SONG WRITER: Sarah Adams
MUSIC WRITER: Lowell Mason
WHEN WRITTEN: 1841
HYMN HISTORY: This hymn was written by two sisters. Sarah
Flower Adams wrote the words and her sister, Eliza Flower, wrote the
music. Together they wrote a number of hymns, but this is the only one
still in common use today.
Sarah (the author of the words) enjoyed a successful
career on the stage playing Lady MacBeth in Shakespearean drama, but retired
from the stage due to health problems. Not long thereafter, her sister,
Eliza, came down with tuberculosis. Sarah, determined to nurse her, came
down with the disease as well, and both died at a relatively young age.
However, this hymn acknowledges the possibility of
suffering but refuses to allow it to have the last word. It says:
"E'en though it be
a cross
that raiseth me;
Still all my song shall be,
nearer my God to Thee."
that raiseth me;
Still all my song shall be,
nearer my God to Thee."
BIBLE VERSE: Psalm 119:151 – “But you are near, O Lord, and all your commandments are true.”
HYMN LYRICS:
Nearer, my God,
to thee, nearer to thee!
E'en though it
be a cross that raiseth me,
still all my
song shall be,
nearer, my God,
to thee;
nearer, my God,
to thee, nearer to thee!
Though like the
wanderer, the sun gone down,
darkness be over
me, my rest a stone;
yet in my dreams
I'd be
nearer, my God,
to thee;
nearer, my God,
to thee, nearer to thee!
There let the
way appear, steps unto heaven;
all that thou
sendest me, in mercy given;
angels to beckon
me
nearer, my God,
to thee;
nearer, my God,
to thee, nearer to thee!
Then, with my
waking thoughts bright with thy praise,
out of my stony
griefs Bethel I'll raise;
so by my woes to
be
nearer, my God,
to thee;
nearer, my God,
to thee, nearer to thee!
Or if, on joyful
wing cleaving the sky,
sun, moon, and
stars forgot, upward I fly,
still all my
song shall be,
nearer, my God,
to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee,
nearer to thee!
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