Sunday School was a solid fixture of my childhood years. That, and Vacation Bible School, which was rather like Sunday School all day, five days a week, except a little bit more fun and I didn't have to wear my Sunday clothes.
One of the ingredients in the mix of Sunday School/VBS was singing, usually to the accompaniment of an out-of-tune piano and an inexpert pianist. We sang what we called 'choruses' or what might better be described as 'hymns-lite,' a slightly dummed down version of theology set to music. That was really the best part of Sunday School, because we did it together in a larger group before we got down to the poorly planned, but age specific curriculum of the classes.
We sang those choruses over and over again, and the words ring soundly, and usually error free in my head to this day. I think my belief system was partially founded on those choruses.
One came to mind this morning, and it resonated with a truth that is welling up in me these several decades later. That truth, back then, was ameliorated and tailored to suit the prevailing belief that was being inculcated. You might even say it was frittered away. But it has remained with me, and today I'm reclaiming it, re-translating it and consciously restoring it's truth to my active belief system. Here's how it goes:
He owns the cattle on a thousand hills.
The wealth in every mine.
He owns the rivers and the rocks and rills,
The sun and stars that shine.
Wonderful riches more than tongue can tell.
These are my Father's, so they're mine as well.
He owns the cattle on a thousand hills.
I know that He will care for me.
Sadly, the core truth of that little ditty was lost to me almost immediately. Instead of a great abundance being available to me, I was taught that it was not right to really expect an overflow of goodness, but that it was better to anticipate little. In fact it was really rather righteous to be poor. The rich were somehow suspect, however giving they might seem to be. All this I learned in the face of my much loved chorus.
So, today I am reclaiming the chorus and translating it so that I may access it, and use it as a keystone in the ongoing rebuilding of my belief system. Here goes. (sorry I can't make it a rhyming ditty)
The Universe...amazing!
Utterly complex, no end in sight.
Constantly made of limitless thinking stuff.
I'm an integral part of it...
It is mine and I am it's,
Never are we separated.
With rocks and rivers
moon and stars and cosmos
I am unseverably connected.
Never can I doubt...is there is enough?
Never will I be abandoned or without
water from the well of infinite goodness.
I'm not sure I can sing my translation, but I'm taking it to heart.
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