The Ninety and Nine

One of my favorite hymns is "The Ninety and Nine" - it assures me that my Savior will never abandon me. The author of the words, Eliszabeth Clephane, never lived long enough to hear her words put to music. She wrote it as a poem for children in 1868. It was torn out of a religious paper by Ira D. Sankey and placed in his pocket as an afterthought. In 1874, Ira was in a rivival meeting in Edinburg Schotland with Dwight Moody. Following a powerful sermon Moody asked Ira to sing something appropriate. He thought of the poem in his pocket and pulled it out, placing it on the organ. He sang composing the song as he went - the audience was greatly moved. In fact, Ira related that "Mr. Moody was in tears, and so was I." The hymn remains unchanged to this day.

Yes, Jesus Love Me

(Taken from "The Cyber Hymnal"at www.hymntime.com)

In 1891, when Har­u­tune S. Je­nan­yan, took his wife and lit­tle daugh­ter on a per­i­lous and dan­ger­ous mis­sion­a­ry jour­ney from Tar­sus, Asia Mi­nor, the ci­ty of St. Paul, to Si­vas in Ar­men­ia, they tra­velled on horse-back through rob­ber-in­fest­ed coun­try for four­teen days. Two of the lead­ing rob­ber chiefs on that ter­ri­to­ry were Chol­lo, whose “name cast ter­ror on ev­ery side” since he had suc­cess­ful­ly evad­ed pur­su­ing Gov­ern­ment forc­es for ma­ny months, and Ka­ra Ag­ha, a fa­mous Koor­ish chief, whose name caused even the fear­some Chol­lo to trem­ble. Har­u­tune took his small par­ty di­rect­ly in­to the heart of Ka­ra Ag­ha’s coun­try, tell­ing those he met en­route that he was go­ing to be Ag­ha’s guest in his own vill­age. When they reached the bri­gand’s head-quar­ters, the mis­sion­a­ry asked that they be re­ceived as guests for the night. The sur­prised rob­ber chief gave them ac­com­mo­da­tions, en­ter­tain­ing Har­u­tune in his own spa­cious tent while his wife, Hel­ene, and their lit­tle daugh­ter, Grace were cared for in ano­ther tent by the wo­men of the vill­age. The next morn­ing, be­fore tak­ing their leave, the mis­sion­ary asked for per­miss­ion to read a por­tion of the Ho­ly Script­ure, and then of­fered a pray­er. See­ing that the chief was some­what af­fect­ed, he then said, “Do you wish to have the lit­tle child sing for you?” The chief re­plied, “Oh yes; can she?” Then lit­tle Grace, on­ly three-and-a-half years old, came for­ward and stood be­fore the tall old man and sang two songs she had re­cent­ly learned in the Sun­day School in Tar­sus, sing­ing them in the na­tive tongue, “Je­sus loves me, this I know” and “I want to be an an­gel”. The chief was so deep­ly touched, that he sent his own son, Bek­keer Ag­ha, mount­ed on a hand­some Ar­a­bi­an steed, to lead the small mis­sion­a­ry par­ty through the rest of his ter­ri­to­ry.

"His Eye Is On The Sparrow"

Early in the spring of 1905, Dr. Martin and his wife were visiting some friends in Elmira New York. The friends, a Mr. and Mrs. Dolittle were wonderful people but led very handicapped lives. Mrs. Doolittle had been bedridden for 20 years and her husband, Mr. Doolittle had to push himself in a wheel chair back and forth from his place of business. Despite their afflictions, they were happy and brought inspiration and comfort to all who knew them. During this visit, Dr. Martin asked them what was the secret of their optimistic outlook on life. Mrs. Doolittle's reply was simple: "His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me". The beauty of this simple expression of boundless faith was the inspiration for this comforting hymn.
The great Ethel Waters thought so much of the hymn that she titled her autobiography after it.

Take My Hand, Precious Lord

"Precious Lord, take my hand, lead me on, let me stand,
I am tired, I am weak, I am worn; Thru the storm, thru the night,
Lead me on to the light; Take my hand, precious Lord, Lead me home"
(from the hymn by Thomas Dorsey)

Thomas Dorsey was born just outside of Atlanta, Georgia in 1899. He grew up singing the blues and jazz and by the 1920's became nationally recognized as a leader in this new style of music.
Thomas related the following story - "In 1932, I was 32 years old and living with my wife Nettie in Chicago's south side. One August afternoon I had to go to St. Louis for a revival. Nettie was in the last month of pregnancy with our first child. I didn't want to go, something was strongly telling me to stay, but people were expecting me and I went. The next night, the crowd called on me to sing again and again. When I finally sat down, a messenger ran up with a Western Union telegram. I ripped it open and saw the words "Your wife is dead". I rushed to a phone and called home. All I could hear was "Nettie is dead". When I got back, I learned that Nettie had given birth to a boy. Yet that night, the baby had also died. I buried them both, then fell apart. For days I closeted myself. I felt that God had done me an injustice. I didn't want to serve him anymore. I was lost in grief.
A friend took me to a neighborhood music school one day and left me alone in a room with a piano. It was quiet and the late afternoon sun shined through the window. I sat at the piano and began to browse over the keys. Something happened to me. I felt at peace. I found myself playing a melody, one I've never heard or played before and words came into my head. As the word and music came to me, it seemed that my heart was also healed. I learned from that tragic experience that when we are in our deepest grief, when we feel farthest from God, this is when He is closest."
(taken from "Sing With Feeling by Robert Jay Taylor,Jr.)