I don’t know about you, but I find that there are particular songs and hymns that seem to fit with seasons we or I am going through. I remember being captured by “Hymn of Heaven” by Phil Wickham around about the time my mum died. Interestingly she had mentioned hearing a Phil Wickham song at a funeral earlier that year, possibly this one or Living Hope and it spoke to her.
Back in early 2020 many of us found the words and music of Goodness of God spoke to us. For me it was testimony of God’s faithfulness through depression and we had others in our church family coming through difficult asylum cases.
As we moved into 2026, this version of “Jesus keep me near the cross” captured exactly where I knew I needed to be and where I think that the Church needs to be.
We are at a stage where there are several dangers that the church seems to be facing. The most toxic seems to be “Christian Nationalism”. However, that to my mind is just one outworking of what is really one common theme. We have seen it in misunderstandings of sin and desire, an attempt single out one specific struggle and put it beyond the pale. We see it too in Dominion Theology, the idea that we need to have power and influence in nations. That’s the charismatic version of a reformed variant whereby we are to disciple Christian Nations.
It’s there also in the attempt to justify paedobapfism on the basis that parents are guaranteed covenant promises for their children. But, dare I say it, it’s also there in the grumbles we have seen going into 2026 that our churches don’t give enough attention to God’s transcendence
You see, in all of those discourses and debates, I see little attention to the Cross of Jesus. That’s hardly surprising given that they are pretty much attempts to apply Old Covenant themes directly to us. The result is an over realised, legalistic eschatology about the world around us and an under-realised eschatology when it comes to new covenant benefits available now.
And that is why I think we need the prayer that we find in this hymn. We need Jesus to bring us back and keep us near, as individuals, local churches and the church to his cross.
Faithroots 