Last Sunday, we made a joyful noise together singing the hymn ‘Praise to the Lord, the Almighty, the King of creation!’. As I’ve sung the words over again this week (you usually know I’m close by because I’m singing something), it’s struck me how poignant these words have been for us at Emmanuel over the last year.
I am often asked how we’ve coped with COVID-19 over the last year and people are surprised when I tell them that, since March 2020, no child or teacher in our school has fallen sick with COVID-19. In addition, no child or teacher has missed school because of needing to isolate because of a close contact testing positive for COVID-19. A friend I shared this with recently commented, ‘Wow, it sounds like you really got all your measures right. What do you think really made the difference?’. I shared that our principle from February 2020 was ‘sanity, sanitation and no fear’. Our commitment has been simple: to care for the children we’ve been given to serve, and live courageously under God’s promises. As I reflect on the last year, I’m aware that our experience as a school has been one of God’s mercy. It’s not because we’ve done things ‘right’ that we’ve been spared troubles. God’s grace is Sovereign: He owes us nothing, but we can trust Him with everything. Hudson Taylor once said that ‘God justifies the confidence He enables us to place in Him’. In some way, God enjoys showing that, in all that we trust Him to be, He is sufficient to deliver. As the Almighty, King of creation, the one who holds all things together, our ultimate health and salvation is found in Him.
Praise to the Lord, the Almighty, the King of creation!
O my soul, praise Him, for He is thy health and salvation!
All ye who hear, now to His temple draw near;
Praise Him in glad adoration.
Over the course of the last year, our school has been anchored in a number of Psalms. In March 2020, this was Psalm 91, especially verse 4:
He will cover you with his feathers,
and under his wings you will find refuge;
his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
In January 2021, Psalm 16 encouraged us that God alone is our portion and our cup. He makes our lot secure. Apart from Him we have no good thing. Or as the hymn poetically puts it:
Praise to the Lord, who o’er all things so wondrously reigneth,
Shelters thee under His wings, yea, so gently sustaineth!
Hast thou not seen all you have needed hath been
Granted in what He ordaineth?
Through the third lockdown when we made provision for as many children who needed it to be at school, we prayed Psalm 46 regularly, asking God to be our strength and refuge, and that we would meet Him at the breaking of each new day. Psalm 23 was a constant go-to, asking God to be merciful and show us His goodness. Amazingly, by the end of the Spring Term, our school had also grown in number too.
Praise to the Lord, who doth prosper thy work and defend thee;
Surely His goodness and mercy here daily attend thee;
Ponder anew what the Almighty can do,
If with His love He befriend thee.
Recently, I’ve been thinking about the theme of ‘enchantment’. Enchantment has the sense of putting something under a spell, but it literally means the singing of a song into a situation. In a way we can’t fully fathom, there is something spiritually powerful about the singing of gospel (literally ‘good spell’) realities into our situation. We’ve encouraged the children in singing at Emmanuel this year and held a number of outdoor services so our community can sing. We’ve sung Psalm 46 to the Dambusters March, Amazing Grace, Fight the Good Fight, O God Beyond all Praising, our own school song. These have been the anthems of our heart and have powerfully shaped our reality. Perhaps these are not the measures my friend was asking about, but I suspect they are the measures which matter most. God owes us nothing but we can trust Him with everything. And so we can sing:
Praise to the Lord, oh, let all that is in me adore Him!
All that hath life and breath, come now with praises before Him;
Let the Amen sound from His people again,
Gladly for aye we adore Him.
