It Is Well with My Soul

My Reflection

I knew and loved “It Is Well with My Soul” from early on, in part because its unforgettable story of origin gave the words unusual weight. Over the years I have also come to associate it strongly with funerals, and that association sometimes makes me hesitant to choose it on other occasions.

My wife has no such hesitation. She sings it spontaneously at almost any time and in almost any setting. Her ease with the hymn has often reminded me that its message belongs not only to moments of bereavement but to the ordinary life of faith.

The hymn raises, for me, a question of elemental importance: How is it with your soul? Scripture asks what it profits a person to gain the whole world and lose the soul. The question reaches beneath achievement, appearance and circumstance to the condition of our inner life. If it is well with the soul, then something fundamental is well indeed.

The recurring affirmation of the hymn has enormous consoling power. Repetition does not make the words empty; it allows the assurance to settle more deeply, especially at those defining moments when we must confront what we truly believe. It is a declaration we may need to sing before we can fully feel it.

Perhaps that is why the hymn accompanies so many solemn occasions. It does not deny sorrow. It dares to affirm spiritual security in sorrow's presence. And perhaps my wife's readiness to sing it at any time is its own quiet reminder: the assurance is for living as much as for dying.

What I Carry

The question of the soul matters more than outward success; assurance can be sung even amid sorrow.