He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.
Today we give thanks at church for the life of Bishop Timothy Dudley-Smith, known all over the world as a hymn-writer, who died last month. At 98, he was the oldest member of our church family, and a wonderful encouragement to us here.
Among his many wonderful hymns, one of my favourites is his “Safe in the shadow of the Lord”, which takes its cue from Psalm 91. It begins:
Safe in the shadow of the Lord
beneath his hand and power,
I trust in him,
I trust in him,
my fortress and my tower.
The hymn continues with the same tone of confidence in God, through many dangers and difficulties – as the Psalm does. Its ultimate theme is our security in God’s hands. Our Lord Jesus is the one to whom God made these promises in the first instance, but, wonderfully, they also apply to those who are His people. The Psalm does not promise protection from every earthly peril – indeed, it assumes that there will be these – but through them, there is ultimate security in the closeness of His shadow.
Many of us had the privilege of seeing the peace that comes from trusting Christ in Timothy himself.
The hymn has a special resonance with our family. In 2020, during the lockdown of the Covid pandemic, he asked our daughters Lucy and Alice if they could make a recording of it for Premier Radio’s Sunday Night Live TV show. Premier picked this, I believe, as an encouragement for many in the fearful isolation of that time. Timothy recorded his own introduction, and the hymn was then recorded in the Vicarage dining room! You can see it here. Sing along!
We played it to my own father in the care home as his own earthly days drew to a close. What an encouragement this song is!
This beautiful hymn directs us, as all Timothy’s songs did, to the Lord who is indeed our refuge and our fortress.
