Wayfaring Stranger

I was playing through the songs in my songbook tonight and came across "Wayfaring Stranger". It's an old traditional American song from somewhere up in the mountains. I pass it by usually and play other songs: it is in a minor key and feels sad to me. But I played it through several times, alone here in my room, and it seemed more hopeful tonight than plaintive. It is a song about the end of life, but it is about hope, and going over to a beautiful world of love on the other side.

Gordon Cosby told me once about a talk he had with a soldier in a foxhole before a battle in World War II. He told me the soldier, who'd had a premonition that he was going to die the next day, told him that he didn't believe in Jesus, but wondered what he could do to prepare in case he was killed. Gordon told the soldier that he should expect to experience love which is so great that it is unimaginable to us, but which would bear him away and that he would need to do what he could to ready himself to work with that. The man did die in the battle the next day.

There is something in my heart that knows there is a beautiful vast eternity awaiting us. This old song captures that knowledge, and reminds me of it tonight.

"Golden fields lie right before me
Where weary eyes no more will weep.
I'm going home to see my father
I'm going home no more to roam.
I'm only going over Jordon,
I'm only going over home."

Tonight my heart is with Charles, and with his family gathered around there as he goes home.

Listen to Wayfaring Stranger

I am a poor wayfaring stranger

Traveling through this world alone

There is no sickness, toil or danger

In that fair land to which I go 

I'm going home to see my mother 

I'm going home no more to roam

I am just going over Jordan

I am just going over home 

I know dark clouds will hover on me, 

I know my pathway is rough and steep 

Beauteous fields lie right before me 

Where weary eyes no more will weep

I'm going home to see my father

I'm going home no more to roam 

I am just going over Jordan 

I am just going over home

I’ll soon be free from every trial

This form will rest beneath the sun

I'll drop the cross of self-denial

Come back home with God

I'm going home to see my savior

I'm going home no more to roam

I am just going over Jordan

I am just going over home