This couple was most likely splitting time in 2005 between two continents, including in Europe where they live part of the time in Portstewart, Northern Ireland (see the coat of arms for Londonderry County, the location of Portstewart in N. Ireland, here). The Gettys, Keith and Kristyn, may need a map or a global-positioning device at times to keep track of where they’re headed (they also live part-time in Nashville, Tennessee, USA), but the place where they might say they were ‘living’ one day in 2005 was “Beneath the Cross of Jesus”. They value the history of their faith and the songs from centuries ago that speak of this faith, but Keith and Kristyn also want to be in the present with the exercise of their beliefs. It was the life of a believing community that spurred the Gettys toward what they would write. Read on.
Keith and Kristyn Getty appreciate the mark that hymns have made on Christians, and perhaps that best sums up why they engage in songwriting today. This Irish couple come from a faith culture rich in history spoken through hymns. How many of us appreciate how much we owe in our collective memories to hymnwriters from the British Isles? Indeed, the Gettys must have been mulling over this fact when they decided that a new version of ‘Beneath the Cross of Jesus’ was something they wanted to pursue. This 19th Century standard by Elizabeth Clephane (see this blogger’s August 18, 2012 entry that relates the song’s development) must have been one they’d sung many times, including in their own church in Portstewart. After all, Clephane was one of their British ‘cousins’, as a native of Scotland. Maybe it was sung on one or more of the days that the Gettys remember that they were engaged in a bible study on the book of James in that church, an episode that the couple says went on for a couple of months. Their idea for the renewal of ‘Beneath the Cross…’ evidently emanated from that study, and from a desire to emphasize the community in which believers live. The cross He bore purchases an incredible inheritance for the believer anticipating the future, but Keith and Kristyn thought that He’s so much more than just a future. He’s also about now. And, we occupy this time together; we belong to each other. ‘His family is my own’ (v.2), is a powerful statement, one which the Gettys say bans selfishness and dishonor of each other. We are ‘one through grace alone’ (v.2). This community the Gettys saw in verse two was bookended by how that group of Christ onlookers respond to Him (verses 1 and 3); I, as the individual, am astounded by His gift to me (v.1), and we, this collective ‘bride’ of Christ, live hopefully and joyfully, awaiting the culmination of His perfect act of love (v.3). There’s a lot to love about this spot beneath the cross!
Did God plan it this way, that our position looking up at the instrument of Christ’s execution would upend our concept of life itself? So perplexing it must have been for Mary, John, and the others to watch Jesus confront death, to endure this sting, this insult of His deity. And, what about us mortals? How many centuries of humans did God watch confront death with nothing to feel but foreboding? No doubt about it, death is a menacing thing. But now, death has not won – Christ has. Life doesn’t have to be over, and mortality no longer has to terrorize humanity. And, I’m not alone now, nor will I be when I exit this place for another. Keith and Kristyn remind us that the spot beneath His cross is not a lonely dead-end. He changes everything.
http://www.fbcspringdale.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/2015-03_HOTM-Beneath_the_Cross_of_Jesus.pdf
http://www.fbcspringdale.org/beneath-the-cross-of-jesus/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_%26_Kristyn_Getty#Kristyn_Getty
see here for some details on the song story: https://www.hymnologyarchive.com/beneath-the-cross-of-jesus
No comments:
Post a Comment