That place of quiet rest

There’s something about a shade-dappled pond that simply speaks “peace,”  maybe as a faint shadow of the original, perfect Eden. As I came across this pond at the arboretum adjacent to the University of Idaho in Moscow, Idaho, the hymn title, “Near to the Heart of God” slipped into my heart. The tune stayed with me for a few minutes as I walked back to the car.

There is a place of quiet rest, near to the heart of God;

A place where sin cannot molest, near to the heart of God.

Every hymn has its “birth story,” and when I got home and looked up the background on this one, I realized how unspeakable pain brought forth enduring praise.  The author, Cleland McAfee, was a graduate of Park University in Parkville, Mo., which his father co-founded in 1875 with just seventeen students.  Cleland, his four brothers, and his only sister were all involved with the college. After Cleland’s graduation, he attended seminary, then returned to the college as chaplain and choir director.  For communion Sundays, he would write the words to a musical response that tied in with his  sermon theme.

One week, just before that communion service, Cleland’s brother Howard and his wife lost two small daughters to diphtheria within twenty-four hours. Their deaths shook the college and community. As Cleland meditated on psalms of comfort, he knew he needed to write another song than planned for that Sunday. His choir learned it at the Saturday night rehearsal, and then went to the grieving parents’ darkened, quarantined home. They sang it outside the house, then again that Sunday morning.

Cleland McAfee later became well-known his for scholarly theological writing, but more than a hundred years later it’s this song, written from a broken heart, for which he is best remembered.  Knowing “the rest of the story” of this century-old hymn has helped me appreciate the trusting heart that brought forth memorable lyrics.

The first verse, of course, goes to the “place of quiet rest.”  Verse two is about “the place of comfort sweet.”  Verse three, “the place of full release.”  Then, the affirming chorus:

O Jesus, blest Redeemer,

Sent from the heart of God,

Hold us who wait before Thee,

Near to the heart of God.