All About Victory

When the years start piling up, I mean piling up behind you, a few things get lost in the recesses of human memory.  I mention this not just to confess that old age is upon me, but to acknowledge that I no longer remember everything about my college days with absolute clarity.  I remember Harold, a friend at Young Harris College, and our Sunday journeys to several North Carolina Methodist Churches for preaching opportunities.  A pastor who was assigned to an eight point rural charge asked for some help and Harold and I started going to three of his churches each Sunday to preach.  The churches wanted more worship and preaching and we wanted to do some preaching so it worked out for both of us.

 

What I also remember is that the music in those churches was not the kind of music program found in the larger congregations I later served which had Ministers of Music and gifted choirs.  In one of the churches the pianist could only play two hymns so we sang them each Sunday we went to that place.  One was "Love Divine'" and the other was "Victory in Jesus."  The first song I had sung many times; the second I learned at that country church.  Written in 1939 it is a great gospel song with a message all its own.  The chorus was a song and theology lesson, " O victory in Jesus, My Savior, forever, He sought me and bought me With His redeeming blood.  He loved me ere I knew Him And all my love is due Him. He plunged me to victory Beneath the cleansing flood."

"Victory in Jesus"  is an upbeat hymn with an easy to sing tune and it preaches good theology.  The chorus lifts such theological concepts as Jesus being Savior, the Incarnation and a seeking God, redemption, God's love, prevenient grace, and the work of Christ in forgiving our sin.  It is a lot different than some of the current Christian music which teaches very little and is exceedingly redundant.  It is just hard to understand why some music called Christian could be substituted for something as singable and as powerful as this old gospel song.