Great is Thy Faithfulness
Daffodils are my favorite flower. They became my favorite flower when I was a freshman in college and not just because of their cheerful beauty. When I attended Furman University, the year was broken up into three trimesters rather than semesters and the middle trimester was a beast. Because it was shorter than the other terms while classes were longer, winter term was frenzied and exhausting. Winter term was dark, it was cold, and it was wet. My morning walk to classes over dead grass or snow or frost often felt like a slow trudge. But there would be one morning in the last week or so of February, that would be oh-so different. There would always be one morning when—finally— strong, dark green stalks could be seen poking through the seemingly dead earth. The daffodils were making their appearance. Furman planted thousands of them all over campus and by March we would all be able to delight in a botanical sea of yellow and orange everywhere we looked. That first green shoot always seemed to appear on the hardest day—just when I felt as if the “muchness” of the dark or the cold would never lessen. And upon seeing that glorious little spot of green, I would, without fail, sing to myself, “Morning by morning, new mercies I see…” Spring is coming. Change is coming.
The beloved hymn “Great is Thy Faithfulness” is based on Lamentations 3:21-23:
But this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:
The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases,
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
The words of this hymn and its verses, like a daffodil, have the power to shift our perspective (even for a moment) away from the dark, cold, and never-ending reality right in front of us to the new and green spark of life that hints at change to come. But let us not forget that these verses come from Lamentations—an entire book of our Bible devoted to the outpouring of grief and bitterness and woe. Just before the lamenting author writes of steadfast love and new mercies and faithfulness, the author writes this:
He has made my teeth grind on gravel,
and made me cower in ashes;
my soul is bereft of peace;
I have forgotten what happiness is;
so I say, “Gone is my glory,
and all that I had hoped for from the LORD. (3:16-17)
“But,” the author says. Yes, my soul is bereft of peace. Yes, I have forgotten what happiness is. But, I remember that the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, that new mercies are seen each morning, and that the Lord’s faithfulness is great…and I have hope.
It is past daffodil season now. The daffodil bulbs that my father-in-law planted in my yard as an act of love when we first moved into this house have bloomed and are now gone. Even still, I am in awe of how many signs of life I see when I go looking for them—when I push myself to look for a “but” that bridges my lament to God’s hope, to God’s faithfulness, and to God’s steadfast love. Morning by morning, new mercies I see.
Shelley Woodruff, Interim Pastor for Community Engagement, First Baptist Decatur