Streams of Mercy

My brother texted me yesterday afternoon sharing that in our home church, the organist and his daughter, who directed the choir, played “He Shall Feed His Flock” as duet. That organist sat with his family on the pew behind our family in our growing up years, and I taught his daughter in Sunday School in her growing up years. That dear church is declining in numbers and no longer has a choir, but is blessed with these wonderful musicians sharing from Sunday to Sunday.

My brother recalled the many years our mother was in the choir, sometimes as director and sometimes holding down the alto section, but always a part of it for sixty some years. While we didn’t do much “recording” years back, in my heart of hearts I could hear her beautiful contralto voice singing Handel’s lovely tune.

“He Shall Feed His Flock” was a solo she sang each Advent, usually on the Second Sunday of Advent, when the Old Testament reading comes from Isaiah 40, with these familiar words in verse 11:

“He tends his flock like a shepherd:

He gathers the lambs in his arms

and carries them close to his heart;

he gently leads those that have young.”

My brother’s text started me “remembering” and I recalled a part of the message I shared at the Service of Resurrection for our mother. “In every season of life, she found a song to sing.”

I remember her singing “Would You Like to Swing on a Star” as she combed out my long and tangled hair after Saturday night washings – before all the cream rinses that make this job so much easier! I remember “K-K-Katy” sung as she rocked my youngest daughter in the same chair that rocked her generation.; “In My Heart I Ponder,” sung in the Harlan Presbyterian Christmas Program as a ten-year old Mary rocked baby Jesus, my older daughter; and “Jesus, tender shepherd hear me, bless thy little lamb tonight…” sung to their older brother as his “night-night” song whenever they were together at bedtime.

I even recalled Mother singing “Flaming Mamie” and “Annie Get Your Gun” in a Lons Club Minstrel show one year. Truly she found a song to sing in every season of life, using the beautiful gift God gave her.

While videos and pictures and recordings capture memories and help us to remember, our hearts can do much the same if we quiet ourselves and let our memories come to the surface and our hearts speak.

Elizabeth