My faith looks up to Thee,
Thou Lamb of Calvary, Savior divine!
Now hear me while I pray, take all my guilt away,
O let me from this day be wholly Thine!
May Thy rich grace impart
Strength to my fainting heart, my zeal inspire!
As Thou hast died for me, O may my love to Thee,
Pure warm, and changeless be, a living fire!
While life’s dark maze I tread,
And griefs around me spread, be Thou my Guide;
Bid darkness turn to day, wipe sorrow’s tears away,
Nor let me ever stray from Thee aside.
When ends life’s transient dream,
When death’s cold sullen stream over me roll;
Blest Savior, then in love, fear and distrust remove;
O bear me safe above, a ransomed soul!
About the writer: Ray Palmer, a Congregational minister, was born in Little Compton, Rhode Island in 1808. At 13 he became a clerk in a dry goods store in Boston where he joined the Park Street Congregational Church. That church’s pastor, Dr. S.E. Dwight, discerned his promise and took a deep interest in him – helping him get into Phillips Academy, Andover and later Yale College. After graduating in 1820 he moved to New York City, taking up the study of theology privately and supporting himself by teaching in a woman’s college. He taught in a young ladies’ institute at New Haven during 1832-1834, continuing his theological studies and entering the ministry at the close of this period. From 1835 to 1850 he was pastor of the Congregational Church in Bath, Maine and from 1850 to 1865 he was pastor of the First Congregational Church of Albany, New York. He served other posts but finally retired in 1878. He moved to Newark, New Jersey where he died in 1887. Between 1829 and 1881 he published eleven volumes, among them Hymns and Sacred Pieces, 1865. Julian’s Dictionary of Hymnology states that “the best of his hymns, by their combination of thought, poetry, and devotion, are superior to almost all others of American origin.”
Key Verse: That is why we live by believing and not by seeing. –2 Corinthians 5:7