I love that at Adaton we are taking one of the great hymns of the faith each month and memorizing them together.  February was A Mighty Fortress Is Our God, March is The Solid Rock.  

Brian and I selected twelve hymns to cover twelve months, but one that didn’t make the cut (but easily could have) is a favorite of both of ours, Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing.  Robert Robinson wrote that hymn in 1752, and I’ve been trying to memorize this one on my own this month, and to meditate on the meaning of the verses.

Verse two begins with the following sentence that is not immediately accessible to most of us in the twenty-first century: “Here I raise mine Ebenezer, hither by Thy help I’m come; and I hope, by Thy good pleasure, safely to arrive at home.”  What does that mean?

To answer that question, I think we must answer another question: what is an “Ebenezer”?  It is a biblical reference.  In 1 Samuel 7, we read that the Philistines are about to attack Israel at Mizpah.  “And when the Israelites heard of it, they were afraid because of the Philistines.  They said to Samuel, ‘Do not stop crying out to the Lord our God for us, that he may rescue us from the hand of the Philistines.’  Then Samuel took a suckling lamb and offered it up as a whole burnt offering to the Lord.  He cried out to the Lord on Israel’s behalf, and the Lord answered him” (1 Samuel 7:7-9).  

Israel defeated the Philistines that day, and we read in verse 12 that Samuel set up a stone near Mizpah and named it Ebenezer, which means “stone of help,” to commemorate how the Lord aided his people that day.

So, in singing, “Here I raise mine Ebenezer,” we simply recognize that we’ve made it this far in this fallen world only by the help of the Lord – through the shed blood of Jesus Christ as an atoning sacrifice for our sins, and by the work of the Holy Spirit in giving us new life.  And we trust, we hope, that by God’s good pleasure, he will continue to be our help.   By his grace we trust that one day we will arrive safely home, in heaven, the place of our citizenship (Phil. 3:20), where there is no more crying, sorrow, pain, or death, as we will have achieved final victory over all our enemies and will reign forever with Jesus.