The Deep Purposes Of God
Elaine Utting
This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
Matthew 26:28 (NIV)
Some years ago a friend with a deep, yet unconventional, faith told me about a piece of music that had helped him during a difficult time in his life. It isn’t everyone’s style, but I too have found it moving and also thought provoking.
It is by double bassist and composer Gavin Bryars, who writes experimental classical music. For this piece he looped a fragmentary recording, taken during the making of a documentary about homeless people in London, and then gradually introduced harmonising strings.
The recording is of an elderly man singing these few lines:
Jesus’ blood never failed me yet
Never failed me yet
Jesus’ blood never failed me yet
This one thing I know
That he loves me so
His voice is frail, but he sings in tune, with such contented conviction, and a softening that I find very moving as he sings those last two lines. Gradually, over the repeats, the string orchestra joins, quietly at first and becoming fuller as the old man’s song is repeated over and over.
Gavin Bryars began developing it in 1971, and since then has performed many new versions with different orchestrations depending on the occasion and the musicians available. A google search brings up many of the recorded versions, as well as several articles describing how it was developed.
He does not claim to be a Christian. It seems he was more intrigued by the fact that the old man was singing in a key that matched his piano, but he has produced a piece that has powerfully affected thousands of people.
Frequently, at performances, people are moved to tears.. There are many comments saying something similar on the YouTube versions too. I read in one article that a couple had decided to split up during a holiday, but as they were driving home they heard it on the radio and were reconciled.
In a comment about their own songwriting, from a member of Christian band Jars of Clay (who recorded their own version in 2003), the lead singer seems to explain this. He said that art can:
“make people feel what is true, rather than telling them”.
The old man died before the piece was first recorded, and remains untraced and unknown. No-one can trace the song either. It may be part of a half remembered hymn, perhaps from Sunday School when he was a child in the early 1900s.
The full orchestral piece was last played in a 12 hour performance in 2019, at the Tate Modern. And a version is still played at an annual commemoration service at St Martins for homeless people who have died in the last year.
It amazes me how deep and long and wide the Lord lays his plans. We can’t know how many people have been nudged, encouraged, or strengthened in faith by this piece of music. And it all started when someone who loved Jesus wrote a song, and a small boy or young man learned it, and loved Jesus too.
Now may the God of Peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
Hebrews 13:20-21 (NIV)
