Amazing Grace: A Song That Lives in the Soul

Willie Nelson: Amazing Grace

The first time I heard Amazing Grace, I was too young to understand the weight of its words, but I think I felt them. Before I knew what it meant to be lost and then found, before I knew the depth of grace, I knew the sound of it. It was always there, lingering in the background, steady as a heartbeat. My Nanny’s favorite song, the one she hummed without thinking, the one she carried with her like a quiet prayer. I can still hear it in my mind—her voice soft and unwavering, a melody worn smooth by time.

Later, it became something else entirely. A lullaby. A moment in the dark, Jamie holding our babies close, rocking them gently, his voice low and warm, singing the same words that had been sung long before either of us were here. I would stand in the doorway, barely breathing, watching, listening. There was something sacred about it—not just the song itself, but the way it belonged to us now. The way it wrapped around our children, like a thread binding the past to the present.

And then, there was Jaxon.

At just three or four years old, he started singing it back to Jamie, his little voice rising up in the same melody he’d heard so many times before. I don’t know if he understood the words then, but he knew them. He carried them. And in that moment—watching my son, so small, so full of innocence, repeating those ancient lyrics—I realized how deeply Amazing Grace had woven itself into my life. It was no longer just a song. It was a legacy, passed down without effort, without intention, just as naturally as breathing.

It’s strange how music does that, how it plants itself inside of you, how it lingers long after the moment has passed. Amazing Grace is a song that has lasted for centuries, surviving wars, loss, and change. Maybe because it was written in a storm, born from a man who had once been lost in every way a person can be lost. John Newton should have died at sea, but he didn’t. And when he made it through the wreckage, he knew—grace had spared him. Undeserved, unearned, but given anyway.

Maybe that’s why it’s endured. Because at some point, we all come to understand that kind of grace.

I have heard Amazing Grace sung so many different ways. Dolly Parton, Aretha Franklin, Elvis. But Willie Nelson’s version is the one that stays with me. His voice is different from all the others—where some take the song to church, Willie brings it home. His voice is worn, familiar, steady as an old Texas road. He doesn’t try to elevate the song. He just lets it be. There’s something about the way he sings it that settles deep inside me, something that feels less like a performance and more like a memory.

And perhaps that’s why I keep coming back to it—because I grew up in Texas, and Willie Nelson is stitched into the fabric of home. Maybe it’s because my parents listened to his records, because my Granny liked his music, because his voice is woven into my roots, even before I knew it. But, when Willie sings Amazing Grace, I don’t just hear it—I feel it. A slow, quiet pull in my chest, a memory rising up from somewhere long forgotten. The first strum of his guitar settles low in my stomach, and then his voice comes in—unrushed, unpolished, real. It’s the kind of voice that makes you stop, makes you close your eyes, makes you take a deep breath you didn’t even know you needed. The kind of voice that doesn’t just carry a song—it carries a life lived, a road traveled, a soul weathered but steady.

And somehow his version reminds me of Jamie’s voice. Not in sound—but in feeling. Jamie, singing our babies to sleep, his voice filling the space between us like something ancient, something magical, something real.

And then came Gracie.

Our Amazing Gracie.

We didn’t know what life had in store for us in 2023. We didn’t know that in the middle of grief, change, and uncertainty, we would find out that we were being given a new light. A baby. A daughter. A piece of grace in human form.

Because that’s what she was. That’s what she is. A light. A reminder. The kind of grace that finds you when you need it most, even if you don’t realize it at the time.

When Jamie held her for the first time, I knew—Amazing Grace would be the first song she ever heard him sing.

Her presence mended the unseen fractures within us, stitching together the fabric of our hearts with threads of newfound joy. She taught us to find wonder in the mundane, to cherish the present, and to see the world through unclouded eyes. Gracie didn’t just enter our lives; she transformed them, reminding us of the boundless grace we hadn’t realized we were yearning for.

It’s strange how something as simple as a song can become part of the foundation of a family, how it can weave itself into the quietest moments, the most unexpected places. It was there when my Nanny hummed it in the kitchen. It was there when Jamie rocked our babies in the dark. It was there when Jaxon, barely old enough to understand what he was singing, lifted his tiny voice and filled the air with it. And it was there in Gracie’s name, in the miracle of her presence, in the way she became the light we didn’t know we needed.

 Amazing Grace has lasted through the centuries—because grace is never really one moment. It is always unfolding, always moving, always finding a way back into our lives.

It was there in my Nanny’s voice, humming in the background of my childhood.

It was there in Jamie’s lullabies, sung to all three of our babies.

It was there in Jaxon’s tiny voice, repeating the words before he even knew what they meant.

And it was there in Gracie, in the way she arrived at exactly the right time.

Amazing Grace isn’t just a song to me.



It’s our song. It’s a story. A prayer. A thread through time.