Then Sings My Soul Saturday

One of our retreat speakers this weekend is sharing what God has taught her in the midst of incredible heartache, involving the tragic death of her 21-year-old daughter and son-in-law. She has chosen two songs for us to sing surrounding her talk. One is the incredible song Blessed Be Your Name by Matt Redman. And the other is the wonderful hymn I Need Thee Every Hour.

As I was preparing the Powerpoint slides, I ran across the background of this beautiful song, written by a mom very much like each of us, albeit 136 years ago! Written by Annie Hawks, the circumstances of the song and how it ministered to its author years after she had written it are below:

"One day as a young wife and mo­ther of 37 years of age, I was bu­sy with my reg­u­lar house­hold tasks. Sud­den­ly, I be­came so filled with the sense of near­ness to the Mast­er that, won­der­ing how one could live with­out Him, ei­ther in joy or pain, these words, I Need Thee Ev­e­ry Hour, were ush­ered in­to my mind, the thought at once tak­ing full pos­sess­ion of me."
After writ­ing the lyr­ics, Hawks gave them to her pas­tor, Ro­bert Low­ry, who add­ed the tune and re­frain. The hymn was first pub­lished at the Na­tion­al Bap­tist Sun­day School Con­ven­tion in Cin­cin­na­ti, Ohio, in No­vem­ber 1872. Some years lat­er, af­ter the death of her hus­band, Hawks wrote:
"I did not un­der­stand at first why this hymn had touched the great throb­bing heart of hu­man­i­ty. It was not un­til long af­ter, when the sha­dow fell over my way, the sha­dow of a great loss, that I un­der­stood some­thing of the com­fort­ing pow­er in the words which I had been per­mit­ted to give out to others in my hour of sweet se­ren­i­ty and peace."

I'm sure it's no surprise to you that the beautiful rendition below is none other than Selah. The voice is Nicole Smith Sponberg, the sister of Todd Smith and his wife Angie. (BTW. Angie's blog about their journey in the loss of their precious baby was finally unblocked earlier this week after 10 days. They had received so many comments on her A Letter to My Daughter post that Blogger froze it to check that it wasn't a spam blog! Don't you know the Blogger folks were ministered to as they sifted through their story and the more than 700 comments!)

I NEED THEE EVERY HOUR

I need Thee every hour, most gracious Lord;
No tender voice like Thine can peace afford.

Refrain
I need Thee, O I need Thee;
Every hour I need Thee;
O bless me now, my Savior,
I come to Thee.

I need Thee every hour, stay Thou nearby;
Temptations lose their power when Thou art nigh.

Refrain

I need Thee every hour, in joy or pain;
Come quickly and abide, or life is in vain.

Refrain

I need Thee every hour; teach me Thy will;
And Thy rich promises in me fulfill.

Refrain

I need Thee every hour, most Holy One;
O make me Thine indeed, Thou blessèd Son.

Refrain

Words: Annie Hawks, 1872
Music: Robert Lowry, 1872

Amy has more songs for your soul!