Gentle on my mind

Lately the phrase “Gentle on my Mind” has floated in and out of my thinking. I’ve learned it’s a song popularized by many artists, but especially Glen Campbell. The lyrics are about a drifter’s long-ago love. But I’m drawn to the title for another reason: how hymns learned long ago come back to me—“gentle on my mind”—in renewed ministry.

As a young adult I began attending a church that sang lots of the old Gospel hymns. As a newcomer to the Gospel music culture, I embarrassed myself more than once as I helped out at the piano or organ. My mediocre keyboard skills were stretched by the tricky rhythms or fourteen sharps (or so it seemed). But one by one, those melodies and snatches of verses became a part of me, tucked away in some cerebral electrical compartment. Some rested unused for years, yet ready for retrieval if needed.

After my parents died when I was 31, I was drawn to Lina Sandell Berg’s hymn “Day by Day.” Its message seemed tailored for me with its reminder to find daily strength for life’s trials through trust in God’s wisdom and love. Later I learned that when only 26, she was on lake trip with her pastor-father when the boat lurched and he fell overboard and drowned. Her hymn came out of that incredible tragedy. And about a hundred years later it was “gentle on my mind” in my own loss.

Through the years, other hymns have drifted in during times of rejoicing or tragedy. This past week it happened again. On Monday, I was part of the family surrounding my mother-in-law, Doris, as she took her last breath. Seeing death happen for a faithful Christian woman drove home Paul’s proclamation: “Absent from the body, present with the Lord” (2 Cor. 5:8).

A lot went through my mind that day, but the next morning something I never expected was “gentle on my mind.” It was the chorus of one of those old peppy Gospel hymns—probably one that Doris had sung herself in her many years as a pastor’s wife: “O victory in Jesus, my Savior forever.” I grabbed a hymnbook, read all the verses and chorus—and I knew God had sent it special delivery.

I’m still singing it in my heart: when I wake up, when I drive to errands, and when I lie down at night. And I’ve put a hymnal by the chair where I often read and pray. When another hymn is “gentle on my mind,” I want to be ready to be blessed again.