The following video is making its way around the internet. It is amazing! As I listened to it, I was reminded of John Ortberg’s account of the song’s author in his book Soul Keeping. While the story can be chilling, it provides me a worthwhile perspective.
Horatio Spafford invested most of what he had in real estate. He lived in Chicago and lost everything in the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. It destroyed his home. They had no insurance. He lost most of his money. In 1873 he put his wife and their four daughters (their son having died of scarlet fever in 1870) on a ship heading to England as he stayed behind to restimulate his business. A few days after the ship departed, he received a telegram from his wife: “Saved alone. What shall I do?” There had been a shipwreck. All four of their daughters perished. Horatio quickly boarded another ship to England, and as it passed over the very same place in the ocean where his daughters had drowned, he wrote these words to as song: 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.
Ortberg, John. Soul Keeping: Caring For the Most Important Part of You (p. 48). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.
I pray that you find peace today, despite the circumstances. I pray that God’s peace will be established deeply within our hearts so that we may all rejoice in knowing that “It Is Well,” because He has made it so.