Come Thou Fount of Blessings

Bittersweet. It’s the most beautiful kind of sadness, I think. It’s like at Caleb’s funeral. They played this song called Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing. It wasn’t an orchestra or anything—just my cousin’s old violin and my aunt’s piano. And strangely enough, it was a Christian song. But it was so striking and sad that I knew that my brother would have loved it. The moment I heard it, I knew that I wanted it to be played at my funeral, too—hopefully when I am old and have lived a good life. I want it to be like Caleb’s—no fancy ensemble, either. Just simple and full.

Anyway, I looked at the sheet music after the service was done and I read some of the lyrics. Most of them were not profound enough for me to remember except this one line:

“Tune my heart to sing thy grace”

I think that’s beautiful. When you tune an instrument, you alter it, you shape and mold it to be something better. Something that can produce wonderful things. And isn’t that what we all wish to happen to us in the end? To have our souls and characters altered for the better? And sometimes the only thing that can really inspire you to change yourself is someone else. Sometimes they are inept and clumsy and they make you even worse than you were before. But sometimes a person comes along and they tune your heart just right. So it sings the right notes. The notes that make you happy. And perhaps that is what’s happening to me at this very moment—the parts of me that are off-key and discordant are being smoothed in the crescendo of a new beginning.

You are tuning my heart, Sara. Perhaps some day I can sing your grace as well as you sing mine.