Abide with me
This year a choir representing each team that played in the 3rd round of the Cup led the singing. The hymn has also been sung at every Rugby League Challenge Cup Final since 1929 and was sung at the 2012 London Olympics Opening Ceremony.
The hymn was written by Henry Frances Lyte. He was a curate in the fishing village of Lower Brixham in Devon. The hymn is a prayer to God asking that we might know his presence with us in all the experiences of life and in death. It expresses the aloneness we often feel and our longing to know God’s presence and peace in times of trial and especially when the time comes for us to die. “Abide with me” was sung by soldiers in the trenches in World War I and is always sung at the RBL’s Festival of Remembrance. Nurse Edith Cavell sang it the night before the Germans shot her for helping British soldiers to escape from occupied Belgium.
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Hide AdThe hymn reminds us of our frailty and the brevity of life. “Abide with me; fast falls the eventide; the darkness deepens; Lord with me abide. When other helpers fail and comforts flee, help of the helpless, O abide with me. Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day; earth’s joys grow dim; its glories pass away; change and decay in all around I see; O Thou who changest not, abide with me.”
All the experiences of this life are fleeting as we move to our last hour, which we must each face alone. How wonderful it is to know that we can turn to the eternal God who will hear our prayer so that we will never be alone! “I need Thy presence every passing hour. What but Thy grace can foil the tempter’s power? Who, like Thyself, my guide and stay can be? Through cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me. I fear no foe, with Thee at hand to bless; ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness. Where is death’s sting?
Where, grave, thy victory? I triumph still, if Thou abide with me. Hold Thou Thy cross before my closing eyes; shine through the gloom and point me to the skies. Heaven’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee; in life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.”