Worship Song Highlight: "He Will Hold Me Fast"

Hymns often have a way of ministering to our souls when we are in dark and difficult places. I first heard “He Will Hold Me Fast” in 2016. A friend of mine shared how this song sustained him after he had to leave his job and spend a year of soul-searching to determine what to do next. It is a hymn I want my congregants to know to help carry them through trials and sorrows.

“He Will Hold Me Fast” is a retuned hymn. A retuned hymn is an older hymn which has been given new music by a modern songwriter. Sometimes a songwriter will do like Matt Merker did with this Ada R. Habershon hymn and add or modify the lyrics as well. For “He Will Hold Me Fast,” Merker combined Haberson’s stanzas one and two into his first stanza, combined stanzas three and four into his second stanza, and wrote new lyrics for the third stanza.

Someone showed this text to Merker, and he pulled it out when he was going through a difficult time. After he modified it and shared it with his wife, Erica, and with his pastor, Mark Dever of Capitol Hill Baptist Church in D.C., their church began to sing it. It connected and impacted his church and began spreading from there. The song was picked up by Getty Music and recorded on their 2016 album “Facing a Task Unfinished.” It has since been recorded by Together for the Gospel from their Live III album, as well as by Selah and Shane & Shane.

This song reminds us that God loves us, not because we are strong and able to remain faithful to Him, but because he is strong and faithful towards us. Through temptation and doubt, he will hold us fast. Jesus protects us from the evil one (1 John 5:18), and he also promised that “no one is able to snatch [us] out of the Father’s hand” (John 10:29). He will hold me fast! The second verse echoes 1 Peter 1:19, that we were bought “with the precious blood of Christ.” Since he ransomed us, he will not let us go.

Merker added the third stanza to feature the resurrection and return of Christ. This fits so well, because the second stanza says, “His promises shall last.” What greater promise is there than ‘Christ has died, Christ is risen, and Christ will come again’? Thus the third stanza ends with:

Raised with Him to endless life

He will hold me fast

Till our faith is turned to sight

When he comes at last!

Here is a link to Getty Music’s page about “He Will Hold Me Fast.” It has a YouTube recording embedded, lyrics, the background story, and charts for the song. https://www.gettymusic.com/he-will-hold-me-fast