Little Flowers, Weird Hymn Lyrics, and Prayers Where I Brace Myself

 

1. 

   Scilla Luciliae

   Glory of the Snow

   
   

   Before we get to things, there's something you need to know about these small purple flowers that are popping up behind our house.  The gizmo ap thingy I have on my phone tells me they are called Scilla Luciliae, or "Glory of the Snow."

   
   

   Whatever they're called, they shouldn't be there.  Or at least, as far as it would have depended on me.  These are plants that have a more or less wild and unintentional beginning in the yard far before anyone in our family has lived there.  

   
   
2. It could very well be that the previous owners of the property planted them on purpose.  But it's more likely, judging from the mature yard just behind us, that they have migrated towards us on their own.  
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4. Also, and this is significant, they have survived the construction project that resulted in our new little house being all cozy and quaint back here.  But before it was that, it was a mess. Yet all the tromping and digging and upheaval; none of it has deterred this small but feisty little lovely.  
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6. And I, the non-gardener, marvel because I know that I do not deserve it.  I have done nothing to create this little bit of springtime joy, but here it is just the same.  
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8. This needs to be said, before we get to the hymn.
9. 
   

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing,

Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;

Streams of mercy, never ceasing,

Call for songs of loudest praise.

Teach me some melodious sonnet,

Sung by flaming tongues above;

Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,

Mount of Thy redeeming love.

1. 
   
2. by Robert Roberston
3. In the category of "why didn't I ever notice this before?" a phrase in an old hymn we sang at worship service on Sunday caught my attention.
4. "Tune my heart to sing Thy grace."
5. I guess I'd always thought it was 'sing Thy praise,' which not only rhymes a little, adding to my mistake, but would also be a more expected way to end that thought, I think.  We sing praises, sure. More than we sing grace, right?
6. But noticing it on Sunday, it got me to wondering what it actually meant to 'sing grace.'  Not just sing about grace, but to sing grace itself.
7. Grace is a pretty big deal in the Bible.  And this hymn will keep circling back to it.  A thorough study would certainly yield much, not the least of which is the role of grace in God's big story of reconciling us to Himself.  And speaking of old hymns, how amazing grace is, in all its astonishing, soteriological layers!  For now, and at the risk of oversimplifying it, let's just define grace as being bestowed gifts or blessings or favour we most certainly didn't earn or deserve.  Like my little purple flowers out back.
8. And if that's the case, to sing grace, in a poetic sense, sort of sounds to me like we might spread that around a bit.  Share it into the spaces around us.  Just as we have received grace from God, we now pass that along to those in our orbits.  Like little splashes of springtime joy migrating from one yard to another.
9. Interestingly, the first examples of 'singing grace' that come to mind have to do with simple interactions with strangers.  Allowing space for that car that "didn't see" the lane closed sign way back there and is now trying to nose in.  Being extra friendly and patient with the cashier who's obviously tired and just a little bit grumpy.  Staying pleasant with the customer service associate on the phone, even when you're calling in a legitimate complaint.  Those are the easy songs though.  I can do, and write about, these and feel quite full of grace in my own little heart.  (Or full of something, anyways.)
10. The tune can get a little off key when things are closer to home, it seems.   Like when someone doesn't respond to an email and I am tempted to assign not so nice motives.  Or the repetition of a small but annoying habit begins to wear a groove in my patience. Or a well stated boundary is overstepped, yet again.  All of these things require relational attention for sure.  But with what song? 
11. [And here is interject a nod to the big and awful things that happen that require the kind of grace that can only happen because there is a God.  But this is not about that.]
12. Then there's the part about 'tuning.'   I'm not assuming to know the meaning Robertson gave this phrase, but I like this image a lot.  It speaks of spiritual formation, I think; that process of listening and adjusting and listening again.  
13. If my heart was an instrument to be used of God in His grand mission of making things 'on earth as it is in heaven (Matthew 6:10),' of moving us ever closer to a state in which His will is perpetually carried out and all the tears are wiped away (Revelation 21:4) and no one is afraid (Micah 4:6), and oh how glorious it will all be by then!!!....If that's what my heart is being tuned for, then it would sing of grace.
14. Out in the backyard yesterday, when I discovered my little glory of snow, I felt the Spirit make all the connections.  The little blue flower that I didn't deserve.  The grumblings of my spirit when wronged (perceived or real).  The way my heart is still off key and needs Divine tuning to help me sing His grace when it really counts.  
15. I hum the hymn.  I pray the prayer.
16. "Tune my heart, Lord, to sing Thy grace."
17. It's one of those dangerous prayers, of course, so I best brace myself.
18.