It Is Well With My Soul

It popped into my mind this morning, and I have long given up the thought that these things are “just a coincidence:”

“When peace like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll
Whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say
It is well, it is well, with my soul

It is well
With my soul
It is well, it is well with my soul”

Today is Epiphany.  This is, according to Wikipedia, the day “that celebrates the revelation of God in his Son as human in Jesus Christ. In Western Christianity, the feast commemorates principally … the visit of the Magi to the Christ Child”   While the song was not written until some 1871 years later, it occurs to me that the feeling and emotion I get when I listen to It Is Well With My Soul is something like what the Magi felt as they gazed at the baby Jesus (except x some number).  “It is well, it is well, with my soul.”

The Magi did not, of course, at that point know the rest of the story.  I do:

“Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come,
Let this blest assurance control,
That Christ has regarded my helpless estate,
And hath shed His own blood for my soul

It is well (it is well)
With my soul (with my soul)
It is well, it is well with my soul

My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought
My sin, not in part but the whole,
Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more,
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, o my soul

It is well (it is well)
With my soul (with my soul)”

Indeed.  It is well with my soul.