever out of his life.  Did he contemplate all the wonderful possibilities he must have missed out on in his life as a result of his blindness?  Was he considering the future now that he was losing the faithful guidance and companionship of his sister?

Whatever his thoughts, once he prayerfully pondered through them all, he did what must have been a most natural response … he picked up his pen and wrote the words which poured out from the depths of his being.

 “O love that wilt 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.

O light that followest all my way,
I yield my flickering torch to thee;
my heart restores its borrowed ray,
that in thy sunshine’s blaze its day
may brighter, fairer be.

O joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
and feel the promise is not vain
that morn shall tearless be.

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.”

Elisabeth Elliot certainly was no stranger to sorrow herself and in her book, The Path of Loneliness, she writes of the grief  and the journey that led to George Matheson’s composition.

   “What exactly, did Matheson do? (in response to his grief)  He gave back his life, restored the light of his life, opened his heart, laid down life’s glory.  That spells surrender, which can only come of trust.”

                         “His blindness and rejection proved to be for George Matheson the very means of illuminating the Love of God.”

“In the words, “I give Thee back the life I owe” Matheson understood that there was something he could do with his suffering.  It was the great lesson of the Cross: surrender.”

“The power of the Cross is not exemption from suffering but the very transformation of suffering.”

George Matheson’s response to the suffering of this life was to surrender to God.   Instead of building walls and settling into a life of bitterness and resentment, he instead remained open to the gentle, pursuing love of God and the result was a sweet submission to the will of God and a life defined by peace and joy.

‘O Joy that seekest me through pain
I cannot close my heart to Thee.’

Elisabeth Elliot points out “that this is the response of a humbled heart, one that admits its poverty and recognizes the gentle Love that waits, the Joy that is seeking him precisely because he is in such pain that he can hardly seek anything but death.  Then, although he is blind, he sees with the eye of faith, and what he sees, through the mist of his tears, is a rainbow.  He comes to believe that the promise is true: Tears are not forever. There will be a morning without them.  His faith lays hold of the promise and, mysteriously, he finds that pain has been exchanged for joy.  If he had closed his heart and indulged his feelings, he might have found some miserably meager happiness, but he would have forfeited the joy.”

May we, as the differing trials of life come upon us, respond as George Matheson did when he was faced with suffering.

My God I have never thanked Thee for my ‘thorn!’ I have thanked Thee a thousand times for my roses, but never once for my ‘thorn;’ I have been looking forward to a world where I shall get compensation for my cross as itself a present glory.  Teach me the glory of my cross; teach me the value of my ‘thorn.’  Show me that I have climbed to Thee by the path of pain.  Show me that my tears have made my rainbow.
~George Matheson~