THE SWEET SOUND OF AMAZING GRACE
Ephesians 2:4-10
“For by grace you have been saved by faith...”
Today is “Amazing Grace” Sunday, a Sunday when hundreds of churches all over our country have elected to highlight in worship what is probably the most-loved, best-known hymn in the English-speaking world. Over 3200 recordings of Amazing Grace exist. This hymn crosses all demographic and religious boundaries in its appeal to the masses, perhaps that is one reason why we love it so much.
Here are some amazing facts about “Amazing Grace.”
· The words were written by a reformed British slave trader turned Anglican minister, John Newton.
· The tune we now associate with Amazing Grace was not matched to the words until 1835 in William Walker’s Southern Harmony. Until then, it was set to a variety of tunes.
· The final stanza, “When we’ve been there ten thousand years,” was added by Edwin Othello Excell in 1909 and was borrowed from another hymn.
· Amazing Grace was popular with both sides during the American Civil War. While on the Trail of Tears, the Cherokee were not always able to give their dead a full burial. Instead, the singing of “Amazing Grace” had to suffice.
· The first gospel recording of Amazing Grace was made in 1926 by Rev H R Tomlin.
· Arlo Guthrie opened Woodstock by singing Amazing Grace.
· Most of the recordings of Amazing Grace have been made since Judy Collins had a surprise pop hit with the song in 1971. Other artists recording this song include Diana Ross, Dolly Parton, Bill and Gloria Gaither, Janis Joplin, Jerry Garcia, Mahalia Jackson, Ruben Studdard, Tennessee Ernie Ford, and Rod Stewart to name a few.
· Amazing Grace has been used in many movies, including Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn, The Last Days of Disco, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. It was even used in an episode of Will and Grace.
· A survey of British teenagers in the mid-1970s found that the majority of the teens thought that Amazing Grace was a love song about a girl named Grace.
Amazing Grace is a love song, though it’s not about a girl named Grace...still, it is a love song. The song is written not about an unrequited love but about an undeserved love. The hard news today is that we are unworthy of God’s love because we fall so far short of God’s plan for us. Until folks wrestle with the concept that we deserve none of the blessings we already have from God, it is unlikely that they will ever understand the omnipotent, incomprehensible impact of the gift of grace.
Grace is the one tenet of the Christian faith that separates Christianity from all other faiths. Every other world religion teaches that the believer must do something in order to be “saved,” that is, to earn their way into heaven. There is no admissions policy for heaven. You don’t have to write an essay, take a test, pay a fee, get the grades, take out a loan, or know somebody who knows somebody. The only “somebody” we need to know is Jesus Christ: and he is more than a somebody, he is the true and living Son (and Song) of God. Praise God! (Sing the words, Praise God, to the tune of “Amazing Grace.”
In one song, the Protestant doctrine of God’s Grace is explained in such a way that the world will not, CAN NOT, forget it. “Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost but now am found, was blind but now I see.”
We may not fully “see it” understand it, yet we will never fully forget it. The language of grace speaks not simply in words but more deeply in sensations. The sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell of grace is far sweeter than the best of vineyard-grown grapes, the most melodious bird song, the softest touch from a lover, the widest beauty of a blue ocean, or the fullest fragrance of a meadow in bloom. Such sweetness in all senses is unforgettable.
The hymn Amazing Grace is “unforgettable”--it reaches beyond and between generations, genders, and genetics. When we had our hymn sing on New Year’s Eve morning, it was a sophomore in high school who requested “Amazing Grace.” Everyone wants to sing, Amazing Grace: it rings with the sweetest of sounds, the sound of the soul being freed from slavery to sin and reaching for the salvation of heaven.
What is the sweet sound of amazing grace? For that matter, what is grace? On the “Pithy Statements About God’s Grace” that I put in your bulletins, look at this definition: “Grace is God’s freely given, unmerited favor toward the sinful and failing; the expression of forgiving, redeeming, restoring love toward the unworthy.”
We are the unworthy. Everything, every single thing, we have is because of God’s greatness and not because of our goodness. Ain’t nobody dat good, my friends. And should one of us try to argue the point, we’ve already lost the argument and we have completely missed the point. Perhaps you’ve seen one of those funny church signs that reads, “You’re not too bad to stay out and you’re not too good to come in.” In other words, “Get in here!”
Let our message to the world be, “Get in here!” Why? Because we must praise God and praise him by a life of gratitude, “which is to characterize those who realize that they have been saved by God’s grace alone” (Dictionary of Paul and his Letters, p 373). And so the message we should be glad to Shout to the Lord’s people is, “Get in here to praise God, thank God, pray to God, bow before God, raise your face toward God saying thank you, thank you thank you. Thank you, God, for your grace that comes to me in Jesus Christ.”
Jesus Christ is the living, sweet sound of Amazing Grace. The sound is too sweet to keep to ourselves; it must be shared all around. Get out there, then, and sing this love song of undeserved blessedness. Praise God, don’t berate him, don’t take him for granted, don’t ignore him, don’t hate him. Praise God from whom all blessings flow.
There must be praise to God for all things, for God’s grace to the people is the gift of Jesus Christ. Along every step of the journey we take as a congregation, for it is only by his grace that we are still here.
“The very heart of the gospel is the supreme truth that God accepts us with no conditions whatsoever when we put our trust in the atoning sacrifice of Jesus” on behalf of the unworthy” (John Beehler, “Marvelous, Amazing Grace.”) We are the unworthy....and still, we are completely forgiven, completely loved, completely complete, for “by grace we have been saved” (Ephesians 2:5). Amazing; simply amazing; and sweet, so sweet is the sound of God’s grace. Can you hear it now? Amen.
February 18, 2007
First Parish Federated Church of South Berwick, ME
The Reverend Donna Lee Muise
