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The Soundtrack of You Life Challenge: Day 6 - Amazing Grace

Istijlál (Majesty), 19 Sulṭán (Sovereignty) 176 B.E. - Thursday, February 6, 2020

Title: Amazing Grace
Artist: Judy Collins

Lyrics12

Amazing grace! How sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now am found;
Was blind, but now I see.

’Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,
And grace my fears relieved;
How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believed.

Through many dangers, toils, and snares,
I have already come;
’Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,
And grace will lead me home.

The Lord has promised good to me,
His Word my hope secures;
He will my Shield and Portion be,
As long as life endures.

Yea, when this flesh and heart shall fail,
And mortal life shall cease,
I shall possess, within the veil,
A life of joy and peace.

The earth shall soon dissolve like snow,
The sun forbear to shine;
But God, who called me here below,
Will be forever mine.

When we’ve been there ten thousand years,
Bright shining as the sun,
We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise
Than when we’d first begun.

March 19, 2020 will be my Mother's 99^th birthday. November 29, 2020 will be the 8^th anniversary of her death. One of Mom's favorite songs was Amazing Grace, which was Grandma Mary's favorite song. Grandma Mary was Mom's mother.

Mom and Me

After Mom's death, I lived in the house we shared for about a year before it was sold and I could move out. Moving out started a new phase in my life and in mourning Mom. I still mourn her, but in a different way. Now I can smile, instead of cry, when I remember her. When I was living in the house, I wrote the following poem.

"Even Now" 

Even now,
nine months after her death,
I wake up in the middle of the night
listening for the sound of the machine,
the echoes of the oxygen concentrator,
which sat
on the left side of her bed.

Even now,
I hear her voice call my name
and walk wearily down the hall
before I remember
that she now sleeps
beneath a rose colored headstone
in Palm Eastern Mortuary and Cemetery.

I still hear Mom's voice in my dreams; however, instead of getting up to walk down the hall to check on her, I access the prayer app on my cell phone and say the following prayer reveal by 'Abdu'l-Baha3 for the progress of Mom's soul.

"O Thou forgiving God! Forgive the sins of my loving mother, pardon her shortcomings, cast upon her the glance of Thy gracious providence, and enable her to gain admittance into Thy Kingdom.

O God! From the earliest days of my life she educated and nurtured me, yet I did not recompense her for her toil and labours. Do Thou reward her by granting her eternal life and making her exalted in Thy Kingdom.

Verily, Thou art the Forgiver, the Bestower, and the Kind."

Footnotes
1  https://library.timelesstruths.org/music/Amazing_Grace/
2  Written by John Newton
3  Additional Prayers Revealed by 'Abdu'l-Baha