Showing items filed under “The Rev. Canon Dr. Victor Lee Austin”

Abide with Me

It is said to have been Alfred North Whitehead’s favorite hymn (which, given his heterodox theology, might not be much of a commendation). Whitehead was interested in the old philosophical problem of change and continuity: How can things have identity across time while they are changing? It’s a great question—are you really the same person as the 10-year-old child you used to be? Whitehead’s instinct, perhaps, was that the answer to that old question lay somehow in the hands of God; one could say we have our identity over time only when God abides with us.

We are indeed stuck in fragmented and meaningless lives if God does not abide with us.

“Abide with me” is #662 in The Hymnal 1982. The first line juxtaposes steady abidingness and the reality of change. “Abide with me; fast falls the eventide.” It’s a prayer asking God to stick with us even though (quickly!) the day comes to an end. The image, which is natural to Christian thought, is of a human life as a single day. The poet will shortly spell out that he needs God “every passing hour.” We need God because there are many kinds of change that threaten our life. The darkness deepens. Other helpers fail and comforts flee. We are helpless, but God is precisely the “help of the helpless.”

All that from only the first stanza. The second introduces temptation, indeed, the tempter himself. Only God’s grace “can foil the tempter’s power.” Only God can be our guide through all these changes in life. Only God can be our “stay,” the still point, our secure hold while everything changes. We need God not only in trouble but also when things seem calm. We need God to abide “through” good things and bad: “Through cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me.”

The third stanza expresses the confidence that comes when God is with us. Fear of the foe is gone; our “ills” have no heaviness, our tears no bitterness. Then St. Paul is quoted: “Where is death’s sting? where, grave, thy victory?” This, from 1 Corinthians 15, reveals that our concern from the beginning has been death—and that death is a vanquished enemy. “I triumph still,” the poet says, “if thou abide with me.”    

What is triumph at death? It is the passage from death to life. How does it happen? In the final stanza the poet asks God to keep the cross in front of his eyes as they close, that the last thing he sees in life be the sign of Jesus’ death as his promise of resurrection. After death comes sunshine: “heaven’s morning breaks”! And what, pray tell, is that morning except Easter morning! So the whole prayer can be wrapped up as a request for God to “abide with me” in life, in death, always.

The author was a clergyman who, despite fragile health, was known for cheerfulness. He preached his last sermon against his family’s urging that he stay in bed; he was known to say “better to wear out than to rust out.” Henry Francis Lyte, 1793–1847: he wrote the hymn and it was first sung at his funeral, though not to the perfect tune that we know, “Eventide,” which William Henry Monk wrote 14 years later.

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A few years ago, as part of my campaign for memorizing prayers, I wrote about “Lord Jesus, stay with us, for evening is at hand and the day is past. . . .” That prayer, like “Abide with me,” is based on the story in Luke 24 of the two disciples inviting Jesus to turn in to their home. “Abide with me” is a fitting pair to that collect, and I am going to try to memorize it for the Camino. I invite you to join me in the memorization. (If you don’t know the tune, there are many performances on YouTube; one could do worse than start with the choir of King’s College in Cambridge.)

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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.

I need thy presence every passing hour;

what but thy grace can foil the tempter’s power?

Who, like thyself, my guide and stay can be?

Though cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me.

I fear no foe, with thee at hand to bless;

ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness.

Where is death’s sting? where, grave, thy victory?

I triumph still, if thou abide with me.

Hold thou thy cross before my closing eyes;

shine through the gloom, and point me to the skies;

heaven’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee;

in life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.

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Out & About. This Sunday, March 22, I will be preaching at the 9:30am Eucharist at St. John’s Church in Corsicana, Texas. Then on Wednesday, March 25, I am to speak at their Lenten program. My talk is titled, “Walking the Camino de Santiago in Spain: A pilgrim's reflections.” The program starts at 6pm with a light supper.

Palm Sunday, March 29, I will be preaching at St. Matthew’s Cathedral in Dallas at 9 and 11:15am.

