Lord’s Day, Vol. 7 No. 45

All the Way My Saviour Leads Me

Psalm 37:23 The steps of a goodman are ordered by the LORD: and he delighteth in his way.

This beloved gospel hymn was the expression of gratitude to God after a direct answer to prayer. It is reported that one day Fanny Crosby desperately needed five dollars and did not know where she could obtain this amount. As was her custom, she began to pray about this matter. Within a few minutes, a stranger appeared at her door with just the right amount. “I have no way of accounting for this,” she wrote, “except to believe that God, in answer to my prayer, put it into the heart of this good man to bring the money. My first thought was, it is so wonderful that way the Lord leads me. I immediately wrote the poem and Dr. Lowry set it to music.” The hymn first appeared in a Sunday School collection, Brightest and Best, compiled by William H. Doane and Robert Lowry in 1875.

Fanny Jane Crosby was born of humble parents at Southeast, New York, on March 24, 1823. She was blinded at the age of six weeks by improper medical treatment. Throughout her lifetime she was a faithful member of the St. John Methodist EpiscopalChurch in New York City. She was educated at the New York School for the Blind. From 1847 to 1858 she served as a teacher at this school. In 1858 she married a blind musician, Alexander Van Alstyne, a highly respected teacher of music at the blind institution.

Through the influence of a well-known church musician W.N. Bradbury, she began to write gospel song lyrics in earnest and became the “happiest creature in all the land.” It is said Fanny never wrote a hymn without first kneeling in earnest prayer and asking for divine guidance.

All the way my Savior leads me
What have I to ask beside?
Can I doubt His faithful mercies?
Who through life has been my guide
Heavenly peace, divinest comfort
Ere by faith in Him to dwell
For I know whate’er fall me
Jesus doeth all things well

All of the way my Savior leads me
And He cheers each winding path I tread
Gives me strength for every trial
And He feeds me with the living bread
And though my weary steps may falter
And my soul a-thirst may be
Gushing from a rock before me
Though a spirit joy I see

And all the way my Savior leads me
Oh, the fullness of His love
Perfect rest in me is promised
In my Father’s house above
When my spirit clothed immortal
Wings it’s flight through the realms of the day
This my song through endless ages
Jesus led me all the way

[Extracted and edited from 101 Hymn Stories by Kenneth W. Osbeck]

Yours lovingly,

Pastor Lek Aik Wee