The Song Written Over the Waves That Took Everything

In November 1873, Horatio Spafford stood at the railing of a ship crossing the Atlantic and stared down at the cold, dark water. Somewhere beneath those waves, his four daughters had perished just days earlier when the SS Ville du Havre collided with another vessel and sank within twelve minutes. His wife Anna had survived, sending him a telegram with two devastating words: "Saved alone."

Spafford had already buried a son to scarlet fever. He had lost nearly everything in the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. And now, sailing over the very waters that had swallowed his children, he did something that defies human logic.

He wrote a hymn.

"When peace like a river attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows roll — whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say, it is well, it is well with my soul."

That was not the language of a man who had no pain. It was the language of a man who had decided where to place his pain. Spafford did not trust God because his circumstances were good. He trusted God because he believed the Almighty was good, even when the waves said otherwise.

Trust is not the absence of sorrow. Trust is writing a hymn over the place where your heart broke open, because you believe the One who holds you is stronger than the waters that tried to take everything.

Whatever sea you are crossing today, the same God stands with you at the railing.