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Patience and the Dying Art

 A couple of weeks ago I wrote in this space about medicine and dying. Recently I wrote also for The Human Life Review about patience and the art of dying. The word “art” is deliberate: old Christian wisdom about dying is that there is an art, a craft to it. This art of dying is something we can encourage for people, and it is also something we ourselves can practice. There are particular virtues that are apposite for dying well, for dying in a way that is holy and encouraging to others.
    Traditionally, five good virtues are noted, namely, faith, hope, patience, humility, and charity. Dying persons would be encouraged to practice these things, as best they could, while they had time to do so. These goods arose to combat typical temptations that we humans face as we encounter the limits of our mortal life, temptations of doubt, despair, impatience, vainglory, and avarice.
    In my post, I focused on one of those goods, the virtue of patience. And to explicate it I turned to the Anglican bishop Jeremy Taylor, who in 1651 published The Rule and Exercises of Holy Dying. 
    “Taylor’s first word on patience is directed at the friends and visitors of the sick person. Don’t tell sick people to suppress their sighs, groans, humble complaints, or dolorous expressions. When you are sick you do not have the duty of being cheerful! Different people feel pain to different degrees, and one should allow a sick person to cry out when pain is severe. Indeed crying out may be helpful, in that in some cases it abates or diverts the pain. . . .
    “Christian patience does not forbid complaint but it should shape the way sick people complain. First, our complaints should be without despair. Complain you may, but do not lose hope. Why? Because God really is good, as we know already from our experience. So pray to God to help you; turn to spiritual guides; make use of ‘holy exercises and acts of grace’ that are proper to a state of sickness.
    “Second, our complaints should be ‘without murmur’! Murmuring is what the fallen angels did: they murmured against the way God had arranged things. Instead, think on God’s justice, wisdom, mercy, and grace. Confess your sins, for by doing so you increase and exercise humility. Sing God’s praises—even from the lowest abyss.
    “And third, our complaints should be without peevishness, that is to say, we should be civil and decent towards people who are ministering to us. Seek to be tractable, easy to be persuaded, apt to take counsel. Don’t be ungentle and uneasy to the ministers and nurses that attend you, and bear their accidents contentedly and without disquietude or evil words.”
    Then I listed things that, Taylor points out, people who are dying or very sick can do even in the midst of their weakened state, even if they cannot leave their bed. They can contemplate particular truths—for instance, that others have suffered worse, many of whom were weaker than we are, and some of them children. He says also that a person endures sickness only one minute at a time. Our duty to endure extends only to the present minute. “One minute at a time,” of course, is akin the AA mantra, “One day at a time.”
    Besides such contemplations, there are deeds we can perform in the midst of sickness, confident that God will provide what we need. For instance, we can make an act of thanksgiving, and we can resolve to do all that we can, as God gives us the power. And we can hold before our eyes and in our heart the example of Jesus upon the cross.
    The whole column has more detail and practical examples, and connects with what I wrote two weeks ago in this space. You can read it here: https://humanlifereview.com/patience-and-the-art-of-dying/
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    Out & About. Wednesday, March 11, at St. Augustine’s Church in Oak Cliff, Dallas, I am to speak at the Lenten program on Jesus as, basically, the culmination of all things! The program starts with Stations at 5:30pm followed by a lenten supper at 6. The program runs from 6:30 to 7:30.
    Regrets and commiserations. It is perhaps some consolation that we all go through it together, the shift from Standard Time to the falsely named Daylight Saving Time. Falsely, I say, for the sun rises and sets according to astronomical laws that defy our ability to save daylight. All we can do is rename the hours, we can’t save them! I have long thought, though, that it is unfair for the time change to occur always on a Sunday. Let it be on a fixed date—April 1, say—and let the time change happen on whatever day of the week April 1 happens to fall. That would be a true April Fools!

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The Rev. Canon Victor Lee Austin. Ph.D., is the Theologian-in-Residence for the diocese and is the author of several books including, "Friendship: The Heart of Being Human" and "A Post-Covid Catechesis.: 

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