Hymns That Open Our Hearts

Hymns That Open Our Hearts

 

Scripture Verse: “Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark (ת) upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof.” (Ezekiel 9:4)

Hymns open our hearts. Even if it’s a hymn I’ve sung many times without much feeling, there are moments—especially in particular circumstances—when the Holy Spirit opens my heart and moves me deeply through that very same hymn. This is a story from long ago. I attended a presbytery meeting of our denomination, where an elder—Dr. Kim, a second-generation Korean American—gave a report on his visit to North Korea. He had participated in the Presbyterian Church (USA) General Assembly delegation and, at the time, was teaching microbiology at a university in New York.

Though much of his report on North Korea was information I was already familiar with and did not find particularly engaging, I was captivated at the end when he shared a hymn that he sang with North Korean Christians. This small-framed elder sat down at the piano, laid his hands on the keys, and began to play. As he played a beautifully refined introduction, my heart was drawn in. When he sang verses 1 and 4 in Korean, I imagined the scene of him singing together with the North Korean congregation, and I was overwhelmed with the deep moving of the Holy Spirit.

1. I know not why God’s wondrous grace
To me He hath made known,
Nor why, unworthy, Christ in love
Redeemed me for His own.

Chorus:

But “I know Whom I have believed,
And am persuaded that He is able
To keep that which I’ve committed
Unto Him against that day.”

4. I know not when my Lord may come,
At night or noonday fair,
Nor if I walk the vale with Him,
Or meet Him in the air.

Chorus repeats

Even in the midst of communist dictatorship, and in the sorrow and suffering the world brings, we rejoice and give thanks because God loved and redeemed even someone as useless as me.

Back when I was still a layperson in Korea, I once visited a care center for physically and mentally disabled children with Sunday school teachers and students. The expressions on the children’s faces were dark, and they seemed uninterested in our visit. These children had been neglected and marginalized by society. Initially, they kept their hearts closed. But once they realized that we genuinely wanted to interact with them, they opened their hearts, and behind their gloomy, twisted expressions, we discovered their beautiful inner selves.

We sat together, sang hymns, and shared testimonies of the Lord’s love. As we were about to leave, we invited them to perform a special song at our church’s evening service the following Sunday. The hymn they sang then was more beautiful and grace-filled than anything I had ever heard from any famous choir in the world.

This world is not my home, I’m just a-passing through
My treasures are laid up somewhere beyond the blue
The angels beckon me from heaven’s open door
And I can’t feel at home in this world anymore.

O Lord, You know I have no friend like You
If heaven’s not my home, then Lord what will I do?
The angels beckon me from heaven’s open door
And I can’t feel at home in this world anymore.

Their hymn brought tears to my eyes. Among them were boys and girls who had been abandoned by their siblings and parents. Yet in their hearts, the Lord was present, gently healing their pain with His hand of love. Jesus had gone ahead to heaven to prepare a place for such as these.

When I was about to leave Korea for the United States, I had made the decision to become a missionary and was praying for guidance. During that time, one hymn—number 404—deeply captured my heart.

The love of God is greater far
Than tongue or pen can ever tell;
It goes beyond the highest star,
And reaches to the lowest hell;
The guilty pair bowed down with care,
God gave His Son to win;
His erring child  He reconciled,
And pardoned from His sin. 

Chorus:

Oh love of God, how rich and pure,
How measureless and strong;
It shall forevermore endure—
The saints’ and angels’ song.

Could we with ink the ocean fill,
And were the skies of parchment made,
Were every stalk on earth a quill,
And every man a scribe by trade—
To write the love of God above
Would drain the ocean dry;
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Tho' stretched from sky to sky.

Chorus repeats

I was so overwhelmed and grateful for the immense love of God who saved even someone as unworthy and sinful as I. That love filled me with such awe and emotion that I asked myself: “How can I return this love?” I searched for a way to respond to His grace, to testify to it, and to devote myself to it. That, I believe, is the true grace and awe that hymn-singing can bring.

While teaching the Bible to graduate students in Virginia, one hymn deeply moved a student who had just come to believe in the Lord after arriving in the U.S.

O Thou, in whose presence my soul takes delight,
On whom in affliction I call,
My comfort by day, and my song in the night,
My hope, my salvation, my all! 

Where dost Thou, dear Shepherd, resort with Thy sheep,
To feed them in pastures of love?
Say, why in the valley of death should I weep,
Or alone in this wilderness rove?  

Dear Shepherd! I hear and will follow your call;
I know the sweet sound of Thy voice,
Restore and defend me, for Thou art my all,
And in Thee I will ever rejoice. (Hymn 82, Verses 1, 2, 5) 

Both he and his wife had studied biology at Seoul National University. Even before they fully understood who God was, the Lord touched his heart through the powerful prompting of the Holy Spirit. He felt God’s love so deeply that it seemed to reach into his very being. It wasn’t in a loud revival meeting—it was simply during a quiet preparatory hymn before a Bible study. Yet the Lord completely seized his heart. The emotion was so overwhelming that he couldn’t contain it.

About a year into his studies, the love of God that he had experienced seemed to make everything else feel meaningless to him. One day, he came to me for counseling. We talked all night. I tried to help him understand that even someone who has profoundly experienced God's love and desires to devote their life to God still needs to continue learning and growing, even academically. Eventually, he became an elder. Both he and his wife earned their PhDs, returned to Korea, and began teaching at a college.

While hymns bring us into an encounter with the Holy Spirit—into love and grace—they are not the ultimate goal of our spiritual life. They are a means, a doorway to opening our hearts to God. Therefore, we must become people who, with humble and open hearts, strive to understand more deeply the truth of God and the nature of His love.