Who is Fanny J. Crosby?

Fanny J. Crosby – Week7Blog Holiday

I guess you could say I haven’t been on a blogging holiday – because I just have to put up Word of God Speak every week. Thanks to the wonderful bloggers who link faithfully. This week I found a fascinating woman named Fanny J. Crosby.

Fanny J. Crosby

A pastor friend lent me a book called 101 More Hymn Stories.

From 1870 until she died Fanny wrote over 8000 hymns. When I read that I was astounded. I was searching for “Blessed Assurance” and found that Fanny wrote that. But as I read I found a great story about a hymn called “Saved by Grace”. I had never heard of that one. Both Ira D. Sankey and Dwight Li. Moody used this song in their services almost every week. It is all about being saved by grace.

The chorus says:

And I shall see Him face to face, And tell the story – Saved by grace,
And I shall see Him face to face, And tell the story – Saved by grace,

The story goes that Fanny wrote it, sent it to her publisher, was paid the regular $2 and then nothing was done for three years. One day at a conference she was asked to speak and she used the words of this song. It made an impact but Fanny decided just to use it when she was asked to speak. Not knowing of her decision a reporter had taken the words in shorthand and published them in a periodical. It was put to music and the song spread.

A tribute to Fanny J. Crosby:

There was probably no writer in her day who appealed more to the valued experiences of the Christian life or who expressed, more sympathetically, the deep longings of the heart than did Fanny Crosby. ~ George Stebbins, 1924

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7 comments

  1. I love the way Fanny Crosby thanked God for the way her blindness drove her to His heart. There are things that have driven me to God’s heart, hard things, but I’ve not always been thankful for them.

    1. Elizabeth,
      What a profound statement. Yes we tend to moan when circumstances don’t go our way – but then see blessings later and forget to thank God for them. Thank you.
      Blessings,
      Janis

  2. I read a biography of Fanny Crosby. Like Corrie Ten Boom she let God work through her circumstances. Her life and the hymns she wrote are an inspiration.

  3. Fanny Crosby’s story is so inspiring! Here’s a poem she wrote as a child on her blindness:
    Oh, what a happy soul I am,
    Although I cannot see,
    I am resolved that in this world
    Contented I will be.

    How many blessings I enjoy
    That other people don’t
    To weep and sigh because I’m blind
    I cannot nor I won’t.

    There’s a lot of wisdom there!

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