Someone's Singing, Lord--Pilgrims

Another 30-year-old meditation written specifically for high school kids (I wouldn't dare attempt that today). Like Monday's post, it's age is showing. But the hymn in question, "Guide Me, O Thou Great Redeemer" inspires, even if the meditation totters a little. Just don't miss the Welsh rendition of the hymn many people think of as a favorite. It's at the bottom. 

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"Pilgrim in a barren land. . ."

Okay, vocabulary quiz. Which of the following is the best definition of a sextant?

a. a mutant species of bog fly called mungus phobus;

b. an instrument used for measuring angles in stars;

c. the church custodian;

d. a criminal convicted of naughty things.

No matter how appealing the rest of these definitions are, the answer, as the wizards among you already know, is b. For centuries, a sextant was an essential tool for bearded sea captains ready to ship out on the high seas. A sextant measures angles between the stars and the horizon and thus helps pinpoint exactly where a ship is.

A compass is another tool that travelers use to find their way. If you've backpacked out in the High Sierras or the Rocky Mountains, you've likely used this small device with a tippy magnetized needle that always points north. Compass in hand, one at least knows north from south.

High tech has put both the compass and the sextant in museums­ not because these old instruments don't work, but because today we have faster and more accurate ways of finding out where we are.

The people of Israel had no high tech-and no sextants or compasses either. When Pharaoh gave them the green light to leave Egypt and Moses tiptoed them across the Jordan, they had no way of determining which direction was which. They became pilgrims, wanderers, followers of a promise that Moses relayed to them from God-that somewhere out there lay a promised land, a home.

But, as "Guide Me, O Thou Great Redeemer" says, God gave his people guidance, a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire. When they were hungry, he laid the ground white with manna.

I don't know a soul today who is out in the wilderness trying to fig­ure out his or her position. There may be open space at the North and South Poles, but for the most part the world's wildernesses are pretty well mapped.

But a lot of folks need guidance, even Christians.

That's what makes this hymn the prayer of so many--we all want a sure sense of footing down paths that lie before us, the kind of sure-thing guidance God gave the people of Israel. We want to know which school to go to, which friends to hang around with, what courses to choose, which job to take, what to do with the rest of our lives, who to date, how to deal with parents (or children!).

But today God doesn't work in fiery pillars. So sometimes it's dif­ficult to figure out which way he's guiding us. Sometimes God's will for our lives is mysterious. If it weren't, this hymn wouldn't be a favorite. If we could just call up God's will on a computer screen, we wouldn't be asking him to guide us.

But the great thing is, even when we're unsure, we know that God listens to us. We can always call on God, and there's no long-distance charge. He listens. He delivers.

This song is not the cry of the lost--it's a pilgrim's prayer.

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Here's yet another rendition, by a single church in Wales, where "Guide Me" is, I'm told, almost a national anthem. At the end of the English setting, these folks sing a line in their native tongue. Just to watch them is an inspiration.