Crowds and music often come together in big sports competitions. All sorts of songs sung by all sorts of people – for example, ‘You’ll never walk alone’, ‘We will rock you’, ‘Nessun Dorma’ and ‘I’m forever blowing bubbles’! So it is interesting that an old hymn that touches the deep places of the heart is also regularly sung and to consider why that might be. The tradition of singing ‘Abide With Me’ began in 1927 at the FA Cup Final between Arsenal and Cardiff City, it has been sung before every Rugby League Challenge Cup Final since 1929 and it was sung at the opening of the London 2012 Olympics. It was a favourite of Mahatma Gandhi and of Alfred Lord Tennyson. Jazz superstar Thelonius Monk recorded it as did John Coltrane, Doris Day and Paul McCartney. Elton John said it was his favourite hymn and always made him cry. Let’s take a look at what is behind it and see how it touches your heart.
- ‘It is strange to be known so universally and yet to be so lonely’ – Albert Einstein
- ‘If I am a legend, then why am I so lonely?’ – Judy Garland
- ‘Everybody has something that chews them up and, for me, that thing was always loneliness. The cinema has the power to make you not feel lonely, even when you are’ – Tom Hanks
- ‘I’m perpetually lonely’ – Lady Gaga
Scottish Vicar Henry Lyte was inspired to write the lyrics after visiting an older priest, Augustus le Hunte, in 1820. Augustus was sharing some regrets with Henry as he lay dying and kept repeating these words from Jesus, ‘Abide with me’. Henry Lyte wrote the words in the now-famous hymn and gave them to his daughter two weeks before he died. William Henry Monk was also in great sorrow following the recent loss of his own young daughter and he wrote the tune ‘Eventide’ to go with the lyrics. Charles Ives, Mahler and Vaughan Williams used it in various arrangements 1890 to 1936. It meant so much to heroine Nurse Edith Cavell that she sang it on the evening before her execution by a German firing squad in 1915 for helping Allied soldiers escape to safety during World War I. The words and tune carry great meaning as you can see from just verse one and the final line:
Abide with me; fast falls the eventide;
The darkness deepens; Lord with me abide.
When other helpers fail and comforts flee,
Help of the helpless, O abide with me … In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.
Have you ever gone into a crowded room and felt lonely? Everyone seems to know someone but no one takes time out to ‘abide with you’. You can even feel lonely in a church and it’s not a heresy to admit it! More difficult still is when people are worshipping God but you don’t feel like it or ‘get it’ – loneliness can sit heavy on you and the temptation is to head for the exit never to return. But wait, before you go, even Jesus knew about the depths of loneliness, of being misunderstood, of being abandoned. That is not the only good news but also to know that he knows how you feel and promises never to abandon or forsake you – he wants to be with you and for you to want him to be with you, always, especially when no one else stays with you. Abide with me.
- ‘I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing … As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love’ – John 15:5, 9
- ‘And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”’ – Matthew 27:46
- ‘I have heard many such things; miserable comforters are you all’ – Job 16:2
- ‘Even when walking through the dark valley of death I will not be afraid, for you are close beside me, guarding, guiding all the way’ – Psalm 23:4 (The Living Bible)
When you know the presence of God, you can be alone but not lonely. People pay money to go on ‘retreats’ and ‘sabbaticals’ to discover this. Crowds followed Jesus as he taught them, meeting their spiritual and physical needs. Yet he looked for times of solitude to ‘charge his batteries’ and draw close to his Father God. Do you charge your batteries through being alone or in a crowd? Do you find it easier to feel God’s presence in the quietness of being one-to-one with him or in a larger group? At a key moment in the life of Jesus, he asked his disciples to stay with him and ‘keep watch’ but they all fell asleep. Worse still, when he was betrayed by Judas and arrested in Gethsemane, all of his closest friends who had been with him for three years deserted him and ran away. It should be comforting for us to know that Jesus understands both loneliness and the feeling of abandonment. Following Christ Jesus can feel lonely when you are in the minority (which often seems the case) so how encouraging it is that he promised to be with them through the Holy Spirit to comfort, teach and give support (John 14:18; 15:7; 16:7).
This is not about personality types, it is about the need of the human heart. We need the presence of God in our lives every day, right up to the day we enter the darkest valley. As you consider your own position, you could do worse than listening to the FA Cup Fans Choir and Alfie Boe sing Abide with Me (May 2015):
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